ordered a reform of Canon Law, which had been codified for the first and, to that date, only time in 1917. In 1983, twenty-five years after Pope John’s mandate, Church law was finally recodified, though basically unaltered from its former content.
A phenomenon called “The Spirit of Vatican II” emerged just before the first session of the Council was convened. It swelled during the duration of the Council and continued well after the Council was concluded. The “spirit” was not necessarily identical with the Council itself.
At the Council’s close, the conclusions of the bishop-participants were spelled out in sixteen officially promulgated texts. In them the liturgy was dramatically changed. Ancillary documents contained heady language, such as defining the Church as “the people of God”—creating the impression that there was an element of democracy at the root of the Church.
But, as time passed, practice proved that the functioning Church was still that same old triangle with the Pope on top, the bishops well below him, the priests making up the next inferior level, and the good old “people of God” constituting the ground floor.
Of somewhat greater impact and of greater interest was the elusive “spirit” of the council. It was an emotion. It was an attitude. It was self-startingly motivational. It paralleled the “spirit of change” that marked relevant youth and adults in America in the sixties and seventies. It swept up, among others, Charlie Hogan. Charlie became a statistic, one of the thousands to leave the priesthood.
Neither Pope John, who convened the Council, nor Pope Paul VI, who concluded it, nor the bishops, who wrote the conciliar documents, could have foreseen this unique worldwide exodus—so many priests and nuns leaving their religious vocations.
They could not foresee it because it was not a logical conclusion of the Council, but of the “spirit” of the Council, which came to expect of the Council much more than it delivered. No sooner was the Council concluded than did the official Church begin digging in its heels trying to resist the changes promised by the “spirit” of the Council.
This official demand for obedience and retention of the status quo flew in the face of a spirit of adventure, experimentation, and freedom. This dilemma was the main contributing factor that helped propel thousands of priests and nuns into the lay job market.
Shortly after Hogan made his decision to leave, he phoned Koesler and made an appointment to meet him for dinner. The priest was more than a little surprised when Hogan arrived with a female companion. Koesler and Hogan had dined together often, especially in the six years Charlie had been a priest. Sometimes they had dined alone, sometimes with others. But never with anyone other than priests and almost always all had worn clerical garb. Koesler felt a little awkward seeing Charlie in civvies and with a woman in tow.
Hogan introduced her as Lil Schulte. As the evening progressed, it became evident to Koesler that she soon would be Lil Hogan. They were not unlike other engaged couples Koesler had known. But he was unfamiliar with an engaged couple one of whom was a priest.
Over drinks, salad, and entree, they told Koesler how they’d met and fallen in love. As they conversed, Koesler at first toyed with, then totally discarded, the idea of talking them out of marriage. It was obviously too late for that.
Both Charlie and Lil were activists. Drop a social problem area and they were involved in it. Racial justice, housing, the poor and elderly, peace, the environment, and so on. The “spirit” of Vatican II had led both into the active life. Their common interests had brought them together so often they had become friends. The questioning “spirit” of the Council had led them to wonder what was so exalted about the single life, particularly when two people loved each other.
Push came to shove as Charlie’s pastor first objected to, then flatly forbade Hogan to get involved in extra- parochial matters. According to the pastor, there were plenty of problems in the parish—“and this is your assignment, Father”—without going all over kingdom come looking for trouble.
The Chancery was reluctant to act on Charlie’s request for an assignment that would free him to get involved in larger questions. In those days, it was still a seller’s market and priests were pretty well expected to go where they were sent and not go looking for anything extraneous. Much later, and as a direct result of the departing Charlie Hogan’s, priestly assignments would slip into a buyer’s market. And priests would have much more to say about their own duties.
“So,” said Hogan over dessert, “that’s about how it stands.”
“And you and Lil?” Koesler stirred his coffee, trying to cool it.
“We plan on getting married. But God knows when.”
“What’s the problem?”
“Problems!” Hogan corrected. “First off, I’ve still got this obligation of celibacy. I’ve applied for laicization, but that’s a chancey procedure. It almost depends on how Pope Paul happens to feel on any given day whether Rome grants these requests to return to the lay state.”
Koesler was pleased that Hogan was going through the laicization process. A goodly number of departing priests were not bothering with it. Later, dispensations would be delayed or denied seemingly as a matter of whim. Much later, under another Pope, dispensations would be virtually eliminated.
“What about the other ‘problem’?”
Hogan winced. “Finances! Life gets mighty tough when Holy Mother Church removes her breast from your mouth.”
Koesler glanced at Lil. She wasn’t blushing. He wondered if he was. “That’s right. You’ve got to get a job, don’t you?”
“Only if we want to eat.”
“How about you, Lil: Are you working?”
“Only as a volunteer, and at that not very often, Bob.”
Ordinarily, Koesler preferred the use of his title, “Father,” with the obvious exception of family, extremely close friends, and of course, his colleagues in the priesthood. Although it was new to him, another obvious exception would be the wife, or future wife, of a priest.
“She’s working on her master’s in social work in graduate school,” Hogan explained. “Her parents are financing her education. At least they have been until now. We haven’t told them about us. They’re pretty traditional Catholics. I’m afraid if they knew, they’d disown Lil. It’s got to happen sometime, but it’d be better later than sooner.”
“Even if you get laicized? If they knew you were trying to follow Church law . . .”
“I don’t think it would make much difference. We’ve heard them talk about it before. According to them, if the Church doesn’t let people get unmarried, it shouldn’t let priests get unpriested.”
“But,” Koesler objected, “the indissolubility of marriage is divine law. Celibacy is Church law. If there’s a real marriage, the Church can’t do anything about dissolving it because that’s God’s law. But the Church can do anything it wants about its own laws. If the Pope decides to dispense you from your obligations as a priest, he can certainly do it. Why would any Catholic object to that? Especially traditional Catholics; they, above all, should rubber-stamp whatever the Pope does.”
“You’re right of course, Bob,” Lil said. “And I don’t know what it is with my parents. Just a blind spot, I guess. But they come down hard on priests who leave. That’s just the way it is.”
“Well, then,” Koesler said, “how far away are you from your degree?”
“I’ve got most of my hours in. It’s mostly the practicum that’s left.”
“And then you’ll have an income. Won’t that begin to take care of the financial problem?”
“Bob,” Hogan said, “I’m not going to live off my wife’s earnings! Besides, we want a family. When that happens, there’ll be only one income, and it’ll be mine.”
After a moment’s silence, Koesler said, “If you could use a loan, Charlie . . .”
Hogan grinned. “Thanks, Bob, that’s real thoughtful of you. But what you could afford to loan us would be a hardship on you and wouldn’t begin to take care of our needs. No, I’ve got some savings; that should tide me over till I get steady work. We’re not in desperate straits. It’s just that for a couple of good reasons, we’re not able to get married yet.”
“Well, isn’t there anything I can do? How about your job hunt? How’s that going?”
“I guess as well as can be expected. All those years in the seminary didn’t prepare me for the job market. Well, to be fair, they weren’t supposed to. It’s just that neither business nor industry has any great need for a
