It is a reasonably fair statement to say that much of the suspicion with which the laity are regarded by many of the clergy is a hangover from the Catholic suspicion of Protestantism with its emphasis upon lay participation and its origins in lay protest. The Catholic student who wishes to understand the place of the laity in the Roman Church is faced with no easy task; he finds himself on the frontiers of Catholic theology in which even theologians as eminent as Congar and Rahner are unable to provide him with a clear and unambiguous analysis.

The Council of Trent condemned heresies, as Councils have done since the beginning until Vatican II. It arrested such corruption as had been denounced by the Christian people. It laid down businesslike rules for the re-organization of a rather lax ecclesiastical society, it set up seminaries and effective visitations, and it provided the material for a full-bodied Canon Law which for four hundred years prevented any further epidemic demic of scandals, thereby restoring the good name of the church in the eyes of secular society. But as a social document it failed, and failed egregiously. The period which followed on the Council of Trent is known historically as the Counter-Reformation.

‘“If Christ rose from the dead, His religion and His doctrine are divine; but Christ rose again from the dead, therefore His religion and His doctrine are divine.” The first of these propositions is true; because, if Christ rose from the dead, it must have been by His own power, or by the power of God; if by His own power, by that very fact He would prove Himself God; if by the power of God, this would prove beyond doubt His divine mission … The second proposition, namely, but Christ rose again, only asserts one of the most certain historical facts … This miracle is the object of the attacks of all the incredulous, for this once admitted, no one could deny the divine mission and the Divinity of Jesus Christ.