John W. O'Malley (1927–2022)

I finally finished this book. Ch 1, 2, & 5 were interesting, but things really got bogged down in 3 & 4. Part of the problem is I bought the wrong book! I thought I was getting one on the history of the council itself, but this is on the naming of it & the era from the Catholic side. My mistake. Those chapters I named were interesting but the others took me forever to get through as I kept putting the book down in boredom & frustration. They seemed to be a hit job on the work of Fr. Hubert show more Jedin & a clash of scholarly & nationalistic egos, with each claiming to have “The Answer” the other dunderheads missed. I hate it when scholars act like prima donnas. So overall, I give this one barely 3 stars & now will look for the book I really wanted. show less

The book is excellent. It paints a picture of a fragmented Europe, making it clear why the efforts to reunify the church were unrealistic. The epilogue is important, and if you get bogged down in the details of the endless discussions and disagreements, at least read that. It clarifies the relationship between the council itself and the subsequent history of the Roman Catholic church.

BTW O'Malley does a magnificent job of helping the reader through the discussions. I did not get bogged down.

This is JUST the kind of book I've been wanting for years - a popular history of Vatican II - what happened, with lots of juicy bits, and enough historical background for it all to make sense, and not pushing a particular agenda - just the facts, with enough storyline to make it a joy to read, which it was.

Too brief, of course, but fairly well done, particularly if you'd like something tending more to the hagiographic than to the Black Legend-style attacks. It seems there's no good general history of a more appropriate length, so hopefully O'Malley is working on one.