| Author Quoted | Michael Serafian |
| Title Quoted | Pilgrim: Pope Paul VI, & the Church in Time of Decision / pseudonym of Malachi Martin |
| Date (Year/Month/Day) | 1964/06/30 |
| Imprint | [S.l.] : Michael Joseph. 1964 |
| Quotation | How badly we need a real spirit of liberty in the Church, it is vitally necessary and the whole Church depends on it. Thank God "Serafian" has had the courage and good sense to admit and state frankly that so far the Council has dealt in relative trivialities! The problems that are largely irrelevant to the world at large, problems that are generated by gratuitously adopted and formalistic attitudes of the Church herself-incrustations of her own history. "The irrelevancy of the problems which Catholicism considers fundamental and over which it has consumed itself in two long, expensive sessions is an offshoot of the Church's attitude to humanity." Bull's eye! |
| Quotation Source | Dancing in the Water of Life: Seeking Peace in the Hermitage. The Journals of Thomas Merton, Volume 5, 1963-1965.; Edited by Robert E. Daggy. / San Francisco : Harper Collins. 1997, p. 122 |
| Letter to | |
| Notes | |
| Link to Merton's Copy |
(If there is a link above showing up as a number, click it to open another window with a full text version.) |