Tragically, the episcopal conference in the U.S. since the council has in many cases usurped the canonical responsibility of the bishop as chief teacher of the faith in his diocese, set down in Lumen Gentium and Christus Dominus . The rapid decentralization of the traditional machinery of church government in the episcopal conference proved imprudent in opening the door to neomodernist-inspired forces discussed in the previous chapters, operant in their committees, commissions and experts. The works of these theologians, priests, sisters and laity began to appear in the syllabi of major seminary professors and on the reading lists of religious and those training to be catechists, I myself among them. A noted Catholic journalist and former spokesman for the U.S. bishops’ conference has written: That what is involved here can be called a culture [of dissent] is apparent in the fact that dissent has had—and even now continues to have—the support of...