Norman P. Tanner

I've had this book since 2005 and only just this year did I read it. It is interesting to read a book that was written well after the facts presented occurred, and then from the perspective of twenty years after that. When written, godless Communism had fallen. But, now, after 20 more years, totalitarian regimes have replaced Communism in many places.
While the other three Constitutions of Vatican Council II were well received as representing the views of the vast majority of bishops, they were not totally accepted. Indeed, a hard-core was opposed even to the Council itself. As the years have passed, there has been considerable erosion. But Gaudium et Spes was supposed to have been the crown jewel of the Council, and it turned out to have been too timid. This could not have been foreseen but it had in its timidity the seeds of its own undoing. At best, one might imagine what might have been.
The fate of Inter mirifica has been even worse. It was written and approved against a backdrop of great uncertainty about what to say and, worse, how to say it.… (mehr)

The Ages of Faith brings together twenty previously published articles, chapters, and reviews by Norman Tanner, who's perhaps best known as the editor of the English edition of the Documents of the Ecumenical Councils. The cover blurb promises a "rich and authoritative history" of popular religion in late medieval Europe, but this is a mixed bag. There is some repetition and many of the pieces are slight, particularly those originally written for a popular and confessional audience. Some of the essays on church councils and on the history of Norwich may be of interest to those who work in those areas.… (mehr)