Kennedy en de Rooms-Katholieke Kerk

Samenvatting

James C. Kennedy's description of the developments in the Dutch Roman Catholic churches of the 1960s in Nieuw Babylon in aanbouw: Nederland in de jaren zestig ([Building New Babylon: The Netherlands in the Sixties] 1995) is criticized & related to his preference for strictly national perspectives & for a homogeneous definition of "elites" as described in his "New Babylon and the Politics of Modernity" (1997 [see abstract 9811103]). Arguing that the Dutch Catholic Church cannot be viewed separately from the international & hierarchical organization of which it is a part, the effects of the Second Vatican Council (1959-1965) are described. Subsequently, the influence of relatively progressive theologians, who advised the traditionally practically oriented Dutch bishops in issues related to the Second Vatican Council & who later had a big role in the democratic national Pastoral Council, is discussed. These differences between modern theologians & more conservative clerics indicated a heterogeneous elite in which the "protest generation," according to Kennedy the main proponents of the new ideas of the 1960s, did not play a role. 7 References. Adapted from the source document.