Non-Catholic Influence At Vatican II

We've spoken a bit about the non-Catholic "observers" who were invited to the Council. As you read through the ongoing (really, it is) series about Vatican II, I pull a lot from Robert McAffee Brown, who was one of those very guys.

On a similar note, Rorate has put up a bit about an article published that attempts to quantify how much influence non-Catholic groups actually had, albeit indirectly. No surprise, it looks to have been quite a bit.

A new analysis of voting patterns among bishops at the Second Vatican Council points to the indirect influence of non-Catholic churches in the Council’s liberalization of the Catholic Church.

Melissa Wilde, an associate professor of sociology in the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, led a team of researchers that investigated data from the Vatican Secret Archive to determine the critical factors influencing how bishops voted at the Second Vatican Council.

Their findings are outlined in “Religious Economy or Organizational Field? Predicting Bishops’ Votes at the Second Vatican Council,” published in the August issue of American Sociological Review.

The researchers found that the relationship between the church and state as well as changes in the institution’s situation in relation to other institutions, particularly a loss of dominance and the presence of and relationship with other religious institutions, were crucial factors in predicting whether religious leaders would be open to change and also what kinds of change they would prioritize.

I haven't read the article, but I'm going to try and get my hands on a copy. Sounds like interesting stuff.