Reform the Church "in head and members." Such was the great cry during most of the 1400s and early 1500s. Over the twenty centuries of the life of our Church such reform, when it has taken place, has been advanced by two means: assemblies and visitations. Assemblies include councils and synods, pastoral gatherings and parish councils, and presbyteral assemblies, among others. Visitations include papal visits, nuncios and legates, episcopal visits of parishes, pastoral visitations of parishioners among others. A brief examination of some examples of these reforming tools in Church History will set the stage for some applications for our own day and for the ministry of parish priests. Before that, however, it is necessary to define what is meant by reform.

In the medieval period, there were many calls for reform in the Church. The popes regularly called ecumenical councils for the purposes of raising a crusade against the Muslims, of restoring peace (if there was a state of war) or restoring Christian unity (with the Orthodox), and of reforming the Church. Regarding this last aim, the second Council of Lyons (1274 AD, #1) declared: "We proposed also a reform of morals, which have become corrupt owing to the sins of both clergy and people." The Council of Basel (1433, Session XII) also highlighted reform: "Just as in building a house the architect’s chief concern is to lay such a foundation that the edifice built on it will endure immovable, so in the general reformation of the Church the principal preoccupation of this holy synod is that the pastors set over the Church may be such that, like pillars and bases, they will firmly uphold the church by the strength of their doctrine and merits." Even the first session of the Council of Trent (1545) called for the "uprooting of heresies, for the peace and unity of the Church, for the reform of the clergy and the Christian people, for the crushing and complete removal of the enemies of the Christian name…." Finally, the Second Vatican Council summoned the Church to renewal. Within the call to universal holiness, the council asked the members of the Church: "All Catholics must therefore aim at Christian perfection…that the Church…may be daily more purified and renewed…" (#4 Ecumenism). This same document on Ecumenism (#6) continued: "Every renewal of the Church essentially consists in an increase of fidelity to the Church’s own calling…. In its pilgrimage on earth Christ summons the Church to continual reformation, of which it is always in need, in so far as it is an institution of human beings here on earth. Thus, if, in various times and circumstances, there have been deficiencies in moral conduct or in Church discipline, or even in the way the Church teaching has been formulated—to be carefully distinguished from the deposit of faith itself—these should be set right in the proper way at the opportune moment."

Therefore, to seek reform in the Church is to conform the members of the Church to Christ, to have all seek holiness, to correct immoral behaviors and to promote what Paul in his pastoral letters describes as Sound Doctrine, which is always more than just teachings; it is Christian behavior informed by the truth. While it is not said in the Scriptures, the conciliar legislation lays a great deal of the obligation to conform to Christ at the feet of the clergy. To reform the Church in head and members requires the clergy, in particular, to reform.

How then has the Church conducted this kind of reform in the past and what can this history say about how we, as parish priests, should bring about the reform of the Church in our own parishes? Jesus demonstrates a method for this Christification of the People of God. He gathered together a group, his disciples and apostles among them. This assembling was the occasion for him to teach them, to love them, to feed them, to exhort them. While there certainly were many opportunities, no doubt, for socializing with these groups of people, the Scriptures record their gatherings as primarily times for Jesus to feed his people, with word and sacrament. But Jesus also knew that the reform of the Church and the World would require his apostles to go out, to visit the world, as he charged them at the end of Matthew’s gospel.

The Apostles continued this same kind of activity. The Acts of the Apostles records the trips of Peter and Paul, of Philip and Bartholomew. Paul was very conscious, by his visits and letters, to make sure that the people in his charge were adhering to the Gospel he preached and not following after false teachers; and that their lives manifested the truth they held. In addition, the Acts of the Apostles records the gatherings of the community, to share what they had in common, to break the bread, and, in chapter 15, to provide conciliar guidance to the Pauline mission. These two scriptural modes of spreading Gospel living, that of visiting and that of gathering, have continued in Church History.

Now we turn to four examples: the Carolingian Reforms of the 700-800s, the Gregorian Reform of the 1100s, the Tridentine Reform of the 1500-1600s, and the Vatican Two Reform of this past half century.

From 750 A.D. on the Franks, under the leadership of Pepin the Short, his son, Charles the Great, his son, Louis the Pious, and his son, Charles the Bald until his death in 877, worked toward the reform of the Church. The Franks had already developed quite a habit of holding local Church councils to effect these reforms. The series in the 500s, mostly held in Orleans, dealt with Church property and the true teachings on the Trinity, all in the face of the presence of Arianism. For the personal reform of the faithful, the Council of Chalon in 650 recommended the use of private confession, a recent import from Ireland and England. In addition the work of Boniface during the early 700s, through his holding of councils throughout the Frankish realm and through his missionary visitations to Germany and Frisia, was critical in the reform and spread of the faith and its practice.

Once, however, Pepin the Short was designated as King of the Franks around 750 and especially due to the close link established between these new Carolingian rulers and the papacy, the French kings had a keener sense of their responsibility for the welfare of the Church. Their realm, especially as it was extended by Charlemagne, began to resemble and was called Christendom. Some sixteen major royal synods were held during the century following Pepin’s elevation. Charlemagne’s Council of Frankfort in 794 established diocesan boundaries, determined that clergy would be tried in Church courts, and emphasized the role of Bishops as responsible for their priests. Charles, in fact, was constantly seeking the reform of the priests through the reform of the bishops. Near the end of his life, he summoned the bishops to Aachen in 813 for one last attempt. He was quite angry at the many failures of the bishops and asked them, "Are you really Christians?" Charlemagne’s most important Church legislation was the Admonitio Generalis resulting from the gathering at Aachen in 789. Some 82 articles were promulgated including 60 dealing with clerical behavior. In fact, most of these reform synods dealt with clerical reform. They required that bishops be absent from their sees for no more than three weeks a year, a canon which has been repeated time and again over the centuries. Bishops were to be able to read the Scriptures, comment on them, know the canons and Gregory’s Pastoral Rule, preach in the vernacular, tour the diocese regularly, recruit good clergy and reform the existing ones, establish cathedral schools, and copy authentic liturgical texts. This legislation urged priests to live a common life if they were assigned to the cathedral parish, to have a modicum of learning--that they be able to say and understand the Our Father and the Creed and be able to explain these basic texts to the people—and to live rightly. To the people of God, the synods addressed these concerns: that the Sabbath rest be enforced; that superstition be restricted, that the laity avoid incest, adultery, murder, etc. In addition to all this, the Frankish rulers directed a reform of the liturgy, fundamentally by seeking uniformity and correctness in the liturgical books. Exact copies of Roman texts of Scriptures, Sacramentaries, Lectionaries, Homilaries, Antiphonaries, Penitentials were made. Often these new copies included some additional Frankish and Irish liturgical elements which had already become standards in the kingdom. This Frankish liturgical practice then made its way back to Rome and became part of the Roman Liturgy. Louis the Pious saw his greatest impact in the arena of monastic reform. His synods promoted the reform of Benedictine houses, emphasizing that they be places of liturgy and prayer. While this did create an imbalance as time went on, weakening the "labora" aspect of the monks’ life, nonetheless, the reform called the monasteries back to genuine piety and led to a rapid increase in vocations to the vowed life.

The Carolingians’ second great means of reforming the religious life of Christendom was by the missi dominici, those sent out by the king. Charlemagne described them this way in his Capitulary of 802: "The most serene and most Christian emperor Charles did choose from among his nobles the most prudent and the wisest of men—archbishops as well as other bishops, and venerable abbots, and pious laymen—and did send them over his whole kingdom; and did grant through them, by means of all the following provisions, that men should live according to law and right." The entire Frankish realm was divided into counties, of various sizes. In the counties resided a count, as the civil leader, and usually a bishop or abbot, as the religious leader. Oftentimes, both of these leaders where relatives of the Carolingians ruling over peoples of different ethnic origins. Over a grouping of counties were placed a nobleman and a cleric, who were designated as missi, those sent by the king. Usually they were themselves counts, bishops, or abbots in other counties in the realm. Thus they did not reside in or rule over this grouping of counties. Rather they were expected to visit the counties under their care, make sure that the rules of the king were being implemented, settle disputes, especially those between the civil and religious leaders, and reinforce the authority of the king. These missi were critical for the reform of Christendom. The enactments of the synods and councils would have been dead letters without the followup of these pastoral and civil visitations.

All these reforms led to a revival of learning, theology, and culture during the Carolingian age. However, the chaos of the later 800s and 900s, with invasions by Vikings, Magyars, and Muslims, together with the constant divisions of the realm into ever smaller units, and the control of the papacy by local families, all served to undo many of the reforms put in place.

The second major event dealing with Church reform was the great Gregorian Reform of the eleventh century. The young Hildebrand first entered the papal service at the age of 22 in 1045. He witnessed the disorder of the Church, racked as she was by two anti-popes. It was, at first, just as in the case of the Carolingians, a civil leader, King Henry III who brought order to the Church by means of a council, Sutri, in 1045. The king himself had been instituting Church reforms in Germany, particularly attacking simony. He and the pope began a few synods to inculcate these reforms in the broader Church. However, a series of German popes were felled by the Italian malaria and it was not until Leo IX was designated by Henry as pope in 1049 that serious reform began. This commenced when the new pope accepted the papacy only on the condition that the Romans accept him as their bishop. Leo then brought in reformers from present-day Alsace Lorraine and made them cardinals, turning a mostly liturgical office into a chief advisory position. Hildebrand was appointed administrator of St. Paul’s Outside the Walls.

Pope Leo’s major vehicle for reform was the local council. His Council at Reims in France in 1049 began the project of requiring canonical elections for bishops; their being named by a secular prince or king was no longer sufficient. For him, the reform of the Church was tied to the independence of the Church from lay control. This pope made three long journeys beyond the Alps during his six year reign holding synods in all the major centers to promote this cause. Besides his struggles against simony and lay control of the Church, he also sought the restoration of a chaste celibacy for the clergy. In addition, these synods condemned the charging of fees for burials, baptisms, Eucharist, or visiting the sick. They also called on the laity to avoid bigamy, incest, and defrauding the poor. The Council of Mainz was reported at the time in this way: "In that council a certain bishop of Speyer, Sibico, who was accused of the crime of adultery was cleared by sacrificial ordeal. Moreover many things were decreed there for the good of the Church and, above all, simoniacal heresy and the evil of clerical marriage were forever condemned by the signatures of the council."

The rather contested election of Nicholas II in 1059 by the cardinals demonstrated to the pope the real dangers of simony—lay control of the choice of bishops, including the Bishop of Rome. This hit at the root of the freedom of the Church. Thus Nicholas held a synod at Rome that very year and regularized the process of papal elections for the first time: "When the pontiff of this universal Roman Church dies the cardinal bishops shall first confer together most diligently concerning the election; next they shall summon the other cardinal clergy; and then the rest of the clergy and the people shall approach to give their assent to the new election, the greatest care being taken lest the evil of venality creep in by any way whatsoever…. They shall make their choice from the members of this church if a suitable man is to be found there, but if not they shall take one from another church." This same synod forbade clergy to receive a benefice from a layperson. Pope Nicholas named Hildebrand the Archdeacon of the Roman Church, traditionally the chief advisor of the pope and often a capable papal candidate himself.

Alexander II (1061-1073) succeeded Nicholas and began a continuous series of synods in France from 1063, then in England after 1066, soon also in Germany and northern Spain. Hildebrand was elected pope in 1073 as Gregory VII by popular acclamation. His struggles with Henry IV of Germany were so contentious that little in the way of reform was accomplished except by those forces throughout Europe which were already actively set in motion. However, his first two synods at Rome (1074 and 1075) reasserted the condemnations of simony, lay control, and violations of celibacy. Gregory too sent out many legates to promote reforms, something that had not been widely used by popes before. This was another tool of visitation.

A third example of Church reform followed upon the Tridentine Council of the 1500s. Attendees struggled to focus the council on either clarifying Catholic teaching or promoting genuine reform. When it first opened under Paul III in 1545, the pontiff emphasized teaching in the face of various heresies. However, in the long run, as the Church historian, Hubert Jedin, has stated, a new sense of pastoral care came out of the council and that reformed the Church. A key element of this care, Jedin noted, was raising standards for the clergy. The chief method of enacting this new legislation was the establishment of permanent papal nuncios throughout Europe during the 1500’s. This institutionalized the ministry of Peter visiting the flock. In addition, the council itself called for frequent visits by bishops of their dioceses and the holding of synods. As is commonly known, one of the major changes was the establishment of the seminary system. Now certainly these elements of reform of the Church were tinged by the movement of counter-reform against Protestantism. This is not the time or place to evaluate the positive and negative results of the council. Suffice it to say that both existed, in abundance.

One of the reforms of the Council was a call for better preaching, especially urging bishops to be teachers and preachers, something Vatican II highly emphasized. The ideal preacher was one who loved the truth, who was faithful to Scripture, who interpreted Scripture according to the Fathers, who had a pastoral care for souls, and who avoided error. This decree was approved in 1546, one of the first. This first period of the council ended in 1548.

Pope Julius III, in 1551, opened the second period which lasted less than a year; while some reform legislation was passed, most of the year was spent dealing with the Sacrament of Penance and the Sacrifice of the Mass. Ten years later, Pius IV convoked the third period of the council in 1562. In 1563 the council promulgated a decree on Orders labeling it a matter of divine precept that the priest know his flock. At the same time seminaries were called for and bishops were required to hold yearly synods in their dioceses and provincial councils every three years. The council finally concluded in 1564.

The promulgation of the dogmatic and disciplinary reforms of Trent varied greatly throughout Europe. St. Peter Canisius, SJ, was sent the next year into Germany to carry copies of the decrees to the resident bishops and urge their implementation. Pius V also sent Cardinal Commendone as Nuncio to Germany and Poland in the late 1560s for this purpose. However reform was slow since only one provincial council was held in Empire before 1600 and few after that. Some diocesan synods did take place. It really took the education of a new generation of priests and bishops before leadership could be found to implement Trent. The kings of Spain and Portugal promoted acceptance of the Council; its practical implementation in those realms, however, took much longer. The French Church did not receive the council until 1615 due to opposition from the king and the parliaments. These agents believed the council infringed on royal and state rights over the Church. The French clergy, however, continually petitioned for the acceptance of the council. Finally, in 1615, the bishops were convinced and promulgated the council over the objections of the crown.

Often the visits of Jesuit missionaries and papal nuncios promoted and pushed the enactment of the reform legislation throughout Europe. The Council of Trent probably would have been more effective sooner had the decrees for regular diocesan synods and provincial councils been implemented. As it was, these gatherings became sporadic and rare events.

In fact, it was the United States which demonstrated the strongest conciliar tradition. The United States’ first diocese was established in 1789 under the leadership of Bishop John Carroll of Baltimore. He held the first synod in 1791 in order to regularize discipline among clergy and laity, to regularize sacramental practice, and to encourage the laity to resist the worldliness and indifference of the American environment. With the erection of three new dioceses in 1810, Carroll held a meeting with his suffragans in 1810 and planned to have a first provincial council by 1812. War prevented that. However, subsequent provincial councils were held in Baltimore in 1829, 1833, 1837, 1840, 1842, 1846, 1849. The first council attacked trusteeism. It also legislated that priests were to be tied to a diocese and stay there and to avoid unseemly amusements such as games of chance. The other councils dealt with anti-Catholicism, mixed marriage legislation, and especially education. During this whole time a number of dioceses held several synods each as well. The establishment of other archdioceses in the United States--Oregon City (1846; later Portland); St. Louis (1849); and New York, Cincinnati, and New Orleans (1850)—created a need to hold a national plenary council in order to establish uniformity of legislation. Thus the Baltimore Councils, I, II, and III, were held in 1852, 1866, and 1884, the last one being the originator of the Baltimore Catechism. The Plenary Council of Baltimore II in 1866 was the largest conciliar gathering in the world since the Council of Trent 300 years earlier. From 1852 onward the provinces continued to hold their councils and many dioceses conducted synods. All of these synods, and provincial councils, and plenary councils served to implement the Tridentine legislation in the United States. In fact, the United States had more meetings of these kinds than all the other ecclesiastical areas of the world combined since Trent.

A final example of Church reform is the recent Second Vatican Council and its implementation. The clear call of the council was to universal holiness, the ultimate reform of the Church, head and members. One of the most obvious results of the council has been assemblies of various sorts seeking to bring about this holiness. We have seen, for instance, the incredible growth of national or regional episcopal conferences. When the United States Bishops’ conference was first founded in 1917 as the National Catholic War Council, it was one of only about three such bodies in the world. By the time of Vatican II, the NCWC was considered a model for all to follow. The Council canonized this process in relegating to such episcopal bodies a number of legislative tasks, especially in the arena of liturgy.

Another evidence of the promotion of assemblies at the episcopal level is the regular meeting of the Synod of Bishops during the years since Vatican II. It reminds the historian somewhat of the conciliar movement of the 1400s. However, the difference now is that this activity is not designed to be confrontational but rather pastoral, a gathering to reform, to make the Church holy.

Given our history of councils in this country, the paucity of synods, provincial councils, and even the lack of a plenary council since Vatican II and especially since the promulgation of the New Code of Canon Law is amazing. True it is that some dioceses have held synods and some more than one. One diocese held a synod in the 1990s and arrived at ten goals, the fifth of which called for increased opportunities for retreats and conversion experiences for the laity. There was no goal specifically directed to the reform in holiness of the priests and bishop, that is, summoning them to participate in Vatican II’s universal call to holiness. Historically, this is an anomaly. Next, I don’t know of any provincial councils having taken place in the United States since Vatican II, and there has not been a Plenary Council since 1884, though there have been many calls for one over the years. However, that this does not mean that assemblies are no longer a good vehicle for implementing Church reform. To the contrary, these more legal and formal assemblies have, instead, been replaced by a series of other kinds of gatherings.

The annual meetings of the United States bishops since 1917 has really obviated the necessity of a plenary council. Granted the old NCWC was not legislative, and the current NCCB has only limited legislative clout, still the bishops seem to find sufficient direction for the reform and holiness of the Church in their now biannual meetings rather than resorting to a fully legislative plenary council. The same can be said at the provincial level. Many states in this union now have conferences, such as the Michigan Catholic Conference or the Ohio Catholic Conference. These standing secretariats and the regular meetings of their boards, which include the bishops, seem to provide a sufficient resource to the bishops in their guidance of the Church of a state or province. Finally, at a diocesan level, the existence of presbyteral councils and diocesan pastoral assemblies or councils seems to be supplanting the need for regular synods. Most every parish imitates this kind of assembling with regular meetings of parish councils and commissions.

However, it would seem that a caution is in order. These regular bodies, the NCCB/USCC soon to be known as the USCCB, the state conferences, and the diocesan priests and pastoral assemblies, tend to become bureaucratic managers. They focus on the laudable tasks of keeping things going, tinkering to make them better, and providing regular feedback and communication at various levels of the Church. A system of regular synods, provincial councils, and perhaps a plenary council, would break the Church out of normal operating mode long enough to take a look at Gospel compliance, at how well the Church is following the truth in love, at communal adherence to the Vatican Council, at looking energetically at the evangelization of the country and world, etc. Even gatherings such as priestly convocations can become social events where the focus of continual reform of the lives of priests and bishops can be lost. Perhaps a similar charge can be made about parish councils and commissions. And reform will not take place just by isolated individuals thinking about it. There is need to get together to goad one another to holiness and to commit the ministries of the Church in a common pursuit of the Lord’s will. This does not mean all these other forms of assembling people are not good. It does mean that unless Church members gather together regularly at all levels and start with the question, how can the Church become holier, more like Christ, and then arrive at a concrete plan of action to do so, reform, which is a constant task, will skip a generation or more.

The pastoral application of this historical survey can now be seen in an incident from the 1920s. Lapeer, a rural county in one of our midwestern states, is the setting. Bishop Francis Kelley, the founder of the Catholic Church Extension Society wanted to establish a "Religious Experimental Farm," a sort of laboratory for rural ministry. He noted:

Most Catholic farmers have to drive from two to twenty-five miles to assist at Holy Mass. Under such circumstances they are in touch with the Church, on an average, of not more than twice a month—when they go to Mass in town…. The priest with missions, living alone…often fails to cultivate his field, satisfying himself with Sunday duties. When there is no school to look after he has plenty of idle time on his hands…

In 1923 Fr. Thomas Carey was assigned with three priests to the care of Lapeer County. At the end of the previous century, the Catholics of this county had been severely alienated by a pastor who had effectively lost his faith but continued to minister. The percentage of Catholics practicing their faith was abysmal. This county was also a Ku Klux Klan stronghold and thus it would take some level of courage to admit one’s Catholicism anyway. The people were poor and neglected. The priests settled in Lapeer, the major town in the county, and set up three missions. The three associates lived five days each week at a parishioner’s house in the three missions, did census work, and visited all the families in their missions three times a year. Their aim was to increase Mass attendance and the reception of communion, for which the best vehicle was the creation and support of religious societies. For two days, usually late Sunday to Tuesday, the three associates joined the pastor back at Lapeer for social and spiritual support, to report in on their visitations, and to receive directions from the pastor.

The records of the visitations are remarkable. Fr. Dakoske wrote:

Found a family of ten children. Not one of whom had received first communion. Terrible! Dragged the Lapeer field again this week—listing 7 more families. The work is endless. Children by the dozens have been without instruction. [And on October 11 at Millington,] the father is an ignorant Seventh-Day Adventist; the mother a weak-kneed Catholic, and the three children are not even baptized.

Fr. James Grady of Boise found Poles who had never been served because of language difficulties. In all these four priests made 2409 visits that first year, finding 500 Catholic families where they expected only 200. By these visits, teaching catechism to the children, using Sunday homilies to instruct on the Sacraments, the liturgy, frequent confession and communion, and mailing out the Our Sunday Visitor a solid start was made. By 1925, two years into the program, the missions were self-supporting and the Extension Society dropped its subsidy. From 1924 to 1927 annual Mass attendance nearly doubled from 46,000 to 83,000. Communions from 1923 to 1927 increased a tenfold from 3000 to 31,000. By 1928 the missions became independent parishes. Bishop Kelley was aware of the positive impact of this program not only on the people of Lapeer but on the priests themselves as he wrote in 1928:

They [the priests] developed a comradeship nothing short of remarkable. So they like their work. It is easy to see why. They see growth under their hands… I asked them [if they wanted to move]. To a man they answered that they did not want to be changed. They are not yearning for the city parishes.

Working together as a team and using a tool of extensive visitations as well as gathering weekly for substantial meetings, these men were able to revive and rejuvenate a nearly lost Church. God used these tools as vehicles of his grace.

This article has been about the value of regular gatherings, assemblies, at all levels of the Church and the value of visitation, Pope to the bishops, bishops to their priests and parishes, priests to their people. Yet the aim of both of these tools is to seek the reform of the Church, that is to seek holiness both in the clergy and in the laity. This holiness is built upon the truth and manifested in love. Do assemblies, diocesan assemblies, parish gatherings today promote these things specifically or do they dwell nearly entirely upon socializing and/or managing? It is not necessary to get rid of social/managerial gatherings, but at least regularly to replace one with or to add a gathering which specifically seeks such reform. The material for that still rests before us. It is the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, and especially the instructions concerning those teachings coming from His Holiness, John Paul II. There is also need to improve the methods of visitation. Perhaps that means bishops need to be visiting priests and parishes more. It certainly means that priests need to visit their parishioners more. These too, however, are not merely social visits. They are times to go forth like Paul to proclaim, to teach, to carry Good News, and to bring forth a harvest for salvation. It is altogether too easy to get stuck in a chancery or rectory, to be completely bowled over by paying bills and signing contracts. While these are needed actions, visitations and assemblies are more critical for the reform of the Church, head and members.