Roman Catholics: The Bravest Schema

A century ago, in his Syllabus of Errors, Pope Pius IX condemned the thesis that the Roman Catholic Church should accommodate itself to the modern world. Last week the bishops of the Second Vatican Council began discussion of a document that goes a long way toward making that accommodation. For Catholics, Schema 13, entitled The Church in the Modern World, is the most personally important item of all on the council's agenda. Sometimes with platitudes, sometimes with passion, the schema bravely touches on every social issue that troubles the hearts of men, from overpopulation to nuclear war, and summons...