Tom McMahon begins a new series today. It's a retrospective on the The Documents of Vatican II. Not so much an historical analysis of the documents themselves as a reflection back on how they influenced his life and the lives of others around him.

A series on the Documents of Vatican II…

With this commentary I begin a series on the Documents of Vatican Two.

The Editor's 1967 Reprint Edition looks as weathered as the copy Tom McMahon describes in this commentary. Love the price on it: $1.65! Click image to enlarge.

A reader will not experience a formal treatise that follows slavishly the 16 documents as published by Walter M. Abbott S.J. in 1966. My copy of Abbott's book is worn and ragged from use; what I offer in the forthcoming months will be stories and lived experiences concerning the history of the Roman Catholic Church, its woes and joys, and its present advances and setbacks in its struggle to implement the mind of Vatican Two. I was 8 years ordained and 33 years old when John the 23rd called together the Second Vatican Council. Many of the ideas herein center around men with whom I was ordained in 1954 and who have ministered in virtually two different churches for 45 years. Mine has been the privilege of discovering where Jesus had risen from chaos.

I begin to write this at 8.41am on Tuesday, June 22, 2010. For the past hour I have been experiencing a drifting in and out of history and present moment, really not knowing which way this commentary will go. I have the immediate awareness that I am to drive one of our 78-year-old female faith-community members to the doctor, 60 miles round trip, and possibly tonight to take the train to a wake service of a classmate, we once 13-year-old boys who entered seminary in 1942 and were ordained together in San Francisco. When I return to this writing I will have partially processed 68 years of two churches that have moved into the Modern World as viewed by two old friends who took radically different paths. Both of us were ordained before the name of John the 23rd was widely known. Both are depression kids; both 12 year seminary men. Both have spent a lifetime in the pursuit of the Mystery called God.

I was away from home for two days, up to our mountain chalet at 7000 ft, at peace with the idea of my Creator having fashioned all this High Sierra beauty for us humans to enjoy. In the forest tranquillity, I have a faith experience of God in creation. I had not a care in the world, surely not occupied with heaven or hell or my eternal salvation.

Turning on my computer early Tuesday morning I saw the news of the death of Fr. Ronald Burke. A 7am phone call to fellow classmate John Kelly confirmed the news and the wheels of my brain began to spin in recall.

I'll date this diary of my thinking. Classmate John spent 25 years in institutional ministry; today John volunteers (ministers) in education at San Quentin prison, a simple friend of the incarcerated. John masterminded the founding of Samaritan House, an outreach to the less fortunate in well endowed San Mateo. (In my opinion John is the best priest ever ordained from my seminary. When he finished his last Mass in front of the congregation, who loved him, John took off his cassock and in his beautiful baritone sang "Born Free".)

The "toxic glue" of guilt...

9.29pm, Tuesday June 22nd: I prudently talked myself out of an evening train ride to San Bruno, a distance of 50 miles — old men should not be out late at night, alone! I shall be teaching my Senior Health Class tomorrow as Ron's funeral takes place. It will be the first classmates funeral I have missed in 40 years. At first I confused sadness to a long forgotten guilt; my sadness is for my classmate as he rarely enjoyed life — the whole of Ron's life consumed in attempting to save peoples' souls. For Ron work was an obsession and he had no time for himself. Guilt, as I have explained to people since Vatican Two in 1965, is a toxic glue that binds one to the past and unchristian ways of life put on us perhaps from early childhood. Guilt is telltale that one has not matured into self-determination and adulthood. I shall explain my sadness as I address the issue of a celibate priest having only his work as a way of life. John and myself struggled to grow as human beings, a formidable task when one has been trained the opposite in 12 years of seminary.

Fr Ronald Burke Photo from the Obituary published in the San Francisco Chronicle

I have not yet seen Ron's obituary [LINK] as I get the San Francisco Chronicle only on weekends. I am told Ron is referred to as a River Rat … and does this rattle the barnacles of my memory. Ron had three sisters, lovely young females who enjoyed life and companionship 'UP' the Russian River, commonly called in the 1930's and '40's The Poor Man's Tahoe; the place crawled with Roman Catholics, firemen and police from Baghdad by the Bay. My uncle was pastor of five summer churches along the Russian River, missions from which he derived enough income to sustain the parish all year; in the winter of 1936 his Sunday collection might be $3.45. During early seminary Ron was the one fellow I thought who would never make it based on the number of girl friends he had and who often sent him mail in the seminary with a lipstick SWAK on back. So tells me classmate Msgr. Leo McFadden of Reno fame … sealed with a kiss. Read in Greg McAllister's masterful analysis of our seminary training "Priest Pedophiles—Manichaean Candidates?" [LINK] how the future priest was groomed for a planned exit of the female for his entire life.

In seminary Ron Burke walked with fellow student after dinner learning and speaking Spanish, a language that would lead him out of the United States to ministry in Mexico, Guatemala and El Salvador. While in Central America Ron became a native, literally by-passing the age of technology in America and becoming deeply immersed in native customs of devotion to Mary and her appearances to indigenous peoples. Twice annually Ron began to send to his classmates, the Menlo Men of '54, letters filled with how to convert Russia from communism and to save the world from hell, fire and brimstone.

Ron's exit from El Salvador was hastily arranged by the United States State Department when his name was found on a assassination slip of paper in the dead hand of his chief catechist. Armed State Department personnel, one of whom had been a convert to Catholicism when Ron was in Morgan Hill, California, hustled Ron aboard a US military plane. Our small faith community had Ron share his experience, we fast becoming aware that Vatican Two played no role in my classmate's life.

The Menlo Men of '54 once 33 in number, and stationed in seven different dioceses, have met yearly, quietly watching the influence of Vatican Two as it offered education and opportunity to serve the Lord in new ways. Now 14 we hope to meet this summer in Reno, Nevada to memorialize our dead brothers and to renew our friendships. We remain strong in bond as death decreases our numbers. I have written about them/us for 30 years, admiring our goodness and gentle steadfastness to what each deems "the call from God". Ron went far distant from this. Tom McMahon who went to extremes on the other side of reform. We remained brothers, respecting our differences and holding fast to that initial call we felt as we entered the seminary in 1942. All the men with whom I was ordained were good human beings; little did we know in 1942 what a tsunami of change would catch us off guard in a Church that badly needed reform. We were men in no way prepared for our medieval Church to meet the Modern World.

Next Week: I will send along the story of John who was recently buried with high honors from the church he built as active pastor; John's three sons gave the homily. Never did I think I would live to see the day. More on Greg McAllister's paper soon.

Tom McMahon in San Jose. Ca. reporting on the express train of modern church racing along. 29/06/2010

©2010 Tom McMahon

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