Affirming Religious Freedom

New Out of Print Book

How Vatican Council II Developed the Church's Teachings to Meet Todat;s Needs

by: Kenneth Whitehead

Vatican II adopted an approach to religious liberty based on affirming the human dignity of the religious believer. This new emphasis was reflected in the title of its declaration on affirming religious freedom Dignitatis Humanae which means "On Human Dignity". In it the Church, speaking through the Council, teaches that "the human person has a right to religious freedom".

What is entailed by this right is "that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of every human power in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, within due limits." This book by Kenneth D. Whitehead goes into detail regarding the implications of this new emphais on what the Church has traditionally held and taught, but which has not always been well understood.

Kenneth D. Whitehead is a former career Foreign Service Officer who for some ten years was stationed in American embassies in Rome, the Middle East, and North Africa. He later served as President Ronald Reagan's Assistant Secretary of Education for Postsecondary Education. For eight years he was Executive Vice President of Catholics United for the Faith. Since retiring, he works as a writer, lecturer, editor and translator in Falls Church, Virginia. He is the author of hundreds of articles, and of some eight books, most recently, The New Ecumenism: How the Catholic Church after Vatican II Took Over the Leadership of the World Ecumenical Movement (ST PAULS/Alba House, 2009), and One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic: The Early Church Was the Catholic Church (Ignatius Press, 2000). With James Likoudis, he is the co-author of a study of the "changes" in the liturgy following the Second Vatican Council, The Pope, the Council, and the Mass (25th Anniversary Revised Edition: Emmaus Road Publishing, 2006). Mr. Whitehead was educated at the University of Utah and the University of Paris and holds an honorary degree as a Doctor of Christian Letters from the Franciscan University of Steubenville. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, and the Review of Metaphysics. Mr. Whitehead is married to the former Margaret O'Donohue, a professional religious educator, and they are the parents of four grown sons.

Paperback. 90 pages.