The Dutch Pastoral Council that outlines policy for the country’s Catholics, rejected Pope Paul’s encyclical Humanae Vitae as “not convincing on the basis of the argumentation given.”

The church in The Netherlands is perhaps the most independent and autonomy-minded in the Roman Catholic fold. Time and again, it has challenged Rome’s ideas of orthodoxy. Last week the Dutch defied the Vatican again, this time with particular force. Meeting in the North Sea town of Noordwijkerhout, theā€¦