}

AN INTRODUCTION TO
VATICAN II AS AN ONGOING
THEOLOGICAL EVENT
S a c r a D o c t r i n a S e r i e s

Series Editors

Chad C. Pecknold, The Catholic University of America

Thomas Joseph White, OP, Dominican House of Studies

 AN
INTRODUCTION
}
TO
VATICAN II
as an Ongoing
Theological Event

Matthew Levering

The Catholic University of America Press

Washington, D.C.
Copyright © 2017
The Catholic University of America Press
All rights reserved
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
National Standards for Information Science—Permanence of Paper for Printed
Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
∞

Cataloging-in-Publication Data available from the Library of Congress

ISBN 978-0-8132-2930-0
} To Robert Imbelli
 Contents

Acknowledgments  ix

Introduction 1

1. Persons and Propositions: Dei Verbum in

Context 20

2. Active Participation: Sacrosanctum Concilium

in Context 50

3. True and False Reform: Lumen Gentium in

Context 81

4. Nature and Grace: Gaudium et Spes in Context 134

5. Vatican II as an Ongoing Theological Event:

The Way Forward 174

Conclusion 207

Bibliography  223

Index  239

  vii
Ac k n owl e dgm e nts
Ac k n owl e dgm e nts

Acknowledgments

My first thanks go to my dear friend Fr. Thomas Joseph White, OP, for
suggesting that I write an introductory book on this topic. During the
writing process, I was aided by two speaking invitations for Fall 2015: from
Christopher Ruddy and Robert Miller to speak at the Catholic University
of America to a conference devoted to Dei Verbum, and from Fr. Antonio
López, FSCB, to speak at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies
on Marriage and Family at the Catholic University of America to a confer-
ence devoted to Gaudium et Spes. In a very different form, parts of chapter
4 will appear as “Nature and Grace in Gaudium et Spes: The Status of the
Theory of the Natural Desire for the Supernatural” in a book edited by
Antonio López (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, forthcoming). Many
thanks to these good friends for the invitations to speak and for their gra-
cious hospitality.
The process of revising the manuscript was a difficult one. I owe par-
ticularly extensive thanks to my colleague Fr. Scott Hebden and to Fr. In-
nocent Smith, OP, both of whom read the draft in its roughest form and
made incisive and wide-ranging corrections. Fr. Robert Imbelli, Andrew
Meszaros, and Fr. Thomas Guarino read and corrected portions of the
manuscript and also merit my deep thanks. To others who helped me dur-
ing the revising of the manuscript, I extend my warm thanks. Christopher
Ruddy graciously read a penultimate draft of the introduction, chapter 5,
and the conclusion, and his superb corrections and insights enabled me
to make some crucial last-minute additions and deletions. My research as-
sistant and friend David Augustine, now a doctoral student at the Catho-

ix
lic University of America, did the bibliography and helped me with the
book in a variety of other ways.
A short, introductory book such as this one pursues various goals at
once and can achieve only some of them! Fundamentally, the book seeks
to be of service to a movement of renewal in Catholic theology, rooted
in a strong sense of divine revelation and of the transformative power of
Jesus Christ.
At the Catholic University of America Press, John Martino ably steered
the manuscript to publication. I received helpful corrections from Gavin
D’Costa and from an anonymous peer reviewer. Anne Needham, who
copyedited the book for the Catholic University of America Press, sug-
gested a number of corrections that improved the book greatly. I owe a
major debt to Mundelein Seminary, especially to its Rector Fr. John Kartje
and its Dean Fr. Thomas Baima, and to James and Mary Perry who gener-
ously endowed the chair that I hold.
To my beloved wife, Joy, I “give thanks to God always for you” (2 Thes
2:13) and for our children. You are such a treasure! Scripture truly describes
you when it praises the person who is “temperate, sensible, dignified, hos-
pitable, an apt teacher, no drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrel-
some, and no lover of money” (1 Tm 3:2–3). You embody the “still more
excellent way” (1 Cor 12:31).
This book is dedicated to a true man of the Council, whose formative
years as a seminarian took place in Rome in the very midst of the Coun-
cil, and who has zealously sought ever since to embody its letter and spirit
in word and deed in the service of Jesus Christ: Father Robert Imbelli. I
and many others studied at Boston College under Fr. Imbelli, who also
preached beautifully at the parish Joy and I attended. “Let the elders who
rule well be considered worthy of a double honor, especially those who
labor in preaching and teaching” (1 Tm 5:17).

x A c k n owl e d gm e nts 

Int ro d u c t i on
Int ro d u c t i on

}
I NTRODUCT ION

In his Address at the Solemn Opening of the Second Session of the Sec-
ond Vatican Council (September 29, 1963), Pope Paul VI observed: “The
starting point and the goal [of the Council] is that here and at this very
hour we should proclaim Christ to ourselves and to the world around us:
Christ our beginning, Christ our life and our guide, Christ our hope and
our end.”1 In the same vein, in his 1964 encylical Ecclesiam Suam, Paul VI
exhorts the whole Church “to make a conscious, generous, whole-hearted
act of faith in Jesus Christ our Lord.”2 Warning against those who “imag-
ine that the Church should abdicate its proper role, and adopt an entirely
new and unprecedented mode of existence,” he argues that the crucial
evangelistic task, presently being undertaken by the Council (in 1964),
consists in the Church’s contemplation of its divinely given constitution
and mission. As he explains, “The Church must get a clearer idea of what
it really is in the mind of Jesus Christ as recorded and preserved in Sa-
cred Scripture and in Apostolic Tradition, and interpreted and explained
by the tradition of the Church under the inspiration and guidance of the

1. Pope Paul VI, Address at the Solemn Opening of the Second Session of the Second Vatican
Council, September 29, 1963, §3.3, at www.vatican.va (Latin); see the English translation in Council
Daybook: Vatican II, Session I, 1962, and Session II, 1963, ed. Floyd Anderson (Washington, D.C.:
National Catholic Welfare Service, 1965), 143–50. For discussion, see Jared Wicks, SJ, “Vatican II’s
Turn in 1963: Toward Renewing Catholic Ecclesiology and Validating Catholic Ecumenism,” Jo-
sephinum Journal of Theology 19 (2012): 1–13, at 5–8.
2. Pope Paul VI, Ecclesiam Suam, Encyclical Letter, August 6, 1964, §23, at www.vatican.va.

1
Holy Spirit.”3 The heart of everything that the Council does, therefore,
must be the Church’s “renewed discovery of its vital bond of union with
Christ.”4 The purpose of this “renewed discovery” is not solely to enrich
the Church’s unity in Christ, but to enrich the unity of the whole world.
As Pope John XXIII put it in his Address at the Solemn Opening of the
Second Vatican Council on October 11, 1962, the Church, “illumined by
the light of Christ,” seeks to spread charity and to enable all human beings
“to thoroughly understand what they themselves really are, what dignity
distinguishes them, what goal they must pursue.”5
Meeting twenty years after the Council’s conclusion, the 1985 Extraor-
dinary Synod of Bishops—gathered to assess the implementation of the
Council twenty years after its conclusion—joyfully affirmed the Council
“as a grace of God and a gift of the Holy Spirit.”6 At the same time, the

3. Ibid., §26. Thus Paul VI aims to combat “the errors we see circulating within the Church itself
and to which people are exposed who have only a partial understanding of the Church and its mis-
sion, and who do not pay close enough attention to divine revelation and the Church’s Christ-given
authority to teach” (ibid., §27). As he observes, “Obviously, there can be no question of reforming
the essential nature of the Church or its basic and necessary structure. To use the word reform in
that context would be to misuse it completely. We cannot brand the holy and beloved Church of
God with the mark of infidelity. . . . [W]hen we speak about reform we are not concerned to change
things, but to preserve all the more resolutely the characteristic features which Christ has impressed
on His Church. Or rather, we are concerned to restore to the Church that ideal of perfection and
beauty that corresponds to its original image, and that is at the same time consistent with its nec-
essary, normal and legitimate growth from its original, embryonic form into its present structure”
(ibid., §§46–47). In the same context, Paul VI cautions against the notion that “the reform of the
Church should consist principally in adapting its way of thinking and acting to the customs and
temper of the modern secular world. The fascination of worldly life today is very powerful indeed,
and many people regard conformity to it as an inescapable and indeed a wise course to take. Hence,
those who are not deeply rooted in the faith and in the observance of the Church’s laws, readily
imagine that the time is ripe to adjust themselves to worldly standards of living, on the assumption
that these are the best and only possible ones for a Christian to adopt” (ibid., §48).
4. Ibid., §35.
5. Pope John XXIII, “Gaudet Mater Ecclesia,” Address on the Occasion of the Solemn Open-
ing of the Most Holy Council, October 11, 1962, §17 (Latin text available at https://w2.vatican.va/
content/john-xxiii/la/speeches/1962/documents/hf_j-xxiii_spe_19621011_opening-council.html;
English translation at https://jakomonchak.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/john-xxiii-opening-speech
.pdf ). The Lutheran scholar Oscar Cullmann, an invited observer at the Council, points out that
“John XXIII, to whom today has been incorrectly assigned a radicalism, something foreign to him,
desired a Catholic renewal in a Catholic framework” (Cullmann, Vatican Council II: The New Direc-
tion, trans. James D. Hester [New York: Harper and Row, 1968], 68).
6. The Synod of Bishops, “Final Report,” December 7, 1985, in The Extraordinary Synod—1985:
Message to the People of God (Boston, Mass.: St. Paul Editions, 1986), 37–68, at 38.

2 I n t ro d u c tion
bishops fault their reception of the Council for “speaking too much of
the renewal of the Church’s external structures and too little of God and
of Christ.”7 They propose to read the Council afresh by giving “[s]pecial
attention . . . to the four major constitutions of the Council, which con-
tain the interpretative key for the other decrees and declarations.”8 In their
view, only by attending to the central conciliar teachings, which flow from
a desire for a more perfect union with Christ, can the Church truly have
something to offer the world and thereby meet the challenge posed by
John XXIII at the outset of the Council and by Paul VI in Ecclesiam Suam:
“The Church must enter into dialogue with the world in which it lives. It
has something to say, a message to give, a communication to make.”9
With a similar emphasis on Christ and evangelization, Pope Francis’s
2013 apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium—published fifty years af-
ter the promulgation of the first document of the Council—begins with
a personal call to faith. Pope Francis states, “I invite all Christians, every-
where, at this very moment, to a renewed personal encounter with Jesus
Christ, or at least an openness to letting him encounter them; I ask all of
you to do this unfailingly each day. No one should think that this invita-
tion is not meant for him or her.”10 This invitation to the whole world to

7. Ibid., 41. 8. Ibid.

9. Paul VI, Ecclesiam Suam, §65.
10. Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium, Apostolic Exhortation, November 24, 2013, §3, at www
.vatican.va. For the Christological and ecclesiological links between Benedict XVI and Pope Fran-
cis, see Robert P. Imbelli, “Benedict and Francis,” in Go into the Streets! The Welcoming Church of
Pope Francis, ed. Thomas P. Rausch, SJ, and Richard R. Gaillardetz (New York: Paulist Press, 2016),
11–27. Imbelli argues that both popes are significantly influenced by Henri de Lubac. He concludes,
“What intimately supports and sustains the ecclesial vision of Benedict and Francis is this con-
viction: if the center who is Jesus Christ is secure, one can venture courageously to the farthest
peripheries without losing the Way” (Imbelli, “Benedict and Francis,” 24). In the same volume, by
contrast, Gerard Mannion argues that “Both [Evangelii Gaudium] and so much of Pope Francis’s
subsequent actions and statements have demonstrated a clear and dramatic break with the agenda
and perspectives of his two immediate predecessors on many fronts” (Mannion, “Re-engaging
the People of God,” in Go into the Streets!, 57–75, at 59). Mannion suggests that the previous two
pontificates ( John Paul II and Benedict XVI) had encouraged Catholics to “resist the vision of
the Council” (Mannion, “Re-engaging the People of God,” 59). After this rather divisive assertion,
Mannion relates that Pope Francis “accentuates what people share in common rather than what
divides them” (Mannion, “Re-engaging the People of God,” 60). For Mannion, Pope Francis “has
certainly appeared to take a stance on the Council’s attempts to affirm a greater sense of episcopal
collegiality throughout the church” (Mannion, “Re-engaging the People of God,”, 61), and I agree
that this is so, even if the contributions of the African bishops at the 2015 Synod were disparaged

I n t ro d uct i o n 3
encounter Christ personally is at the heart of the Second Vatican Coun-
cil. As Karol Wojtyła (the future Pope John Paul II) remarks in his 1972
book Sources of Renewal, which he wrote after taking an active part in the
Council’s deliberations, “The enrichment of faith is nothing else than in-
creasingly full participation in divine truth. This is the fundamental view-
point from which we must judge the reality of Vatican II and seek ways of
putting it into practice.”11
Inspired by the words of the present pope and his predecessors, as well
as the words of the bishops who gathered twenty years after the Council
to reflect upon its implementation, the present book engages Vatican II
as an ongoing theological event. Drawing upon the use of the term “event”
in historiography and sociology, Joseph Komonchak defines “event” as “a
‘noteworthy’ occurrence, one that has consequences. . . . In almost all of the
literature, the assumption is that an ‘event’ represents novelty, discontinu-
ity, a ‘rupture,’ a break from routine, causing surprise, disturbance, even
trauma, and perhaps initiating a new routine, a new realm of the taken-for-
granted.”12 I agree that Vatican II was an “event” in the sense of “a ‘note-

and the Synod’s participants and outcome were shaped decisively by Vatican intervention. For a
generally appreciative evaluation of Pope Francis’s steps toward increasing episcopal collegiality, see
Christopher Ruddy, “The Local and Universal Church,” in Go into the Streets!, 109–24. Mannion
repeats the standard warning against “the juridical and institutional discourse of the late eighteenth
and especially nineteenth and early mid-twentieth centuries” (Mannion, “Re-engaging the People
of God,” 63), but I find Mannion’s essay to be itself overly focused on juridical and institutional
power distribution and not sufficiently attentive to the actual demands of the gospel of mercy
with its universal call to holiness. Juridically—since he focuses upon power relationships rather
than upon evidences of faith, hope, and love—Mannion argues that under the past two popes,
“Slowly but surely the image of the church as people of God was challenged and then supplanted
by the official communio ecclesiology. Many of the gains of Vatican II that were grounded upon
the ecclesiology of the people of God were therefore also challenged—for example, the sense of
co-responsibility in the church and a more egalitarian understanding of collaborative ministry. . . .
The emphasis in Francis’s papacy thus far upon greater consultation and dialogue, alongside in-
creasing hints toward a radically more participatory style of teaching authority, suggests there may
also be a revolution in the understanding and exercise of magisterium in this papacy” (Mannion,
“Re-engaging the People of God,”65, 69).
11. Karol Wojtyła, Sources of Renewal: The Implementation of the Second Vatican Council, trans.
P. S. Falla (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1980), 15.
12. Joseph A. Komonchak, “Vatican II as an ‘Event’,” in Vatican II: Did Anything Happen?, ed.
David G. Schultenover, SJ (New York: Continuum, 2007), 24–51, at 27. Komonchak, however,
argues that the interpretation of the Council promoted by Henri de Lubac and Joseph Ratzing-
er “plays down the eventful character of the council as a break or rupture with tradition” (ibid.,
29). I think, on the contrary, that de Lubac and Ratzinger fully recognize the “event” character of

4 I n t ro d u c tion
worthy’ occurrence, one that has consequences,” and in my view it remains
today—in and through the sixteen conciliar documents—an ongoing
“event.” Continuity in the Church’s teaching does not mean no change,
no “break from routine,” no “disturbance,” no discontinuity whatsoever. In
the hands of Yves Congar, Henri de Lubac, Joseph Ratzinger, Avery Dulles,
and others upon whom I model my approach to Vatican II, the term “con-
tinuity” means that the enduring cognitive content of divine revelation has
been and continues to be faithfully handed on by the Church; it is in this
sense that Vatican II’s teaching does not constitute “rupture” or “disconti-
nuity.” In describing Vatican II as an “ongoing theological event,” I should
also note that I intend no separation between the “event” and the actual
texts of the Council’s documents, since it is the latter that must govern the
ongoing theological event.13
In order to introduce Vatican II, my book focuses upon the four

the Council; they are well aware of the Council’s boldness and new directions. At the same time,
like Yves Congar and Avery Dulles, they emphasize doctrinal continuity. See also Ormond Rush,
Still Interpreting Vatican II: Some Hermeneutical Principles (New York: Paulist Press, 2004). For
Rush, agreeing with Komonchak (and with John O’Malley), “a retrospective interpretation of the
Council along the continuum of church history does indeed show that it constitutes an ‘event,’
in that it marks a radical break beginning a new epoch. Retrospectively, and seen within the con-
text of two thousand years of church history, the Council can now be seen to constitute a deliber-
ate break with particular elements of the tradition (variously named Constantinian, Gregorian,
Counter-Reformation, Pian, etc.), now judged to be impeding continuity with the great tradition
and impeding a more effective receptio/traditio of the Gospel in the contemporary world” (Rush,
Still Interpreting Vatican II, 75). All agree that the Council broke deliberately with some “Con-
stantinian, Gregorian, Pian, Counter-Reformation” elements; de Lubac and Ratzinger themselves
sought and welcomed this kind of break. The question however is whether a rupture occurred in
definitive doctrinal teaching. Rush assumes that there is something called “the Gospel” whose con-
tent is knowable insofar as we can make judgments today about how to receive and hand it on in
“a more effective” way, but it is precisely the existence of “the Gospel” (as a reality mediated faith-
fully through Scripture as interpreted by the Church) that is at stake in the question of doctrinal
rupture, unless one is a biblicist. Rush holds that Ratzinger rejects “ ‘rupture’ theories of any kind,”
but in fact Ratzinger accepts certain kinds of breaks and ruptures while rejecting (on Christologi-
cal and pneumatological grounds) the possibility of other kinds. Rush argues: “A pneumatology of
aggiornamento is needed that incorporates discontinuity along with continuity” (Rush, Still Inter-
preting Vatican II, 75). In fact Congar worked his whole life to develop just such a pneumatology,
but he still insisted upon doctrinal continuity (in terms of definitive doctrine about the content of
the gospel). For Congar, as for Newman, enduring truth is not opposed to historical contextualiza-
tion. See my Engaging the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit: Love and Gift in the Trinity and the Church
(Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2016), especially chapter 7.
13. See also Andrew Meszaros, “Vatican II as Theological Event and Text according to Yves
Congar,” forthcoming in the Josephinum Journal of Theology.

I nt ro d uct i o n 5
Constitutions that the Council produced: the Dogmatic Constitution
on Divine Revelation (Dei Verbum, which I treat first because divine
revelation is the absolute sine qua non), the Constitution on the Sacred
Liturgy (Sacrosanctum Concilium), the Dogmatic Constitution on the
Church (Lumen Gentium), and the Pastoral Constitution on the Church
in the Modern World (Gaudium et Spes). I highlight four doctrinal and
pastoral themes by which the Council sought to increase “full participa-
tion in divine truth” and to make possible “a renewed personal encounter
with Jesus Christ.” These four themes are divine revelation as a personal
and cognitive-propositional encounter with Christ, active participation
of the laity in the liturgy, reform of the Church’s human aspects so as to
make the divine gifts more visible, and the orientation of human nature
to fulfillment through the grace of Christ. Each of these themes was hotly
debated during the conciliar era and remains central to theological and
pastoral discussions today.
In accord with the four themes I have chosen, each of the first four
chapters surveys one cutting-edge book from the conciliar era that high-
lights one of these four themes, so as to contextualize the conciliar Con-
stitutions in their era. Each chapter then gives a detailed summary of one
of the four Constitutions, concluding with some reflections drawn from
today’s ongoing theological debates about the theme that I highlight in
the chapter. My goal is to exhibit not only the content of Vatican II’s
Constitutions but also their emergence from complex theological discus-
sions and their ongoing importance in today’s theological discussions and
debates. Gabriel Flynn has rightly observed that “the documents of the
Second Vatican Council . . . are, for the most part, unread, even by stu-
dents of theology.”14 I hope to stimulate interest in reading the Council’s
Constitutions by indicating their relationship to the theological debates
of our time and by echoing their call to a deeper and more personal wor-
ship of Christ.15
In their recent introduction to Vatican II, Keys to the Council: Unlock-

14. Gabriel Flynn, “Epilogue: Yves Congar’s Theology in the New Millennium,” in Yves Con-
gar: Theologian of the Church, ed. Gabriel Flynn (Leuven: Peeters, 2005), 459–61, at 460.
15. See the essay by Christopher Ruddy, “ ‘In my end is my beginning’: Lumen Gentium and
the Priority of Doxology,” Irish Theological Quarterly 79 (2014): 144–64.

6 I n t ro d uc tion
ing the Teaching of Vatican II, Richard Gaillardetz and Catherine Clif-
ford acknowledge that “the sheer volume of the council documents can
overwhelm the reader.”16 Their solution is to focus on “twenty passages
from the council documents that we believe provide interpretive ‘keys’ ”
and that “can lead the reader to a greater appreciation for the larger vi-
sion of the council.”17 Fourteen of their twenty passages come from the
four Constitutions on which I focus: Sacrosanctum Concilium §§6, 7, 14;
Dei Verbum §§2, 8; Lumen Gentium §§1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 23; and Gaudium et
Spes §§40, 43, and 48. Their other six passages come from Christus Domi-
nus §11; Dignitatis Humanae §2; Unitatis Redintegratio §§3, 6, and 11; and
Nostra Aetate §2.18

16. Richard R. Gaillardetz and Catherine E. Clifford, Keys to the Council: Unlocking the Teach-
ing of Vatican II (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2012), xvii. John W. O’Malley, SJ, puts the
matter more bluntly (and, surely, accurately): “The verbosity of the documents of the Council of-
ten makes them boring to read, almost impossible to teach, and further complicates their inter-
pretation” (O’Malley, “Vatican II: Historical Perspectives on Its Uniqueness and Interpretation,”
in his Tradition and Transition: Historical Perspectives on Vatican II [Wilmington, Del.: Michael
Glazier, 1989], 19–31, at 28). For O’Malley, this verbosity is a positive sign of “the growing aware-
ness of the participants of the complexity of the issues, of the wide variety of positions possible
concerning them, and of the necessity of not bringing them to a premature closure” (O’Malley,
“Vatican II: Historical Perspectives,” 28). I think that the documents simply cover a lot of moral
and doctrinal ground, in addition to treating a number of practical matters. O’Malley also observes
that “the documents have a kind of detached quality to them, suspended somehow above the his-
torical situations that they were aimed at changing. Since enemies and abuses are not named as
such, the documents have a vagueness that opens them to a variety of interpretations, especially by
persons untrained in the exegesis of theological texts. Since they are committee documents, more-
over, they evince a flaccid quality that, at least at the distance of over twenty years, weakens the
dramatic punch many of them in fact in their substance delivered” (O’Malley, “Vatican II: Histori-
cal Perspectives,” 27). O’Malley approves, as I do, of the dialogic style of the Council’s documents,
although he exaggerates the ecclesiological “horizontalism” implied by true dialogue: “Dialogue is
horizontal not vertical, and it implies, if it is to be taken seriously, a shift in ecclesiology more basic
than any single passage or image from Lumen gentium” (O’Malley, “Vatican II: Historical Perspec-
tives,” 27–28).
17. Gaillardetz and Clifford, Keys to the Council, xvii–xviii.
18. These six texts engage teachings on religious freedom, ecumenism, interreligious dialogue,
and the distribution of power between the bishops and the pope and Curia. The grounding for
each of these texts is found in the four Constitutions. For recent valuable studies of Dignitatis Hu-
manae and Nostra Aetate, see David L. Schindler and Nicholas J. Healy, Jr., Freedom, Truth, and
Human Dignity: The Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom: A New Transla-
tion, Redaction History, and Interpretation of Dignitatis Humanae (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerd-
mans, 2015); and Gavin D’Costa, Vatican II: Catholic Doctrines on Jews and Muslims (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2014). See also my essay on Christus Dominus and its reception, in The
Reception of Vatican II, ed. Matthew L. Lamb and Matthew Levering (Oxford: Oxford University

I n t ro d uct i o n 7
 I agree with Gaillardetz and Clifford’s privileging of the four Consti-
tutions and with their view that an introductory book on the Council
cannot and should not try to cover all the documents. Nonetheless, as
they recognize, crucial passages from the four Constitutions are missing
from their selections. Consider, for example, the eschatological and evan-
gelizing notes of Sacrosanctum Concilium §§8–9, or Sacrosanctum Con-
cilium §10’s crucial teaching that the liturgy is the source and summit of
the Church’s work. Consider likewise Dei Verbum §1’s stirring citation of
1 John 1:2–3 to express its desire for the whole world to hear the call to
salvation; Dei Verbum §§3–7’s exposition of the economy of salvation, the
obedience of faith, and the nature and transmission of divine revelation;
and Dei Verbum §§9–12’s presentation of Scripture, Tradition, the Magis-
terium of the Church, and the inspiration and interpretation of Scripture.
Also missing from Gaillardetz and Clifford’s book are Lumen Gen-
tium §§2–3 on the Father’s sending of the Son and Spirit and on the eu-
charistic upbuilding of the Church in unity; Lumen Gentium §§5–6 on
the Church as the inauguration of the kingdom of Christ and on the Old
Testament images of the Church; Lumen Gentium §8 on the unity of
the hierarchical Church with the heavenly Church and on the truth that
Christ’s Church “subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by
the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him”; Lu-
men Gentium §12 on the proper meaning of the sensus fidei; Lumen Gen-
tium §§18–22 on the hierarchical constitution of the Church; and Lumen
Gentium §§30–42 on the work of the laity and on the universal call to ho-
liness. Their book is also unable to include Gaudium et Spes §§1–10 on the
need to communicate the gospel of Christ to the whole of humankind,
in dialogue with the problems and aspirations of the modern world, with
Christ as the key and the center and the goal of history; Gaudium et Spes
§§12–21’s reflections on humans as created to know and love God, yet af-
flicted by atheism; and Gaudium et Spes §22’s teaching that Christ reveals

Press, forthcoming), as well as the essays in that volume by Nicholas J. Healy Jr. (“Dignitatis Hu-
manae”), Gavin D’Costa (“Nostra Aetate”), and Matthew Ramage (“Unitatis Redintegratio”). For
further historical background to Catholic ecumenism, see Jerome-Michael Vereb, CP, “Because He
Was a German!” Cardinal Bea and the Origins of Roman Catholic Engagement in the Ecumenical
Movement (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2006).

8 I n t ro d uc tion
humankind to itself, because only Christ reveals the meaning and goal of
the mystery of human life by showing us the path of self-sacrificial love
and the goal of resurrected life as adopted sons in the Son. They also leave
out Gaudium et Spes §§23–32 on how Christ fulfills the social or com-
munal vocation of humanity, rather than offering a merely individualistic
salvation; and Gaudium et Spes §45 on Christ as the alpha and omega and
on the Church as the sacrament of salvation.
Although they are not explicit about it, Gaillardetz and Clifford’s in-
troductory book belongs to a particular stream of contemporary theolo-
gy. Their perspective can be seen when they argue, for example, that today
(in 2012) “much of the council’s teaching is being minimized, dangerously
reinterpreted, or altogether ignored,” and so “an authentic and informed
understanding of the council is more important than ever.”19 In saying
this, they indicate their deep concern about the ways in which then-Pope
Benedict XVI (and his predecessor John Paul II) implemented Vatican
II. By analyzing twenty key passages from the Council’s documents, Gail-
lardetz and Clifford hope to “unlock a vision of the church that remains
both challenging and liberating, a vision capable of guiding our church
in the decades to come.”20 Thus their book is an effort to introduce Vati-
can II in a manner that cautions against specific ways in which Vatican II
was, in their view, “being minimized, dangerously reinterpreted, or alto-
gether ignored” during the pontificate of Benedict XVI.21 Their selection
and analysis of twenty key passages from the documents of Vatican II is
guided by this theological viewpoint.
My own theological viewpoint appears clearly in this book, since
although I survey the whole of each conciliar Constitution, I do so by
focusing on conciliar-era theological debates that remain contested. Let
me reiterate the four theological themes that guide my engagement with
the four Constitutions: (1) the relationship in divine revelation between
persons (personal encounter) and propositions (cognitive judgments22);

19. Gaillardetz and Clifford, Keys to the Council, xviii.

20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. A “proposition” is language that conveys cognitive content that is true or false. As Mats
Wahlberg points out: “Maybe the most common misconception about propositional revelation is

I nt ro d uct i o n 9
(2) the active participation of all believers in the liturgical enactment
of Christ’s sacrificial self-offering, with reference to whether the priest
should face the people in the Eucharistic prayer; (3) true and false reform
in the Church, and thus the question of what is irreformable and what
is reformable; and (4) the need of created human nature for fulfillment
through graced communion with Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit.
Specifically, in surveying the paragraphs of Dei Verbum (chapter 1), I
have in view “persons and propositions” and René Latourelle’s Theology of
Revelation. In surveying the paragraphs of Sacrosanctum Concilium (chap-
ter 2), I have in view “active participation” and Louis Bouyer’s Liturgy and
Architecture. In surveying the paragraphs of Lumen Gentium (chapter 3),
I have in view “true and false reform” and Yves Congar’s True and False
Reform in the Church. Lastly, in surveying the paragraphs of Gaudium et
Spes (chapter 4), I have in view “nature and grace” and Henri de Lubac’s
The Mystery of the Supernatural. Latourelle’s and de Lubac’s books were
published during the Council on the basis of research done prior to the
Council (although the translated edition of Latourelle’s book includes
some new material and appeared in 1966); Congar’s book was published
in 1950 with a revised edition appearing shortly after the Council; and
Bouyer’s book appeared in 1967 and generally reiterates historical points
that he had made prior to the Council, although he is also responding to
the postconciliar situation.

that it is incompatible with the metaphorical and symbolic character of much biblical language”
(Wahlberg, Revelation as Testimony: A Philosophical-Theological Study [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eer-
dmans, 2014], 37). Since metaphorical and symbolic language can convey cognitive content that
is true or false, it is a mistake “to think that only literal speech can express propositions” (ibid.).
Wahlberg notes that it is possible that some propositions “can only be expressed by metaphorical
or symbolic speech” (ibid., 38), and he gives the example of the metaphorical affirmation of God
as our father. He adds that the allegorical and spiritual cognitive content in biblical texts (whether
in psalms and hymns, narratives, poetry, or other genres), even if it cannot be stated in literal lan-
guage, can be propositional. Furthermore, not all propositions need express truths, since a proposi-
tion “can be expressed without being asserted (claimed to be true)” (ibid., 38). The key point is that
anything is propositional that conveys information. Wahlberg concludes that “revelation indeed
is more than a transmission of information. The crucial point is that it cannot be less. If the goal
of the transformation [brought about by revelation] is something that the subject is supposed to
consciously affirm and pursue, then information about that goal must somehow be involved in rev-
elation. And there is absolutely no incompatibility between viewing revelation as life-transforming
and as information-providing” (ibid., 41).

10 I n t r o d uction
 In highlighting these theological themes and sources, I hope to shed
light upon the very heart of the Council’s dogmatic and pastoral contribu-
tions: namely, its insistence upon the centrality of Jesus Christ within the
modern pluralistic, technologically advancing, and historically conscious
world. Put succinctly: We can encounter Christ personally and know him
cognitively (propositionally) as our Savior today, two thousand years after
his Pasch (Dei Verbum). We are called to actively participate liturgically
in Christ’s holy self-offering on the Cross to the Father through the Holy
Spirit (Sacrosanctum Concilium). As members of Christ’s eschatological
people and his mystical Body, we receive the holy gifts of Christ’s teach-
ing, sacraments, and hierarchical order that enable us, in a manner that is
ever in need of renewal and reform, to share in his priestly, prophetic, and
royal mission (Lumen Gentium). Lastly, in the midst of the unique pas-
toral developments, challenges, and opportunities of the modern world,
we attain in Jesus Christ to the graced fulfillment of the world’s highest
aspirations (Gaudium et Spes).
The first four chapters are arranged to show the interrelatedness of the
four Constitutions with respect to Christ and the Church. Dei Verbum
comes first, because without God’s self-revelation in Christ nothing else
would follow; then comes Sacrosanctum Concilium, since the Eucharist
builds the Church by uniting us in and through Christ’s Pasch; then Lu-
men Gentium on the Church as participating in Christ’s offices of priest,
prophet, and king, and finally Gaudium et Spes on the Church in the
modern world that (often without knowing it) yearns for the fulfillment
that Christ brings.23 In this order, the four chapters engage with funda-
mental theology (Dei Verbum), liturgical theology (Sacrosanctum Con-
cilium), ecclesiology (Lumen Gentium), and theological anthropology
(Gaudium et Spes). I devote a fifth and final chapter to reflecting upon

23. Other authors order the four Constitutions differently; I defend my ordering further in
chapter 5. I use the translations of Dei Verbum and of the first part of Gaudium et Spes that are
found in Vatican Council II, vol. 1, The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, rev. ed., ed. Austin
Flannery, OP (Northport, N.Y.: Costello Publishing, 1996); while for Sacrosanctum Concilium,
Lumen Gentium, and the second part of Gaudium et Spes, I use the translations found in Decrees of
the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2, Trent to Vatican II, ed. Norman P. Tanner, SJ (Washington, D.C.:
Georgetown University Press, 1990). I have chosen to employ both of the two standard compen-
diums of the documents of Vatican II in English (although I also consult the Latin texts directly).

I nt ro d uct i o n 11
contemporary scholarly orientations to the Council and its texts. In this
fifth chapter, I focus upon two representative, but contrasting, perspec-
tives on the Council set forth by Robert Imbelli and Massimo Faggioli.24
I argue that Imbelli’s perspective accurately unfolds the Council and its
reception, because Imbelli emphasizes the centrality of Christ for the
whole Council and for the ongoing theological debates that surround it.
In this way, Imbelli’s perspective is attuned to the centrality of personal
and cognitive-propositional revelation of Christ, active participation in
Christ’s liturgical self-offering, true reform of the Church so as to allow
Christ’s enduring gifts to shine forth, and the orientation of human na-
ture to graced fulfillment in Christ. Latourelle, Bouyer, Congar, and de
Lubac would have recognized and approved Imbelli’s approach, which
succeeds by refusing to float free of the actual theological soil in which
Vatican II germinated.
The four theological themes highlighted in my book inform the other
twelve documents of the Council, which I do not have space to treat. Thus,
the relationship of person/encounter and cognitive-propositional know-
ing is an underlying issue in Inter Mirifica, Gravissimum Educationis, and
Optatam Totius; true and false reform is an underlying issue in Orientalium
Ecclesiarum, Perfectae Caritatis, and Unitatis Redintegratio; active partici-
pation is an underlying issue in Christus Dominus, Presbyterorum Ordinis,
and Apostolicam Actuositatem; and the relationship of nature and grace, or
Church and world, is an underlying issue in Ad Gentes, Nostra Aetate, and
Dignitatis Humanae. These four theological themes (or, better, realities)
converge in broader themes or realities, such as the universal call to holi-
ness, the history of salvation, ecumenical and interreligious reconciliation,
and the communion that God wills for his people in Christ and the Holy
Spirit. Holiness and communion in history are another way of speaking of
the Person and work of Jesus Christ, in whom all the themes of Vatican II
have their center: “when the Counselor comes, whom I shall send you from
the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will
bear witness to me, and you also are witnesses” (Jn 15:26–27). The Council’s

24. Imbelli was a seminarian at the Gregorian University in Rome during the four years of the
Council, and among his teachers was Latourelle. Both Imbelli and Faggioli are well known scholars
who also publish frequently in popular venues such as Commonweal.

12 I n t ro d uction
ecumenical passion, its affirmation of religious liberty, its love for the Jew-
ish people, its respect for other religions, its commitment to a historically
conscious faith that does not fear the modern world, its effort to enhance
participatory communion within the Church, its universal call to holiness,
its Mariology, its insistence upon evangelization—all these follow from the
Council’s proclamation of Jesus Christ, no mere abstraction but a living
Person.25
According to the four Constitutions, Jesus reveals God to us: he is the
human face of God, and he reveals God in a manner suited to our mode
of knowing, since he teaches us by words and performs deeds that are in-
telligible to us (though mystagogically inexhaustible). We receive divine
revelation within the communion of a people (Israel and the Church)
called and gathered to share in Christ’s Paschal offering to the Father by
the Holy Spirit, and God’s revelatory words and deeds are never separated
from the interpretative matrix of this liturgical people, who are guided
by the ascended Lord and his Spirit. Jesus Christ is the measure of true
reform of the Church: true reform always deepens the relationship of the
whole body of Christ to its head. True reform refines and renovates the
merely human elements and limited perspectives that, however useful at
an earlier time in history, now impede believers from attaining to their
full unity and stature in Christ. The active participation of the laity in
25. For eighteenth-century background to Vatican II, relevant for almost all the domains de-
scribed in this paragraph, see Shaun Blanchard, “ ‘Proto-Ecumenical’ Catholic Reform in the Eigh-
teenth Century: Lodovico Muratori as a Forerunner of Vatican II,” Pro Ecclesia 25 (2016): 71–89.
Blanchard sums up Muratori’s contribution: “First, his theology succumbed neither to Enlight-
enment rationalism nor to Catholic movements that were ultimately suppressed, he approached
problems with historical consciousness, and he had a ‘proto-ecumenical’ spirit. Second, Muratori
was deeply Christocentric, and in this he anticipated the Council and especially Dei Verbum. Third,
he was a forerunner of Sacrosanctum Concilium by advocating lay liturgical participation and com-
prehension. Fourth, Muratori critiqued devotions to Mary and the saints that obscured Christo-
centrism, scandalized Protestants, and encouraged superstition. In this he also anticipated Vatican
II, and particularly Lumen Gentium” (ibid., 89). As Ulrich L. Lehner has demonstrated, Vatican II
should be read in light of the Tridentine reform as mediated by the Catholic Enlightenment, with-
out thereby neglecting the contributions of the Baroque scholastic theologians. See Lehner’s The
Catholic Enlightenment: The Forgotten History of a Global Movement (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2016); Lehner, On the Road to Vatican II: German Catholic Enlightenment and Reform of the
Church (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2016). See also Paola Vismara, “Lodovico Antonio
Muratori (1672–1750): Enlightenment in a Tridentine Mode,” in Enlightenment and Catholicism
in Europe: A Transnational History, ed. Jeffrey D. Burson and Ulrich L. Lehner (Notre Dame, Ind.:
University of Notre Dame Press, 2014), 249–68.

I n t ro d uct i o n 13
the liturgy and in the Church has as its purpose full configuration to the
Passover of Christ, the members with the Head, so as to share in Christ’s
Resurrection. The profound relationship between nature and grace flows
from the fact that Christ, as the eternal Word, is the Creator of the world
and the world was made for fulfillment in Christ. In Christ, fallen hu-
man nature, wounded and subject to death, finds its true meaning and at-
tains its true expression in self-giving love for the sake of the world’s com-
munion with God. Thus the four theological themes highlighted in this
book illumine, in various ways, the Christ-centered reform and renewal
of the Church undertaken by the Second Vatican Council in the context
of the modern world.26
For a succinct introduction to the content and background of all six-
teen of the documents, I recommend Vatican II: Renewal within Tradi-
tion, but there are many other helpful one-volume or multivolume intro-
ductions to the contents of the sixteen documents.27 For exposition and
analysis of the behind-the-scenes debates and controversies among draft-
ers, as well as for the speeches on the floor of the Council and the role of
Popes John XXIII and Paul VI, readers should see detailed scholarly stud-
ies such as Jared Wicks’s writings on Dei Verbum, or multivolume works
such as the historical and theological commentary on the Council edited
by Herbert Vorgrimler (1966–1968), the five-volume history of the Coun-
cil edited by Giuseppe Alberigo (1995–2006), and the five-volume com-
mentary edited by Peter Hünermann and Bernd Jochen Hilberath (2004–
2006).28 A readable short history of the Council’s main events is John

26. See the important essay of Jean Galot, SJ, “Christ: Revealer, Founder of the Church, and
Source of Ecclesial Life,” trans. Leslie Wearne, in Vatican II: Assessment and Perspectives; Twenty-Five
Years After (1962–1987), vol. 1, ed. René Latourelle, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1988), 385–406.
After detailing the Christocentrism of Dei Verbum, Lumen Gentium, Sacrosanctum Concilium, and
Gaudium et Spes, Galot concludes: “There is no christomonism here, for the Council is careful to
place Christ within the divine plan of salvation. The Son is sent by the Father and acts through the
Holy Spirit. Moreover, his predominant action in the life of the Church does not curb the activity of
the members of his body, but tends rather to develop it as much as possible” (ibid., 403).
27. See Philippe J. Roy, Bibliographie du Concile Vatican II (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice
Vaticana, 2012).
28. Jared Wicks, SJ, “Dei Verbum Developing: Vatican II’s Revelation Doctrine, 1963–1964,”
in The Convergence of Theology: A Festschrift Honoring Gerald O’Collins, S.J., ed. Daniel Kendall, SJ,
and Stephen T. Davis (New York: Paulist Press, 2001), 109–25. Jared Wicks, SJ, “Pieter Smulders
and Dei Verbum,” 5 Parts, Gregorianum 82 (2001): 247–97; 82 (2001): 559–93; 83 (2003): 225–67;

14 I n t ro d uc tion
O’Malley’s What Happened at Vatican II, although one should be aware
of the theological perspective that informs O’Malley’s work.29 If one reads
German, one has available the short history authored by Knut Wenzel or
the lengthier work, with analysis of the postconciliar period, by Otto Her-
mann Pesch.30 Numerous instructive diaries penned during the Council
have also been published in recent years, including those of Gérard Philips,

85 (2004): 242–77; 86 (2005): 92–134. Jared Wicks, SJ, “Dei Verbum under Revision, March–April
1964: Contributions of Charles Moeller and Other Belgian Theologians,” in The Belgian Contribu-
tion to the Second Vatican Council, ed. Doris Donnelly, Joseph Famerée, Mathijs Lamberigts, and
Karim Schelkens (Leuven: Peeters, 2008), 460–94. Jared Wicks, SJ, “Six Texts by Prof. Joseph
Ratzinger as Peritus before and during Vatican Council II,” Gregorianum 89 (2008): 233–311. Jared
Wicks, SJ, “Vatican II on Revelation—From behind the Scenes,” Theological Studies 71 (2010):
637–50. Jared Wicks, SJ, “Scripture Reading Urged Vehementer (Dei Verbum no. 25): Background
and Development,” in 50 Years On: Probing the Riches of Vatican II, ed. David G. Schultenover,
SJ (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2015), 365–90. Herbert Vorgrimler, ed., Commentary on
the Documents of Vatican II, 5 vols. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1967–1969). Giuseppe Alberi-
go, ed., History of Vatican II, 5 vols, English version ed. Joseph A. Komonchak, (Leuven: Peeters,
1995–2006). Peter Hünermann and Bernd Jochen Hilberath, ed., Herders theologischer Kommentar
zum Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzil, 5 vols. (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 2004–2006). See also,
for further theological and historical analysis, four recent edited volumes: El Concilio Vaticano
II: Una perspectiva teologica, ed. Vicente Vide and José R. Villar (Madrid: San Pablo, 2013), with
essays by Luis Ladaria, SJ, Salvador Pié-Ninot, and others; La théologie catholique entre intransi-
geance et renouveau. La reception des mouvements préconciliaires à Vatican II, ed. Gilles Routhier,
Philippe J. Roy, and Karim Schelkens (Leuven: College Erasme / Universiteitsbibliotheek, 2011);
Erinnerung an die Zukunft. Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil. Werweiterte und aktualisierte Auflage,
ed. Jan-Heiner Tück (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 2013), with essays by Thomas Prügl, Marianne
Schlosser, and others; and Zweites Vatikanisches Konzil. Programmatik—Rezeption—Vision, ed.
Christoph Böttigheimer (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 2014).
29. John W. O’Malley, SJ, What Happened at Vatican II (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer-
sity Press, 2008). For concerns about O’Malley’s book, see John M. McDermott, SJ’s erudite “Did
That Really Happen at Vatican II? Reflections on John O’Malley’s Recent Book,” Nova et Vetera 8
(2010): 425–66.
30. Knut Wenzel, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil: Eine Einführung (Freiburg: Herder, 2014);
Otto Hermann Pesch, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil: Vorgeschichte—Verlauf—Ergebnisse—Nach-
geschichte (Ostfildern: Matthias Grünewald, 2001). See also Giuseppe Alberigo’s less accurate A
Brief History of Vatican II, trans. Matthew Sherry (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2006). Richard
Schenk, OP, cautions: “Alberigo identifies his circle of friends and mentors with the majority. Free-
ly awarded modifiers, bluntly separating ‘fortunate’ from ‘unfortunate’ developments at the Coun-
cil, underline the personal stance behind the book, based on memories of personal involvement in
the events by the late author and his wife, Angelina Nicora, whose journals are cited here at length
as authoritative. The book presents the majority’s successful interventions with the pope as some-
thing altogether positive. By contrast, the minority’s occasionally successful interventions with the
pope are portrayed as nefarious and opposed to the conciliar dynamic. Official and spontaneous
subgroups of the majority are portrayed as pro-conciliar; those of the minority, as anti-conciliar”
(Schenk, “Gaudium et Spes: The Task before Us,” Nova et Vetera 8 [2010]: 323–35, at 325).

I nt ro d uct i o n 15
Otto Semmelroth, Pieter Smulders, Yves Congar, and Henri de Lubac.
For the purposes of this book, I presume that readers know the ba-
sic history of the Council: Pope John XXIII’s decision in 1959 to call an
ecumenical Council and its opening on October 11, 1962; the conflict,
which especially marked the early stages of the Council, between Roman
neo-scholastic theologians and (often younger) Belgian, French, and Ger-
man theologians of the nouvelle théologie; Pope John’s death on June 3,
1963, and the election of Pope Paul VI, who as Giovanni Montini had al-
ready been collaborating closely with Pope John; the debating and repeated
re-drafting of each conciliar document by Commissions composed mainly
of bishops assisted by theological experts (periti);31 the gradual promulga-
tion of the first five conciliar documents, starting with Sacrosanctum Con-
cilium, between December 1963 and November 1964; the promulgation of
the final eleven conciliar documents in late fall 1965; and the closing of the
Council on December 8, 1965.
Speaking as a historian, John O’Malley sharply criticizes efforts to en-
gage the teachings of Vatican II that “[s]tick to the final sixteen documents
and pay no attention to the historical context, the history of the texts, or
the controversies concerning them during the council.”32 As the son of
an accomplished historian, I value historical work and historical-critical
analysis of the contexts in which texts were written. In my view, theolo-
gians should integrate the fruits of historical work into properly theologi-
cal modes of reflection on the Council. I consider that the Council best
comes alive today through contact with its insistence upon the centrality
of Christ and upon our Spirit-filled participation in Christ through Scrip-
ture, the liturgy, and evangelization. The centrality of Christ has ramifica-
tions for the distribution of power in the Church, as can be seen especially
in the case of true reform.33 Yet, in the Council’s own focus on Christ,
31. On the role of the periti, see Jared Wicks, SJ, “Theologians at Vatican Council II,” in
Wicks, Doing Theology (New York: Paulist Press, 2009), 187–223. See also Personenlexikon zum
Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzil ed. Michael Quisinsky and Peter Walter (Freiburg: Herder, 2012).
32. John W. O’Malley, SJ, “Ten Surefire Ways to Mix Up the Teaching of Vatican II,” in
O’Malley, Catholic History for Today’s Church: How Our Past Illuminates Our Present (Lanham,
Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 2015), 109–13, at 112.
33. Summarizing the central thesis of his What Happened at Vatican II, O’Malley identi-
fies “three issues-under-the-issues” that are determinative for understanding the sixteen conciliar
documents: “(1) Under what circumstances is change appropriate in the church, and with what

16 I n t ro d uction
power dynamics take a firmly secondary place, important though the dis-
tribution of power is. Along these lines, Marc Ouellet insightfully points
out that “the Council is Christocentric, which immediately means Trini-
tarian. For Christ admits us into the Trinitarian communion. He comes in
the name of his Father; he speaks in the name of the Father; he communi-
cates to us the Spirit of his Father.”34
There are a number of limitations with my approach. For example, by
focusing on four distinct theological themes, I do not integrate the Con-
stitutions with one another as clearly as I might. Nor can I give equal at-
tention to all the themes about which the Council was passionate, such
as ecumenism.35 In addition, each of the first four chapters is inevitably

arguments can it be justified? (2) What is the relationship of center to periphery, which, put in
its most concrete form, is the relationship between the papacy (including the curia) and the rest
of the church, especially the bishops? (3) No matter how authority is distributed, what is the style
or model according to which it should be exercised?” (O’Malley, “What Happened and Did Not
Happen at Vatican II,” in Catholic History for Today’s Church, 115–32, at 118). All three of these un-
derlying issues have to do with true reform, and most importantly with the reform of power in the
Church. It seems to me that O’Malley thereby underestimates the importance of broader Christo-
logical and missiological dimensions of the Council.
34. Marc Cardinal Ouellet, Relevance and Future of the Second Vatican Council: Interviews
with Father Geoffroy de la Tousche, trans. Michael Donley and Joseph Fessio, SJ (San Francisco: Ig-
natius Press, 2013), 57. For a similar emphasis on Christocentricity, focusing on part 1 of Gaudium
et Spes, see Thomas Gertler, Jesus Christus - Die Antwort der Kirche auf die Frage nach dem Men-
schsein (Leipzig: St. Benno-Verlag, 1986).
35. For the ecumenical passion and fruitfulness of the Council, see for example Donald W.
Norwood, Reforming Rome: Karl Barth and Vatican II (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2015);
Yves Congar, OP, “Conquering Our Enmities,” in Steps to Christian Unity, ed. John A. O’Brien
(New York: Doubleday, 1964), 100–109; Timothy George, “Unitatis Redintegratio after Fifty Years:
A Protestant Reading,” Pro Ecclesia 25 (2016): 53–70; Jared Wicks, SJ, “Cardinal Willebrands’s
Contributions to Catholic Ecumenical Theology,” Pro Ecclesia 20 (2011): 6–27. See also Karl Barth,
Ad Limina Apostolorum: An Appraisal of Vatican II, trans. Keith R. Crim (Edinburgh: The Saint
Andrew Press, 1969); as well as such analyses as G. C. Berkouwer, The Second Vatican Council and
the New Catholicism, trans. Lewis B. Smedes (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1965); Cullmann,
Vatican Council II: The New Direction; and George A. Lindbeck, “The Second Vatican Council,”
Concordia Theological Monthly 34 ( January 1963): 19–24. Writing at the very outset of the Council,
Lindbeck already observes that “there has been a revolutionary change in the ecumenical atmo-
sphere,” and he concludes that “when the council is viewed in the broad sweep of history, there is
every reason to believe that it marks the conclusion of the Counter-Reformation epoch. For centu-
ries Roman Catholicism has, from the Reformation perspective, been moving further and further
away from its Christian foundations toward a more and more rigidly defensive authoritarianism,
toward increased papal power and Roman centralism, toward greater Mariolatry. Since Leo XIII
a countercurrent has intermittently flowed, leading to a greater freedom in the social and political
spheres and—especially in recent decades in Europe—to theological, liturgical and biblical reviv-

I n t ro d uct i o n 17
somewhat diffuse, since in each chapter I provide a detailed survery of
one conciliar Constitution and introduce an ongoing theological debate
without resolving it in a systematic fashion. Although I tried to match
an appropriate conciliar-era book with each of the four Constitutions,
there can be no one-to-one link between the thematical focus of the
conciliar-era book and the wide-ranging exposition that necessarily char-
acterizes each Constitution. Lastly, the detailed surveys of the four Con-
stitutions may put off advanced readers who are already well versed in the
Council, and my attention to the theological discussions and debates of
the conciliar era may put off introductory readers who simply want a brief
analytical digest of the Council.
By engaging the Council through four ongoing theological debates,
four cutting-edge conciliar-era books, and detailed surveys of the four
Constitutions, I wish to invite readers to think theologically with the
Council. Above all, I aim to draw the reader into the Council’s goals of fos-
tering encounter with the self-revealing God in Christ through the open-
ing up of Scripture, active participation in Christ’s self-offering, true eccle-
sial reform so as to intensify the communion in Christ of the whole people
of God, and appreciation of the graced ordering of all creatures to fulfill-
ment and unity in Christ in a manner that mandates a mutually enriching
dialogue of the Church with the world. At the heart of all this is Jesus of
Nazareth, who as the Messiah of Israel calls us to “come and see” and to
abide with him ( Jn 1:39), liturgically offers us his “blood of the covenant,
which is poured out for many” (Mk 14:24), constitutes us “a royal priest-
hood, a holy nation, God’s own people” (1 Pt 2:9), and frees the whole cre-
ation “from its bondage to decay” so that all things might share in “the
glorious liberty of the children of God” (Rom 8:21). As Ouellet sums up
the achievement of the Second Vatican Council: “The Church had to be
redefined starting from Christ, not on the basis of a sociological model or
of one particular state in the Church’s history.”36

als. The coming council, if it follows the lead of the preparatory work, will be basically on the side
of this renewal” (Lindbeck, “The Second Vatican Council,” 24). For summaries of the responses of
leading Protestant theologians to the Council, though from a perspective quite suspicious of Ca-
tholicism, see Leonardo De Chirico, Evangelical Theological Perspectives on Post–Vatican II Roman
Catholicism (New York: Peter Lang, 2003).
36. Ouellet, Relevance and Future of the Second Vatican Council, 38–39.

18 I n t ro d uc tion
 In short, I seek theological renewal, a new ressourcement in the spirit of
the theologians whose work inspired the Constitutions of Vatican II and
produced a rich aggiornamento.37 Renewal (or true reform) must steer be-
tween two poles: an ahistorical extrinsicism, for which no reform is ever
needed in the Church, and an atheological historicism, for which reform
is merely a matter of adjudicating power within ever-changing human con-
structs.38 Such renewal or reform is nourished by love for the living Person
of Jesus Christ, whose personal presence is mediated liturgically and doc-
trinally by the Church of the Holy Spirit, and who calls us to share in his life
and mission. As the Orthodox theologian Nicholas Denysenko remarks,
“The Council envisioned a significant body of Christians participating in
Christ’s eternal liturgy offered to God; having partaken of God by hearing
the proclamation of the Word and receiving Holy Communion, Christians
return to the world to bear Christ and contribute to society’s transforma-
tion and transfiguration into an icon of God’s kingdom.”39 This deeply chal-
lenging and deeply rewarding work of renewal is the central task of the on-
going theological event that is the Second Vatican Council.

37. The contrast between ressourcement and Thomistic modes of thought has been exagger-
ated, to the detriment of both. For a corrective, see Thomas G. Guarino, “Analogy and Vatican II:
An Overlooked Dimension of the Council?,” Josephinum Journal of Theology 22 (2015), forthcom-
ing. See also Thomas Joseph White, OP, “Gaudium et Spes,” in The Reception of Vatican II, ed. Mat-
thew L. Lamb and Matthew Levering, forthcoming; Yves Congar, OP, Situation et taches présentes
de la théologie (Paris: Cerf, 1967), 53; Joseph A. Komonchak, “Thomism and the Second Vatican
Council,” in Continuity and Plurality in Catholic Theology: Essays in Honor of Gerald A. McCool,
S.J., ed. Anthony J. Cernera (Fairfield, Conn.: Sacred Heart University Press, 1998), 53–73.
38. On these two poles, see Maurice Blondel, History and Dogma, trans. Alexander Dru, in
Blondel, The Letter on Apologetics and History and Dogma (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1994),
221–87.
39. Nicholas E. Denysenko, Liturgical Reform after Vatican II: The Impact on Eastern Ortho-
doxy (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2015), 37. Denysenko goes on to point out, “Ressource-
ment aimed to illuminate a more holistic ecclesial history so that the contemporary Church would
reform herself in light of her whole story. Vatican II did not inaugurate ressourcement, but the
Council employed and encouraged it. At the same time, ressourcement was and remains an ecu-
menical endeavor” (ibid., 38).

I nt ro d uct i o n 19
C h a p t e r 1

}
PERSONS AND
PROPOSITIONS
Dei Verbum in Context

In his 1992 remarks announcing the promulgation of the Catechism of

the Catholic Church, Joseph Ratzinger observes that the Catechism draws
its answers to the basic questions of human life from “observations tran-
scending the merely human, observations that transmit what was seen
and heard by men who were in contact with God himself.”1 Defending
the Catechism from the charge that its teachings fail to appreciate the
timebound and contextualized character of all expressions of Catho-
lic faith, Ratzinger emphasizes that the Church speaks about God (and
about humanity) on the basis of God’s self-revelation in Christ, as com-
municated faithfully in Scripture and Tradition. He states that “we can-
1. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, “What Can We Expect from a Catechism of the Catholic
Church?,” in his Gospel, Catechesis, Catechism: Sidelights on the Catechism of the Catholic Church
(San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1997), 9–22, at 14.

20
not speak rightly about God unless God himself tells us who he is,” and
he argues that the Catechism “is able to make all its affirmations about our
moral conduct only in the perspective of God, the God who has revealed
himself in Jesus Christ.”2
Ratzinger had advocated for a universal catechism since the 1970s, and
during the Extraordinary Synod of 1985, the assembled bishops voted to
commission a universal catechism. In explaining the bishops’ decision,
Ratzinger recalls a conversation from the early postconciliar period in
which Hans Urs von Balthasar advised Ratzinger: “Do not presuppose the
faith but propose it.”3 This advice was an awakening for Ratzinger, presum-
ably because he had always lived in a strongly Catholic culture. What he
learned from von Balthasar, he says, was that “[f ]aith is not maintained
automatically. It is not a ‘finished business’ that we can simply take for
granted. The life of faith has to be constantly renewed.”4
This insight seems surprisingly simple, but Ratzinger suggests that af-
ter the Council a number of bishops came in various ways to the same
awakening that von Balthasar’s letter had triggered for Ratzinger. He states,
“The bishops present at the 1985 Synod called for a universal catechism of
the whole Church because they sensed precisely what Balthasar had put
into words in his note to me.”5 In sum, the purpose of the Catechism was
to “propose” the faith by instructing believers about the content of divine
revelation as handed on in the Church under the guidance of the Holy
Spirit through Scripture and Tradition, because the fundamental content
of Catholic faith was in danger of being neglected, obscured, and forgotten.
The Catechism’s historical context, in which the bishops deemed that
a propositional restatement of the content of Catholic faith was neces-
sary, was largely the opposite of the context of the Second Vatican Coun-
cil’s Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, Dei Verbum. Dei Ver-
bum has its roots in a widespread and salutary determination, shared by

2. Ibid., 14–15. For strong concerns expressed by leading Catholic theologians in America
about a draft of the Catechism’s text, as well as doubts that a useful Catechism could ever be pro-
duced, see The Universal Catechism Reader: Reflections and Responses, ed. Thomas J. Reese, SJ (New
York: HarperCollins, 1990).
3. Ratzinger, “On the Meaning of Faith,” in Gospel, Catechesis, Catechism, 23–34, at 23.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid., 24.

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 21
the young Ratzinger and other leading theologians at the Council, to
replace a propositionalist understanding of revelation (revelation as a set
of revealed truths) with a personalist understanding of revelation as dy-
namic encounter with the living Lord and therefore as transformative of
the whole person rather than solely engaging the intellect.6 In critiquing
propositionalism, they sought to highlight the central place of Scripture
and its dialogue between God and his people as fundamental for the on-
going life of the Church. Thus, in his 1967 commentary on Dei Verbum,
Ratzinger remarks that “[o]ne of the most important events in the strug-
gle over the Constitution on Revelation was undoubtedly the liberation
from this narrow [neo-scholastic] view and the return to what actually
happens in the positive sources, before it was crystallized into doctrine,
when God ‘reveals’ himself.”7 In the same place, Ratzinger bemoans “how
little intellectualism and doctrinalism are able to comprehend the nature
of revelation, which is not concerned with talking about something that
is quite external to the person, but with the realization of the existence
of man, with the relation of the human ‘I’ to the divine ‘thou.’ ” 8 Against

6. See Joseph Ratzinger, “Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation: Origin and Back-
ground,” trans. William Glen Doepel, in Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, ed. Herbert
Vorgrimler, vol. 3 (New York: Crossroad, 1989), 155–66; Ratzinger, “Chapter 1: Revelation Itself,”
in Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, 170–80. From the same time period see also the
following two commentaries on Dei Verbum: Augustin Bea, The Word of God and Mankind, trans.
Dorothy White (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1967); Henri de Lubac, SJ, La Révélation Divine,
3rd ed. (Paris: Cerf, 1983), whose first edition appeared in 1968. For de Lubac’s book, Jean-Pierre
Torrell, OP, prepared the Latin text and French translation of Dei Verbum.
7. Ratzinger, “Chapter 1: Revelation Itself,” 170.
8. Ibid., 175. Ratzinger’s critiques of neo-scholasticism are balanced by his reflections about the
postconciliar period in an essay written less than a decade later: “Boldly and certain of victory, we
barricaded the door of a time that was past and proclaimed the abrogation and annihilation of all
that lay behind it. In conciliar and post-conciliar literature, there is abundant evidence of the ridi-
cule with which, like pupils ready for graduation, we bade farewell to our outmoded schoolbooks. In
the meantime, however, our ears and our souls have been pierced by a different kind of ridicule that
mocks more than we had wanted or wished. Gradually we have stopped laughing; gradually we have
become aware that behind the closed doors are concealed those things that we must not lose if we do
not want to lose our souls as well. Certainly we cannot return to the past, nor have we any desire to
do so. But we must be ready to reflect anew on that which, in the lapse of time, has remained the one
constant. To seek it without distraction and to dare to accept, with joyful heart and without diminu-
tion, the foolishness of truth—this, I think, is the task for today and for tomorrow: the true nucleus
of the Church’s service to the world” (Ratzinger, “On the Status of Church and Theology Today,” in
Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology, trans. Mary Frances Mc-
Carthy, SND [San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987], 367–93, at 393).

22 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
“intellectualism and doctrinalism,” which imagine that divine revelation
aims solely to deliver doctrinal truths, Ratzinger in 1967 states that “the
purpose of this dialogue [made possible by revelation] is ultimately not
information, but unity and transformation.”9
Taken together, Ratzinger’s remarks in 1967 and in 1992 underscore
that both the personal and the cognitive-propositional dimensions of di-
vine revelation are necessary. As Gerald O’Collins has shown (in accord
with Ratzinger’s own view), the latter dimension is enfolded within the for-
mer: “The interpersonal ‘dialogue,’ which is God’s self-communication, says
and communicates information. Through encountering the divine Truth in
person, human beings know new truths.”10 O’Collins’s formulation care-
fully unites the personal and cognitive-propositional elements of revela-
tion, showing that they must be inseparable (as they are in Scripture) if in
fact any real revelation has occurred. Just as one finds in Scripture itself,
O’Collins gives primacy to the dimension of personal encounter: “Rev-
elation [for Dei Verbum] primarily means meeting the Mystery of God in
person and only secondarily knowing the divine mysteries (plural and in
lowercase).”11 O’Collins contrasts this position with Vatican I’s Dei Filius,
which (in his words) understands “divine revelation to be primarily God
communicating the divine truths (plural).”12 Dei Filius, of course, was re-
sponding in its nineteenth-century context to currents of thought that
denied the existence (and even the possibility) of a cognitively knowable
and necessary supernatural revelation, the existence of which O’Collins
strongly defends.13

9. Ratzinger, “Chapter 1: Revelation Itself,” 175.

10. Gerald O’Collins, SJ, The Second Vatican Council: Message and Meaning (Collegeville,
Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2014), 142.
11. Ibid., 143. See also Die Wahrheit ist Person: Brennpunkte einer christologisch gewendeten
Dogmatik. Festschrift für Karl-Heinz Menke, ed. Julia Knop, Magnus Lerch, and Bernd J. Claret
(Regensburg: Verlag Friedrich Pustet, 2015).
12. O’Collins, The Second Vatican Council, 143.
13. See Dei Filius (Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith), chapters 2–3, in Decrees of
the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2, Trent to Vatican II, ed. Norman P. Tanner, SJ (Washington, D.C.:
Georgetown University Press, 1990), 804–11, at 806–8. Following Vatican I, theologians and
catechists worked intelligently to explicate and defend this teaching of Dei Filius. For the point
that the historico-personalist conception of revelation is fundamentally coherent with the scho-
lastic definition of revelation as locutio dei, see Andrew Meszaros, “Revelation in George Tyrrell,
Neo-Scholasticism, and Dei Verbum,” Angelicum 91 (2014): 535–68.

De i Ve r bum i n C o n t ext 23
 The question of the relationship of personal self-revelation and cog-
nitive-propositional content governs further positions that theologians
take today with regard to whether Scripture and dogma can adequately
(even if not exhaustively) express divine revelation. We see this, for in-
stance, in Lieven Boeve’s 2003 argument that Christianity “constitutes a
specific, always particular, context-determined and, in light of this con-
text, irreplaceable witness to that which transcends its witnessing.”14 For
Boeve, Christianity is a “witness” and thus a personal encounter with the
Transcendent, but the truth-status of its cognitive claims can be evaluated
only in terms of its own “particular narratives, concrete images and con-
textual thought patterns.”15 On this view, Christians bear a “witness” that
cannot lay claim to describing reality in an enduring and definitive way
for all humans prior to the eschaton, since divine Truth can be relational-
ly encountered and pointed toward, but is fundamentally inexpressible in
human words. Here Scripture functions as a springboard for Christians,
but not as an inspired means by which God personally communicates
trans-historical truth about himself for the purpose of human salvation.
The ongoing theological event of Dei Verbum, therefore, today consists
centrally in the effort to understand how the personal and the cognitive-
propositional relate in the revelation of the divine Mystery, a revelation
that is faithfully communicated in Scripture and Tradition and that in-
volves the action of God with his covenantal people, Israel, and the union
of believers with Christ through the Holy Spirit.16 In order to introduce
Dei Verbum as an ongoing theological event, this chapter first explores René

14. Lieven Boeve, Interrupting Tradition: An Essay on Christian Faith in a Postmodern Context
(Leuven: Peeters, 2003), 176.
15. Ibid.; cf. 175.
16. Only a deeper understanding of this relationship will enable scholars to meet the need iden-
tified by Brigid Curtin Frein, who remarks in a 1997 essay that “there is still need for a biblical schol-
arship that is distinctively Catholic. . . . Biblical scholars in the Church need to develop approaches
and methods that rest on the presupposition of faith” (Frein, “Scripture in the Life of the Church,”
in Vatican II: The Continuing Agenda, ed. Anthony J. Cernera [Fairfield, Conn.: Sacred Heart Uni-
versity Press, 1997], 71–87, at 83). See also Joseph Ratzinger, “Biblical Interpretations in Conflict:
On the Foundations and the Itinerary of Exegesis Today,” trans. Adrian Walker, in Opening Up the
Scriptures: Joseph Ratzinger and the Foundations of Biblical Interpretation, ed. José Granados, Carlos
Granados, and Luis Sánchez-Navarro (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2008), 1–29; Ignace de la
Potterie, SJ, “Interpretation of Holy Scripture in the Spirit in Which It Was Written (Dei Verbum
12c),” trans. Leslie Wearne, in Vatican II: Assessment and Perspectives; Twenty-Five Years After (1962–
1987), vol. 1, ed. René Latourelle, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1988), 220–66.

24 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
Latourelle’s Theology of Revelation, published in 1963. A young French-
Canadian professor of theology at the Gregorian University, Latourelle
had earned doctorates in history and theology and was later to become
dean of the Gregorian.17 In his book, he highlights the primacy of the
personal and existential dimensions of revelation, and he also underscores
the central place of inexhaustible mystery in revelation. At the same time,
he insists upon revelation’s cognitive or propositional content, without
which no true testimony to Jesus Christ would be possible. After present-
ing the main lines of Latourelle’s book, I survey the twenty-six paragraphs
of Dei Verbum with the relationship of personal-existential encounter and
cognitive-propositional content in view.

René Latourelle’s Theology of Revelation

René Latourelle’s Theology of Revelation begins with God’s Presence, and
specifically with God revealing himself to us in Jesus Christ. Citing He-
brews 1:1 and John 1:18, Latourelle states: “God is not an absent Presence. . . .
God broke the silence; God came out of His mystery; He addressed Him-
self to man and unveiled for him the secrets of His personal life; to man
He communicated His unheard-of plan for a covenant with man, offering
him a share in life. God, the living God, has spoken to humanity.”18 This
speaking—like all speaking—has cognitive content. But perhaps even more
important is the fact that “[t]he whole economy of salvation, in the order
of knowledge, rests upon this mystery of God’s self-manifestation in trust
and love.”19 God’s personal self-manifestation “is the original mystery” that
“communicates every other mystery.”20 There is a distinction, though not
a separation, between “the original mystery” (God’s personal Presence, no
longer hidden) and “every other mystery.” The cognitive content of faith
leads us back to the “original mystery” of the living God who personally
comes to meet human beings.

17. See also the essays in the Festschrift presented to Latourelle on the occasion of his sev-
entieth birthday: Gesù rivelatore. Teologia fondamentale, ed. Rino Fisichella (Casale Monferrato:
Piemme, 1988).
18. René Latourelle, SJ, Theology of Revelation (New York: Alba House, 1966), 13.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 25
 This “original mystery” has the character of an event, and thus cannot
be simply reduced to its cognitive expressions. Latourelle explains: “Scrip-
ture and tradition contain this word; the preaching of the Church trans-
mits it; the liturgy celebrates and actualizes it. But all this derives from
the original word spoken through God.”21 Revelation is one thing; the
transmission and actualization of its cognitive content is another. Even
if the cognitive content is the same, the experience of the event of revela-
tion—especially in the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ—is distinguished
by the existential directness by which God touched the humans to whom
he revealed himself. In the strictest sense, Latourelle defines “revelation”
as the “first intervention by which God comes out of His mystery, ad-
dresses Himself to humanity, and communicates His plan for salvation.”22
Although this “first intervention” is existentially distinguishable from
its written transmission, since it takes place fundamentally “under the
form of an encounter between two people” (God and the human being),
nonetheless revelation never lacks a cognitive-propositional aspect. For
Latourelle, in the Old Testament “revelation is presented primarily as the
experience of the activity of a sovereign power,” but “this activity is not a
brute display of power; it is always incorporated in words: this power is
the dialogue, the announcement, the explanation, the manifestation of a
plan.”23 For this reason, Latourelle argues that revelation in the Old Testa-
ment is consistently revelation of the word of God. It is a cognitive com-
munication, even though as an existential experience it is certainly more
than that—as for instance in Moses’s experience of awe at Sinai.
This emphasis on revelation as communicating God’s word fits with
the cognitive communication that we find in Scripture, which is the word
of God written down in a fixed form. Regarding the relationship of rev-
elation and (Israel’s) Scripture, Latourelle states: “This fixed format made
it possible to read and meditate the word of God, to contemplate His
faithful accomplishment of His promises. In its written form, the word
of God takes on a quality of durability and eternity: it abides, irrevoca-
ble and infallible. On the other hand, in its fixed form, it runs the risk

21. Ibid., 15. 22. Ibid.

23. Ibid., 22.

26 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
of losing something of the dynamism that it had in the prophets.”24 This
“dynamism” experienced by the prophets is what Latourelle has in view
when he speaks of revelation in the strictest sense, as the event of personal
encounter with the self-manifesting God. Yet revelation is always an expe-
rience with cognitive-propositional content, and therefore the cognitive
content—written down in Scripture—is the word of God just as much
as the original dynamic communication was. Latourelle remarks that the
written word regains its dynamic dimension when it is “actualized and ap-
plied to new situations in history, by a constant re-reading, which is itself
the key to a new depth of understanding.”25
Latourelle differentiates the cognitive content of the word of God
from purely abstract, impersonal propositions. Citing a number of Old
Testament texts that refer to God’s word or dabar, he finds that God’s
word is “not the pure expression of abstract ideas; it is full of meaning,
it has a noetic content, resulting from a man’s concentration on an object
or the rising up within him of thoughts which seize upon him, but at the
same time it expresses a state of soul; something of his soul impregnates
the spoken, articulated word.”26 This “state of soul” is characteristic of
revelation as a personal encounter or event. For Latourelle, therefore, the
investigation of divine revelation must aim not simply at determining the
revealed truths found in the deposit of faith, but at identifying and par-
ticipating in the existential energy produced by the event of revelation.
He explains: “For Israel, the word possesses a double force: noetic and
dynamic. . . . [T]he word is an active force whose dynamism is rooted in
the very dynamism of the person who pronounces it. It is hardly distinct
from the person whose mode of being and activity it represents.”27 To ap-
prehend God’s personal revelation, then, one must apprehend cognitive
content (revealed truths), but at the same time one must also come into
real contact with the “active force” or personal “dynamism” of God, since
revelation is “the mystery of a personal meeting between the living God
and man.”28 If so, then surely the communication of divine revelation re-
quires not only doctrinal teaching but also something more, something

24. Ibid., 29. 25. Ibid.

26. Ibid. 27. Ibid., 30.
28. Ibid., 31.

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 27
that conveys the existential dynamism of personal encounter with God.
Latourelle’s understanding of prophecy is important here. The proph-
ets often discern and interpret God’s actions in history. Their inspired in-
terpretation renders God’s actions intelligible as revelation. As Latourelle
observes, “The God of the Old Testament is a God who intervenes, and
the prophet is the man who meditates upon these interventions, who
grasps and proclaims their meaning for salvation. . . . If the realization of
salvation in history is already the word of God, the precise content of this
word becomes intelligible only through the word of the prophet.”29 God’s
actions in history are already in themselves “the word of God,” but the
prophetic interpretation is needed for the communication of the word
of God.
Similarly, Jesus Christ’s revelation of God by his deeds cannot be
separated from his words, which carry divine authority. Latourelle com-
ments that Jesus “speaks, preaches, teaches, testifies to what He has seen
and heard in the bosom of the Father,” and therefore he is “the summit
and fullness of revelation.”30 With regard to the apostolic mediation of
Christ’s revelatory words and deeds, Latourelle emphasizes their witness
and testimony. The apostles’ direct experience of revelation, and their re-
sponse of faith, made them true witnesses to the Word. Latourelle states:
“Witness is thus the activity proper to those who have seen and heard
Christ, who have lived in intimacy with Him and, as a result, possess a
direct and living experience of His person, His doctrine, and His work.”31
The deposit of revelation in New Testament Scripture and apostolic Tra-
dition comes from this witness of the apostles, which includes both the
communication of cognitive content and the fruit of existentially having
lived in such close contact with the Word. The unique apostolic status
belongs also to Paul, since Paul encountered the risen Christ directly and
was taught by Christ.
In Christ, God reveals his glorious plan for humans, a plan that Paul
calls a “mystery” and whose cognitive content is the truths of the gospel.
To understand this content at a deep level requires the Holy Spirit, not
least because one needs charity in order to be able to appreciate Christ’s
29. Ibid., 35. 30. Ibid., 45.
31. Ibid., 53.

28 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
charity. As Latourelle remarks, “The mystery reveals an abyss of wisdom
and love,” and it calls for the response of faith and love.32 Since Christ
is the incarnate Word, Latourelle emphasizes that Christ “is ontologi-
cally qualified as the only perfect Revealer.”33 Indeed, the Gospel of John
makes clear that the Word incarnate, in revealing the Father, reveals that
of which the Word himself is a witness. Only the Word can be such a
witness, since only the Word knows the Father intimately. Even in being
rejected by the world, Christ testifies to the supreme love of the Father.
In turn, the apostles bear testimony to Christ, because they knew Christ
intimately and because Christ and the Spirit enable them to perform
works of power. The Father testifies to Christ by giving him mighty works
to perform and by uniting humans to Christ in faith by the Holy Spirit.
Latourelle concludes that for the Gospel of John, “testimony, whether
it is interior or exterior, is aimed at faith; it is essentially an invitation
to believe. . . . [T]his testimony is an activity which involves the entire
Trinity.”34
Latourelle engages briefly with Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange’s De Rev-
elatione.35 Garrigou-Lagrange defines revelation as the word of God that
is freely taught by God. God the teacher reveals what was hidden to our
knowledge, and we receive it as taught by God, since God gives us a super-
natural light that enables us to assent with certitude to his word as divine
teaching. In response to Garrigou-Lagrange’s position, Latourelle argues
that testimony, rather than teaching, would be a more scriptural and per-
sonal way of conceiving the communication of the word of God, because
it allows more clearly for interpersonal event and historical development
of doctrine.36

32. Ibid., 66. 33. Ibid., 73.

34. Ibid., 76.
35. See Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, De Revelatione per Ecclesiam catholicam proposita, 2
vols. (Rome: F. Ferrari, 1950). For a much fuller, appreciative summation of this significant work,
see Aidan Nichols, OP, Reason with Piety: Garrigou-Lagrange in the Service of Catholic Thought
(Naples, Fla.: Sapientia Press, 2008), chapters 2–3.
36. See Latourelle, Theology of Revelation, 211. Latourelle states, “It is true that revelation
teaches something that must be handed down as a body of doctrine. Still, what makes it specific as
word is not knowledge but faith. In the genus of word, it belongs to the species of testimony rather
than to the species of teaching” (ibid.). The context of Dei Filius and the particular problems to
which it responds are central for Garrigou-Lagrange’s emphasis on divine teaching.

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 29
 Latourelle agrees with the then-current complaints about the neo-
scholastic treatment of revelation. He notes that “de Lubac, Danielou, Fes-
sard, Bouillard, Von Balthasar, take a stand against a certain intellectualism
which tends to make Christian revelation a communication of a system of
ideas rather than the manifestation of a Person who is Truth in Person.”37
He adds that according to de Lubac, “the majority of theologians are con-
tent to treat revelation with a quick, superficial view, frequently reducing it
to a series of detached propositions.”38 Latourelle himself critically observes
that neo-scholastic theologians “insist much more on the revealed truths
than on God who both reveals and is revealed. They preserve an astonish-
ing reserve on the interpersonal relationship which revelation establishes
between God and men. These deficiencies, to all appearances, arise for the
most part from an inadequate consideration of the data of Scripture.”39
God’s personal presence, God’s making himself known in an intimate and
dialogic way, is the central element of divine revelation, and this interper-
sonal dimension is easily obscured by focusing on the set of revealed truths
that God teaches.
With the interpersonal dimension firmly in view, Latourelle organizes
his own constructive proposal for the theology of revelation under three
headings: word, testimony, and encounter. First, with regard to “word,”
he remarks that the neo-Thomists (and the scholastics more generally)
focus on word or speech as “the unveiling of the thought which is ef-
fected through the word and on the sharing of knowledge which is thus
realized.”40 He finds that this way of thinking about the word is “a rather
static conception” because it lacks an appreciation for “the interpersonal,
existential, dynamic, and out-going character of the word.”41 The result is
an overly intellectual account of revelation, lacking a fully historical and
personal context. Distinguishing revelation from the simple communica-
tion of true propositions about divine realities, Latourelle observes that
“word is not only simple information or instruction: it becomes expres-

37. Latourelle, Theology of Revelation, 213.

38. Ibid. See Henri de Lubac, SJ, “Le problème du développement du dogme,” Recherches de
science religieuse 35 (1948): 130–60, at 153–55. De Lubac’s position here seems exaggerated.
39. Latourelle, Theology of Revelation, 212. 40. Ibid., 316.
41. Ibid.

30 D ei Ver b um in Conte x t
sion (in the sense that we say an act can express ourselves), revelation of
person, testimony regarding self.”42 We put ourselves into our words, so
that our words communicate not only truths, but the “personal mystery”
of our very selves. Our words are likewise addressed to the personal mys-
tery of those whom we are engaging.
This interpersonal element is especially important when, as in biblical
revelation, the revealer is revealing not simply propositional truths, but
his very self. God’s act of revelation cannot be separated from proposi-
tional truths. As the free revelation of the divine Persons to human per-
sons, however, it is more than a set of truths about God and human be-
ings. Latourelle comments that the volitional and affective dimensions
necessarily join the intellectual dimension here: “When word attains this
level, it is the sign of friendship and love; it is the welling up and expres-
sion of a freedom which opens to another person and thus gives itself.”43
In giving knowledge about himself, Christ “gives himself in a communion
of love.”44 Furthermore, Christ offers gestures or deeds that expand the
notion of teaching beyond the limits of propositional truth. In Christ’s
Cross, for example, “the articulated word becomes the immolated word”;
the love of God is so great that it can be fully communicated, ultimately,
only in the silence of “the outstretched arms and the body drained of its
blood,” although Christ’s preaching prepared the disciples to understand
his gift of self on the Cross.45
Having treated “word,” Latourelle secondly addresses “testimony,”
namely the testimony of the prophets and the testimony of Christ, “the
Witness par excellence.”46 Latourelle explains that “[w]hat the apostles
hand down to the Church is a testimony, a deposition of witnesses.”47 Con-
ceiving of revelation in terms of testimony gives us a better appreciation
of its historical embeddedness. Far from being solely a communication
of propositions, revelation depends upon witnesses who not only know
the truths intellectually but have experienced the truths personally. In
receiving this testimony, we place our trust in persons whose authority

42. Ibid., 317. 43. Ibid.

44. Ibid. 45. Ibid., 319–20.
46. Ibid., 320. In turn, the Father testifies to the Son, as does the Spirit.
47. Ibid.

De i Ve r bum i n Co n t ext 31
we accept, since we have reason to believe that they testify about things
that they are in a position to know. Latourelle explains that “[w]hereas
demonstration makes its primary appeal to the intelligence, testimony,
since it calls for an intensity of trust which is measured by the values that
are risked on its behalf, enlists not only the intelligence, but also, in dif-
ferent degrees, the will and love.”48 He points out that there is always a
risk involved in trusting human testimony, given the variability of human
knowledge and truthfulness.
When Christ teaches about “the mystery of the life of the Divine Per-
sons” as well as “the mystery of our new status as sons,” this teaching is
testimony; we are called to believe it on Christ’s (divine) authority. When
we believe, we do not merely know new propositional information, but
rather we are joined in a relationship of friendship with the one who tes-
tifies, in “a confidence of love.”49 The miraculous signs that accompany
Christ’s testimony serve to assure us that the one who testifies is the living
God, whose word is truth. When God moves us interiorly in faith, how-
ever, we assent to Christ’s testimony based solely upon the authority of
the God who testifies.
Third, Latourelle discusses revelation as “encounter.” He observes
that an encounter “can attain different degrees of depth.”50 When God
speaks his word, we must respond in faith in order to encounter God.
Latourelle explains, “When man opens his heart to God who speaks,
shares in his thinking, lets himself be filled and directed by it, God and
man meet each other, and this encounter develops into a communion of
life.”51 Revelation, then, is an I-Thou encounter only when God’s word
implants faith in the one who responds. Put another way, one’s embrace
of the cognitive-propositional content of the divine communication is
completed “by the encounter with the living and personal God.”52 The
point, here again, is that the propositional and personal dimensions of di-
vine revelation are inseparable. We are drawn to assent to Christ’s teach-
ing because of the love that he shows us (preeminently on the Cross), and
thus a relationship is begun, a relationship that involves knowing but also

48. Ibid., 322. 49. Ibid., 323.

50. Ibid., 325. 51. Ibid.
52. Ibid.

32 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
involves self-sacrificial loving: “The very love with which the Father loves
the Son and the Son loves the Father has now taken root in the heart of
man.”53
To understand divine revelation, then, we must always see its true
propositions in the covenantal and historical context of the divine Lover
reaching out to the Beloved through the testimony of Christ and of the
prophets and apostles. We cannot simply set forth the truths of divine rev-
elation without reference to the interpersonal communion of faith and
love that enables us to be united personally to the tri-personal Presence of
God. In sum, fully embracing the propositional content of divine revela-
tion requires that we consistently view these propositions within their in-
terpersonal context, as befits the words of self-revealing Persons.

A Survey of Dei Verbum: Persons and Propositions

Let me now investigate how Dei Verbum’s twenty-six paragraphs present
divine revelation, and how the personal and cognitive-propositional di-
mensions of revelation relate according to Dei Verbum. Does Dei Verbum
retain the balance achieved by Latourelle, or does Dei Verbum empha-
size the personal encounter at the expense of the cognitive-propositional
content, or vice versa? I should note that Dei Verbum begins with a
one-paragraph Prologue, which is followed by chapter 1 on divine revela-
tion itself (paragraphs 2–6), chapter 2 on the transmission of divine rev-
elation (paragraphs 7–10), chapter 3 on the inspiration and interpretation
of Scripture (paragraphs 11–13), chapter 4 on the Old Testament (para-
graphs 14–16), chapter 5 on the New Testament (paragraphs 17–20), and
chapter 6 on Scripture in the life of the Church (paragraphs 21–26).
The Prologue of Dei Verbum (paragraph 1) places the entire docu-
ment under the rubric of a deeply personal and historical understand-
ing of revelation, though without negating the place of propositional
truth. The Council Fathers describe themselves as “hearing the word of
God with reverence, and proclaiming it with faith” (§1).54 To hear and

53. Ibid., 327.

54. Quotations are from Dei Verbum, in Vatican Council II, vol. 1, The Conciliar and Post Con-
ciliar Documents, rev. ed., ed. Austin Flannery, OP (Northport, N.Y.: Costello Publishing, 1996),

De i Ve r bum i n Co n t ext 33
proclaim something in faith requires the expression of revealed truths to
which the mind assents. Yet the Council Fathers’ stance vis-à-vis the word
of God is also resonant of personal relationship, of ongoing encounter
and event. The biblical quotation that immediately follows cements this
sense of revelation as an experiential encounter with Christ and thereby
also as a fellowship with the Trinity who unites the community of be-
lievers. The biblical text comes from 1 John 1:2–3: “We proclaim to you
the eternal life which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—
that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you
may have fellowship with us; and our fellowship is with the Father and
with his Son Jesus Christ” (§1). This sense of personal encounter with the
self-revealing Word is intensified by the first verse of 1 John 1, implied in
the verses quoted: “That which was from the beginning, which we have
heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and
touched with our hands, concerning the word of life” (1 Jn 1:1). Revela-
tion as word, testimony, and encounter—in Latourelle’s formula—could
not be more evident here. The personal dimension of revelation stands at
the center, given the Council Fathers’ identification with St. John as fel-
low witnesses to the revealed word.
Immediately after the quotation from 1 John, the Council Fathers go
on to present themselves as “[f ]ollowing in the steps of the Councils of
Trent and Vatican I” (§1). These two earlier Councils are known for defin-
ing particular truths of faith that belong to the deposit of revelation; for
example, doctrines regarding the Eucharist, justification, faith and reason,
and papal infallibility. Thus the dual recognition that revelation is a per-
sonal encounter that involves fellowship or communion, and that revela-
tion contains cognitive-propositional content, shapes the Prologue of Dei
Verbum. Indeed, as the Prologue says, “this Synod wishes to set forth the
true doctrine [genuinam . . . doctrinam] of divine revelation and its trans-
mission.” Such true doctrine could be set forth only if revelation itself,
within the community established by the self-revealing God, communi-
cated doctrinal truths.

750–65. I have occasionally modified capitalization to configure it to the Latin text (as I have done
here by lowercasing “Word”).

34 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
 The next five paragraphs of Dei Verbum, §§2–6 (chapter 1), exhibit the
ways in which personal encounter/communion and the communication
of cognitive-propositional content are integrally united. Drawing upon
Ephesians 1:9, Dei Verbum §2 states, “It pleased God, in his goodness and
wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known the mystery of his will.”
In revealing himself, he reveals truths about himself; just as in making
“known the mystery of his will,” God makes known truths about God’s
plan for humanity. At the same time, the phrase “the mystery of his will”
comes from Ephesians 1:9, and includes the volitional, transformative di-
mension of revelation. As Dei Verbum §2 observes, “His will was that men
should have access to the Father, through Christ, the Word made flesh, in
the Holy Spirit, and thus become sharers in the divine nature.” Revelation
transforms us and draws us into the divine communion. This emphasis on
revelation as establishing a friendship with God appears in the next sen-
tence of Dei Verbum §2: “By this revelation, then, the invisible God (cf.
Col. 1:15; 1 Tim. 1:17), from the fullness of his love, addresses men as his
friends (cf. Ex. 33:11; Jn. 15:14–15), and moves among them (cf. Bar. 3:38),
in order to invite and receive them into his own company.”
Dei Verbum §2 continues by noting that in the “economy of revela-
tion,” both words and deeds are important, and neither is separable from
the other. The communication of revelation involves the communication
of truth about the mysteries or realities of faith, but this communication
is always bound up with deeds. In this vein, Dei Verbum §2 remarks that
“the works performed by God in the history of salvation show forth and
bear out the doctrine and realities signified by the words; the words, for
their part, proclaim the works, and bring to light the mystery they con-
tain.” This way of phrasing it avoids focusing solely on either the deeds or
the words, and it underscores that revealed doctrine has to do with mys-
teries, with transcendent realities. Without exhaustively apprehending
these mysteries, the words—preeminently those of Jesus Christ—reveal
the saving truth about the realities that Christians confess in faith.
In accord with its appreciation for the mystery of the realities con-
fessed in faith, paragraph 2 concludes by emphasizing that Jesus Christ
himself is the fullness of saving truth in Person. Dei Verbum §2 states,
“The most intimate truth which this revelation gives us about God and

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 35
the salvation of man shines forth in Christ, who is himself both the me-
diator and the sum total of revelation.” Those who suppose that they can
engage revelation solely by unfolding propositional truths have thus made
an error. Jesus Christ communicates saving truth, and this truth is him-
self: in receiving divine revelation, we are receiving a Person, Jesus, and
so revelation establishes a relationship with this Person. The truths that
God reveals for our salvation are summed up in Jesus Christ, who reveals
God to us and who invites us to share in his life of wisdom and self-giving
love. Of course, this does not mean that we can know the Person, Jesus, in
a nonpropositional way, since the human act of knowing cannot bypass
propositional judgments. Furthermore, Jesus’ own propositional teach-
ings and the apostles’ teachings about him inform and instruct our per-
sonal encounter with Jesus.
If Christ is the fullness of revelation, however, why did God not give
this friendship earlier or in a more universally decisive fashion? What
about all the people who have never heard of Christ or who, despite hear-
ing about him, have not come to know him? Dei Verbum §3 indicates
that God’s self-revealing presence has never been lacking among humans.
Since all things are created through the Word, it makes sense that crea-
tures point toward God: God “provides men with constant evidence of
himself in created realities” (§3). The revelation of God’s friendship with
us in Christ builds upon the fact that the Creator has always willed to
make his presence known. The gift of grace was never absent in human
history. Dei Verbum §3 insists that “wishing to open up the way to heav-
enly salvation, he [God] manifested himself to our first parents from the
very beginning. After the fall, he buoyed them up with the hope of salva-
tion, by promising redemption (cf. Gen. 3:15); and he has never ceased to
take care of the human race.” While unfolding in the particular history
of God’s people, Israel, and culminating in the work of their Messiah, the
invitation to friendship with the triune God is a work that always had all
peoples in view and that never excludes them. God acts in and through
specific people and not by universal divine fiat. But the revelation of God
is not exclusionary: on the contrary, Dei Verbum §3 points out that God
“wishes to give eternal life to all those who seek salvation by patience in
well-doing (cf. Rom. 2:6–7).”

36 D ei Ver b um in Conte x t
 Dei Verbum §4 sets forth the ways in which Jesus is the fullness of rev-
elation. For one thing, Jesus reveals saving truth about God: he is “the
eternal Word who enlightens all men” and he came “to dwell among men
and to tell them about the inner life of God” (§4). In addition to his
words, Jesus reveals God by his deeds. Since Jesus reveals God and God’s
will for us by everything he does—“by the total fact of his presence and
self-manifestation,” especially by his Cross and Resurrection and his send-
ing of the Spirit—Dei Verbum §4 notes that Jesus confirms revelation
“with divine guarantees.” If someone asks what or where is divine revela-
tion, we can point them to Jesus, whose words and deeds reveal the per-
sonal presence of the Son, “to see whom is to see the Father (cf. Jn. 14:9).”
According to Dei Verbum §4, Jesus not only teaches us “about the inner
life of God” but also reveals that “God is with us, to deliver us from the
darkness of sin and death, and to raise us up to eternal life.” Jesus reveals
these saving truths by his words and deeds, and fundamentally by his on-
going and salvific presence “with us.”
Dei Verbum §5 underscores the necessity of responding to the self-
revealing God with the “obedience of faith” (Rom 16:26). This obedient
assent requires that there be propositionally knowable revelation to which
to assent. Otherwise, one could not assent obediently to Jesus, since one
would have literally no idea what Jesus’ presence means. At the same time,
this cognitive assent requires a personal relationship with God. Along
these lines, Dei Verbum §5 develops the importance of the Holy Spirit’s
work. Because the content of revelation is a divine mystery, above reason’s
capabilities to judge, the assent of faith comes about only when the grace
of the Holy Spirit moves the will interiorly. Revelation involves conver-
sion and transformation, not merely an intellectual assent. Relationship
with God stands at the center of both revelation’s content and the way in
which we make revelation our own. Through the gifts of the Holy Spirit,
moreover, we receive “an ever deeper understanding of revelation” (§5).
The next paragraph, Dei Verbum §6, also combines the personal and
cognitive-propositional dimensions of revelation. Consider this sentence:
“By divine revelation God wished to manifest and communicate both
himself and the eternal decrees of his will concerning the salvation of
mankind” (§6). In manifesting and communicating himself—which God

De i Ve r bum i n C o nt ext 37
does both through the prophets’ teaching and through the Incarnation of
the Son and the sending of the Spirit—God displays the deep personal
intimacy characteristic of revelation, a personal intimacy that necessarily
involves cognitive communication. When God communicates his “eter-
nal decrees,” the emphasis necessarily falls upon the cognitive content of
revelation, since decrees are propositionally knowable; yet God does this
by communicating “himself ” in the Person of Jesus. In light of this per-
sonal dimension, Dei Verbum §6 quotes two central texts from chapter 2
of Vatican I’s Dei Filius, in which Dei Filius insists upon human reason’s
natural ability to know God as first principle and final end of all things,
while also affirming that in our present fallen condition even such natural
knowledge of God must be revealed (as it has been). The propositional
emphasis of Dei Filius is thereby folded into Dei Verbum’s emphasis on
the personal mode of revelation.
Beginning with paragraph 7, Dei Verbum shifts its attention to the
transmission of divine revelation (chapter 2). Here too we find the same
appreciation for revealed truths, on the one hand, and personal presence,
on the other. For example, Dei Verbum §7 states that the gospel entrusted
to the apostles is “the source of all saving truth.” At the same time, the
apostles communicate the gospel not only by teaching truths of faith—
though they certainly do teach such truths—but also by the example of
their lives and “the institutions they established” (§7). Their communica-
tion of saving truth (a communion) draws upon both what Jesus taught
them when they shared in his life and ministry, and what the Holy Spirit
teaches them. Their personal relationship with Christ and the Spirit en-
ables them to communicate in writing and in oral teaching what they re-
ceived “from the lips of Christ, from his way of life and his works” (§7),
and from the Spirit. With regard to the personal relationship or fellow-
ship with God that fuels the transmission of revealed truth, Dei Verbum
§7 remarks, “This sacred Tradition, then, and the sacred Scripture of both
Testaments, are like a mirror, in which the Church, during its pilgrim
journey here on earth, contemplates God, from whom she receives every-
thing, until such time as she is brought to see him face to face as he really
is (cf. Jn. 3:2).” Personal encounter and cognitive-propositional intelligi-
bility are inseparable.

38 D ei Ver b um in Conte x t
 The next paragraph, §8, similarly includes a description of the
Church’s communion and of believers’ “intimate sense of spiritual reali-
ties which they experience,” alongside the affirmation that “[w]hat was
handed on by the apostles comprises everything that serves to make the
People of God live their lives in holiness and increase their faith.” Clearly
“what was handed on” includes doctrinal and moral teachings, revealed
truth. Dei Verbum §8 speaks of the ongoing development in the Church’s
understanding of the truths that comprise revelation: “the Church is al-
ways advancing towards the plenitude of divine truth.” This advance in
the understanding of revealed truths, however, never leaves out the ele-
ment of transformation and personal relationship with God. Rather than
a mere growth in the number of apprehended truths, Dei Verbum §8 holds
that the growth occurs as “God . . . continues to converse with the spouse
of his beloved Son,” through the activity of the Spirit. It is not solely a
matter of the Church getting the truths right, although the Church does
this through the Spirit’s guidance; rather it is a matter of the Church be-
coming increasingly conformed to revelation, “until eventually the words
of God are fulfilled in her” (§8).
In Dei Verbum §9, we find an understanding of Scripture that unites
cognitive-propositional expression of revelation with the personal Pres-
ence and activity of God. The paragraph states, “Sacred Scripture is
the speech of God as it is put down in writing under the breath of the
Holy Spirit.” The inspired human words of Scripture are associated with
the Spirit’s breath and with God speaking. This is a highly personal way
of formulating God’s relationship to the written words of the Bible, in
which God gives commandments and prophetic promises, along with
doctrinal and moral teaching. By the Spirit’s breath, God speaks person-
ally in human words; thus personal divine communication and the cog-
nitive form that it takes are shown to be a unity, against any possibility
of downplaying mere words. The process of Tradition, by which the en-
tirety of the word of God is handed on, also involves the enlightenment
of the apostles and their successors by the Holy Spirit, who is the “Spirit
of truth.” Again, there is no opposition between cognitive-propositional
communication and the personal dimension of revelation.
In paragraph 10, Tradition and Scripture are described as “a single sa-

De i Ve r bum i n Co n t ext 39
cred deposit of the word of God, which is entrusted to the Church.” The
very notion of a “sacred deposit” indicates a determinative cognitive-
propositional content, which may be more than, but certainly not less
than, a body of truths. In this paragraph, which looks back to Acts 2:42
and thus implicitly also to Acts 20:18–35 (in which Paul passes on his
ministry to the elders of the Church in Ephesus), the Magisterium of the
Church is accorded the role of definitive interpreter of the “sacred depos-
it” of divine revelation. Here it might seem that we encounter revelation
understood as solely a body of truths, unfolded by the Church’s Magiste-
rium through its dogmatic formulations over the centuries. However, Dei
Verbum §10 takes pains to describe “the living teaching office [magisteri-
um] of the Church” as profoundly relational in its reception and handing
on of revelation. The Magisterium appears as the “servant” of the word of
God, and the Magisterium’s acts of listening to, guarding, and expound-
ing the revealed deposit take place “[a]t the divine command and with
the help of the Holy Spirit” (§10). From within the personal matrix of
revelation, the Church’s Magisterium performs its service in the handing
on of revealed truth.
Paragraph 11 starts a new chapter, on the inspiration and interpreta-
tion of Scripture. Dei Verbum §11 places the focus squarely on personal
realities, even while insisting upon the truthful cognitive-propositional
communication of these realities in Scripture “under the inspiration of
the Holy Spirit.” It presents the Church as a personal reality rather than
a mere institution: “Holy Mother Church.” As paragraph 11 says, the
whole of Scripture, including all of its parts, is “sacred” and has God as
its “author,” since the Spirit inspires the whole of Scripture. Recognizing
Scripture’s rootedness in “the faith of the apostolic age,” which is the faith
of the Church, the Church receives and accepts Scripture as it has been
handed on to the Church, namely as divinely inspired and canonical.
Paragraph 11 goes on to note that the human authors of Scripture, who
were chosen by God, wrote in a fully human way and were “true authors,”
even though God “acted in them and by them.” God’s agency inspiring
and guiding the development of the biblical canon does not mean that
the human authors were not men of their times, “true authors.” It does
mean, however, that everything in Scripture belongs there as God’s word,

40 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
since God ensured that the human authors (without ceasing to be such)
“consigned to writing whatever he wanted written, and no more” (§11).
Here the personal intimacy of God inspiring the human authors, and the
emphasis on the realities of faith communicated by the biblical writings,
is tightly linked with cognitive-propositional expression.
Regarding the truth of Scripture, paragraph 11 states that “all that
the inspired authors, or sacred writers, affirm should be regarded as af-
firmed by the Holy Spirit.” This focuses attention on the (propositional)
judgments of the human authors, but it also emphasizes the immediacy
of our scriptural encounter with the Spirit. The same balance between
personal-transformative and cognitive-propositional revelation appears
in paragraph 11’s affirmation that “the books of Scripture, firmly, faith-
fully and without error, teach the truth which God, for the sake of our
salvation, wished to see confided to the sacred Scriptures.” God meets us
in Scripture “for the sake of our salvation”; the purpose of scriptural truth
is transformation and salvation. Paragraph 11 supports this point by quot-
ing 2 Timothy 3:16–17, “All scripture is inspired by God and profitable
for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”
After reiterating the point that “God speaks through men in human
fashion” in the books of Scripture, Dei Verbum §12 urges scholars to inves-
tigate the intention of the human authors, as part of the process of rightly
understanding “what the sacred author wanted to affirm in his work” and
thereby understanding “what God has wished to communicate to us.” The
sacred author’s affirmations are propositional judgments of truth, even if
they are not abstract truths but rather concern historical and experien-
tial realities. In order to apprehend the intention of the human author,
we should take care to appreciate the particular genre of writing and the
cultural circumstances that shaped the author’s approach. Rather than ap-
proaching Scripture in an ahistorical way, looking simply for ahistorical
judgments of truth, we should be deeply aware of both “the customary
and characteristic patterns of perception, speech and narrative which pre-
vailed at the age of the sacred writer, and . . . the conventions which the
people of his time followed in their dealings with one another” (§12).
Paragraph 12 adds that, in addition to investigating the human author-

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 41
ship and cultural circumstances of the scriptural text, we must equally pay
attention to the divine authorship. This requires appreciating and inves-
tigating “the content and unity of the whole of Scripture, taking into ac-
count the Tradition of the entire Church and the analogy of faith” (§12).
Scripture must be interpreted by Scripture, so that each scriptural passage
is interpreted in the light of the whole of Scripture; and the Church’s Tra-
dition provides the living context and guide for this faithful interpreta-
tion. Biblical scholars, whose task is to “help the Church to form a firmer
judgment” about the meaning of particular scriptural texts, should not
fall into the mistake of treating Scripture as merely a compilation of an-
cient near-Eastern texts. In this way, Dei Verbum §12 reminds us that the
interpretation of Scripture requires the interpreter to listen to the witness
of the receptive community, a community commissioned by Christ. Ul-
timately, not academic scholars, but rather the Church has the “divinely
conferred commission and ministry of watching over and interpreting the
Word of God” (§12). God communicates to his people through Scripture,
and so its interpretation is the task of the people of God and cannot be
left to experts as though the scriptural texts did not belong to the per-
sonal communion between God and his people.
Paragraph 13 underscores God’s “condescension” (an idea drawn from
John Chrysostom) in communicating exalted divine mysteries through
human and historically contextualized words, “without prejudice to God’s
truth and holiness.” The point again is that Scripture itself, in its historical
conditioning, bears witness to the personal relationship with God that
God wills to be the context and fruit of revelation. Paragraph 13 compares
God’s use of human words to the divine Word’s incarnation in the hu-
manity of Jesus Christ.
Dei Verbum §§14–16 (chapter 4) pertain to the economy of the Old
Testament, especially from God’s choosing of Abraham onward. The per-
sonal action of God stands at center stage in these paragraphs. At the same
time, of course, consideration for revealed (propositional) truth is hardly
absent. Dei Verbum §15 insists that the books of the Old Testament, “even
though they contain matters imperfect and provisional, nevertheless show
us authentic divine teaching.” An example of such authentic teaching is the
Old Testament’s overall understanding of “how a just and merciful God

42 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
deals with mankind” (§15). Indeed, Dei Verbum §15 presents the whole Old
Testament as “a storehouse of sublime teaching on God.” Paragraph 16 un-
derscores that no book of the Old Testament is isolated from the gospel,
since God’s revelation always has Jesus Christ in view. The Old and New
Testaments mutually illuminate each other, as we would expect from texts
that testify to the same self-revealing God.
In paragraphs 17–20 (chapter 5), the focus shifts from the Old Testa-
ment to the New Testament. Emphasis on God’s personal action in rev-
elation—the Incarnation of the Son, the inauguration of the Kingdom of
God, the revelation of the Father, the sending of the Holy Spirit, and the
commissioning of the apostles—is combined with a strong insistence on
cognitive-propositional content. For instance, we find the assurance that
“the apostles handed on to their hearers what he [ Jesus] had said and done,
but with that fuller understanding which they, instructed by the glori-
ous events of Christ and enlightened by the Spirit of truth, now enjoyed”
(§19). Similarly, Dei Verbum §19 affirms that the four Gospels teach “us the
honest truth about Jesus” and have as their purpose the communication
of this truth. Paragraph 20 emphasizes that the Epistles of Paul and the
other New Testament writings convey revealed truth, not least insofar as
they “firmly establish those matters which concern Christ the Lord” and
“formulate more and more precisely his authentic teaching.” Paragraph
20 concludes the chapter on the New Testament by reiterating the per-
sonal dimension of revelation: “For the Lord Jesus was with his apostles
as he had promised (cf. Mt. 28:20) and he had sent to them the Spirit, the
Counsellor, who would guide them into all the truth (cf. Jn. 16:13).”
The final six paragraphs of Dei Verbum, §§21–26 (chapter 6), address
the role of Scripture in the life of the Church. These paragraphs empha-
size the authority of Scripture for the Church. Scripture is “God’s own
word in an unalterable form” and “the preaching of the Church, as in-
deed the entire Christian religion, should be nourished and ruled by sa-
cred Scripture” (§21). This way of putting it focuses on the written text
and the (propositional) truths that it authoritatively conveys, but the very
next sentence sounds a deeply intimate and personal note: “In the sacred
books the Father who is in heaven comes lovingly to meet his children,
and talks with them” (§21). This conversation with the Father, through

De i Ve r bum i n Co n t ext 43
Christ and the Spirit, transforms believers and builds up the Church.
Thus the emphasis in paragraph 21 is on revelation as transformative per-
sonal dialogue, but not in a manner that relativizes the authority of Scrip-
ture in its expression of saving truth. Likewise, after paragraph 22 focuses
on the importance of translations of Scripture, paragraph 23 presents the
Church as “the spouse of the incarnate Word” and as “taught by the Holy
Spirit.” This paragraph contains instruction for biblical scholars, who Dei
Verbum hopes will be instruments of a biblical renewal among believers.
Paragraph 24 describes the preeminence of Scripture for theological in-
quiry, whose task is to seek “the full truth stored up in the mystery of
Christ” and to do so by allowing Scripture to be “the very soul of sacred
theology.” Paragraph 25 exhorts all priests and catechists, and indeed all
the faithful, especially those in religious life, to read Scripture frequently
and to do so in prayer, so as to allow for spiritual transformation via “a
dialogue . . . between God and man.”
Paragraph 24 states that Scripture both “contain[s] the word of God”
and is “the word of God”; it mediates divine revelation and is divine reve-
lation. Here the twofold emphasis that we found throughout Dei Verbum
is encapsulated: Scripture contains descriptions of God’s personal pres-
ence and action in revealing himself to persons in history, and, since it is
inspired by the Holy Spirit, Scripture itself is this revelation. The truths
conveyed in Scripture receive equal footing with the saving events and en-
counters that form the basis for the written record of Scripture as well as
for the written doctrinal and moral teachings of the Church in its com-
munication of revelation. The personal is propositional, and the propo-
sitional is personal. The final paragraph, §26, closes with an emphasis on
transformation through encounter with the God who reveals himself
personally and propositionally: “So may it come that, by the reading and
study of the sacred books ‘the word of God may speed on and triumph’
(2 Th. 3:1) and the treasure of revelation entrusted to the Church may
more and more fill the hearts of men.”

44 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
Conclusion: Dei Verbum as an Ongoing
Theological Event
In an appended chapter included in the 1966 English edition of his book,
René Latourelle comments on Dei Verbum §2’s statement that “[i]t pleased
God, in his goodness and wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known
the mystery of his will.” Observing that Vatican I too taught that God re-
veals himself, Latourelle specifies what Dei Verbum §2 adds to the perspec-
tive of Vatican I: by “saying that the object of revelation is God himself, the
text thus personalizes revelation: before making known something, that
is, his plan for salvation, God reveals someone, himself.”55 Latourelle also
finds that in using the biblical term “mystery [sacramentum],” Dei Verbum
succeeds in showing that God’s plan of salvation is fundamentally a Per-
son: “Concretely, this mystery is Christ.”56 Put another way—in light of
Dei Verbum §1—it is proper to say that “God has stepped out of his Mys-
tery,” in this sense that the very divine life, otherwise hidden, has been per-
sonally revealed and offered to human beings.57
Latourelle goes on to compare the unity of God’s deeds and words to
the unity of body and soul, while at the same time noting that in the history
of salvation, sometimes deeds are primary (as in Christ’s Pasch) and some-
times words are primary (as in Christ’s Sermon on the Mount). The deeds
require words in order to be properly understood, and vice versa. For ex-
ample, Latourelle notes regarding Jesus’ death on the Cross: “It is the word
of Christ, living on in the word of his apostles, which reveals the unheard-of
dimensions of this death and, at one and the same time, proposes both the
event itself and its salvific bearing on our belief.”58 Are there divine deeds
that only later receive an interpretative divine word so as to become revela-
tory? Latourelle suggests that the answer is yes, so long as we do not fall
into the mistake of supposing the word and the deed ever to be extrinsic to
each other. He states, “The union in question here is a union of nature, not
always a union in time. . . . Sometimes the event precedes the words, e.g. the
creation of the world, the establishment of the royal line in Israel.”59 There

55. Latourelle, Theology of Revelation, 458. 56. Ibid.

57. Ibid., 456. 58. Ibid., 461.
59. Ibid., 462.

De i Ve r bum i n Co nt ext 45
are also cases where the word precedes the deed, as for example in “the de-
scription of the Messiah as a Suffering Servant (cf. Is. 48:3–8; Amos 3:7).”60
Since the deed or event is never completely unintelligible, Latourelle rightly
insists upon “the interpenetration and mutual support that exists between
word and work. God performs the act of salvation and at the same time
develops its meaning.”61
Latourelle is struck by Dei Verbum’s presentation of Jesus as the one
“who reveals the mystery and is the mystery himself in person.”62 This per-
sonalist approach to revelation ensures the transformative power of rev-
elation, rather than allowing us to conceive of revelation simply in terms
of a set of propositions. Yet Latourelle makes clear that the personal and
the propositional are not in opposition, but rather must be held together.
He observes with regard to Dei Verbum §5: “The Council thus avoids two
incomplete conceptions of faith: that of faith-homage, personal but with-
out content; and that of faith-assent, doctrinal but depersonalized.”63 This
integrated balance between the personal and the propositional is crucial.
In contemporary Catholic theology, this balance has been tested. In
response to postconciliar critiques by Catholic theologians of the en-
during truth-content of Catholic doctrine, theologians have given more
attention to the role of propositions. Mats Wahlberg, for example, has
pointed out that it is impossible for our minds to know anything if we
utterly lack propositional knowledge.64 The structure of our cognition
means that we must formulate an insight (however limited and partial)
about something for that thing to be intelligible to us. We cannot have
a personal encounter with God if the encounter lacks at least the basic
propositional knowledge that it is God whom we are encountering. Ad-
dressing the case of “manifestational” revelation, in which something is
revealed without words, Wahlberg observes that even in this case propo-

60. Ibid. 61. Ibid.

62. Ibid., 463. 63. Ibid., 470.
64. See Mats Wahlberg, Revelation as Testimony: A Philosophical-Theological Study (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2014). On the integral connection of thought and language, see also
such works as David Braine, Language and Human Understanding: The Roots of Creativity in
Speech and Thought (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2014); Charles
Taylor, The Language Animal: The Full Shape of the Human Linguistic Capacity (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2016).

46 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
sitions are necessarily involved. For example, “if God manifestationally
reveals that he loves a certain person—for instance, by making her feel
his love in a mystical experience—then it is the receiver of that revelation
who must conceptualize the relevant proposition (that God loves her) her-
self.”65 This proposition must be infused or revealed personally by God
in order for the person to be justified in knowing that the experience of
love is an experience of God. If an experience is utterly nonconceptual,
then the experience cannot justify any particular belief about its source
or meaning.
At the same time, theologians such as Wahlberg recognize that re-
vealed mysteries can never be expressed exhaustively in finite propositions,
as is underscored by Dei Verbum’s crucial emphasis on mystery. Criticiz-
ing the propositionalist model, according to which revelation is solely or
primarily “information,” Richard Gaillardetz argues correctly that Dei Ver-
bum teaches that “revelation, in its primary mode, is not the transmission
of information, as with the propositional model, but the sharing of divine
life.”66 Gaillardetz also grants that “revelation is not just a subjective ex-
perience; revelation does possess some genuine objective content, as the
propositional approach rightly affirms.”67 As we saw, Dei Verbum holds
that the Church over the centuries, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit,
has articulated certain truths that pertain to the apostolic deposit of faith
and that require the obedience of faith.
Indebted to John Thiel, however, Gaillardetz goes on to identify a
“sense of tradition as a reversal of past beliefs and practices.”68 He defines
this “sense of tradition” as the Church’s “communal recognition of dra-
matic discontinuity with its past,” discontinuity that is dramatic or radical
precisely in the sense that it does not rest upon “a consistent affirmation
evident underneath the appearance of change and repudiation.”69 He ar-
gues for example that it is “a kind of historical dishonesty” to “see in the

65. Wahlberg, Revelation as Testimony, 32.

66. Richard R. Gaillardetz, By What Authority? A Primer on Scripture, the Magisterium, and
the Sense of the Faithful (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2003), 7.
67. Ibid.
68. Ibid., 49. See John E. Thiel, Senses of Tradition: Continuity and Development in Catholic
Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
69. Gaillardetz, By What Authority?, 49.

De i Ve r bum i n Co n t ext 47
Second Vatican Council’s teaching on religious liberty and the univer-
sal reach of God’s saving offer nothing more than new formulations of
past insights,” which, however imperfectly or inadequately developed in
the past, “can be found in the tradition.”70 In a section entitled “Disput-
ed Questions” at the end of his chapter, Gaillardetz recognizes that Dei
Verbum and other Vatican II documents (as well as Pope John XXIII’s
opening address to the Council) seek to avoid positing such radical dis-
continuity by making “a distinction between form and content. One
can affirm that the content or substance of a particular dogma remains
unchanged even as its concrete articulation is subject to revision and re-
formulation.”71 While granting that this distinction has been “helpful” in
the past, he concludes his chapter by observing—not in his own voice,
but giving this viewpoint the final word on the topic—that “many theo-
logians today question whether this kind of distinction [between form
and content] is really adequate. They note the important ways in which
the meaning of the dogma cannot be so easily separated or detached from
the cultural, philosophical and theological forms that are used to express
that meaning.”72
What is at stake here is whether it is possible, in any era, to formu-
late a doctrinal proposition whose content or meaning is enduringly true.

70. Ibid. I agree that the Council’s teaching on religious liberty (for example) should not be
described as “nothing more than new formulations of past insights,” but I do not think that this
means that the Council’s teaching cannot “be found in the tradition,” properly understood (in ac-
cord with the principles of doctrinal development as distinct from doctrinal corruption or rupture
of definitive Church teaching). See for example David L. Schindler and Nicholas J. Healy Jr., Free-
dom, Truth, and Human Dignity: The Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom.
A New Translation, Redaction History, and Interpretation of Dignitatis Humanae (Grand Rapids,
MI: Eerdmans, 2015). In his “For Further Reading,” Gaillardetz cites works by Yves Congar as well
as two works on which his own position largely rests: Thiel’s Senses of Tradition and Terrence W.
Tilley, Inventing Catholic Tradition (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2000). I engage more fully
with the views of Thiel and Tilley in my Engaging the Doctrine of Revelation: The Mediation of the
Gospel through Church and Scripture (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2014), chapters 5–6.
71. Gaillardetz, By What Authority?, 52.
72. Ibid., 53. See also Terrence J. Tilley, The Disciples’ Jesus: Christology as Reconciling Practice
(Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2008), 263; and Ormond Rush, Still Interpreting Vatican II: Some
Hermeneutical Principles (New York: Paulist Press, 2004), 79–84, although Rush focuses on issues
of power and therefore continues to support “continuity with the great tradition” (Still Interpret-
ing Vatican II, 84) rather than (so far as I can tell) discontinuity or rupture in what the Church has
definitively taught in the realm of faith and morals.

48 D e i Ve rb um in Conte x t
The loosening of propositional bonds, however, does not lead to a deeper
personal engagement with the self-revealing God. On the contrary, the ef-
fort to relativize and downplay the cognitive-propositional element in di-
vine revelation succeeds mainly in undermining our ability to encounter
the Person of Jesus. The personal dimension of revelation—the personal
encounter today with the living Christ through the mediation of Scrip-
ture and Tradition—depends upon the ability of historically conditioned
propositions (including biblical propositions, with their distinctive his-
torical contexts) to get the self-revealing Persons right. For example,
if Nicea’s teaching that the Son is consubstantial with the Father is not
true, then Jesus could only be a mere human whom we could not now
encounter in a saving way. When one denies the fidelity of the proposi-
tional communication of divine revelation through Scripture and Tradi-
tion, one is left not with the Person of Jesus, but solely with the human
community and its ever-changing praxis.
Fortunately, Dei Verbum offers a better approach, one that should
guide the ongoing theological event inspired by the document. For
Dei Verbum, divine revelation is found in the words and deeds of Jesus
Christ, in fulfillment of God’s revelation to his covenantal people, Israel.
The personal and propositional dimensions of revelation are insepara-
bly joined in Jesus, and the same holds for the mediation of divine rev-
elation in Scripture and Tradition. Divine revelation is a personal and
transformative encounter with Jesus Christ precisely because divine rev-
elation communicates true knowledge of Christ. Insisting upon both the
personal-encounter and cognitive-propositional dimensions of divine
revelation, therefore, let us heed Paul’s prayer “that Christ may dwell in
your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love,
may have power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth
and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which
surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fulness of God”
(Eph 3:17–19).

De i Ve r bum i n Co n t ext 49
C h a p t e r 2

}
ACTIVE
PARTICIPATION
Sacrosanctum Concilium in Context

Sacrosanctum Concilium “did not suddenly appear out of nowhere, but

was the culmination of over a hundred years of research, reflection, writ-
ing, and pastoral work of the Liturgical Movement.”1 In 1903, Pope Pius X

1. Pamela Jackson, An Abundance of Graces: Reflections on Sacrosanctum Concilium (Chicago:

Hillenbrand Books, 2004), 3. See also the Orthodox theologian Nicholas E. Denysenko’s Liturgi-
cal Reform after Vatican II: The Impact on Eastern Orthodoxy (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press,
2015). Denysenko argues that in the preconciliar Liturgical Movement, “Catholic and Orthodox
theologians unearthed and refined the theological foundations for liturgy that had been obscured
through centuries of neglect and decay, and that these foundations, particularly the multilayered
priesthood of the assembly grounded in Christ the High Priest and their active and conscious par-
ticipation in the liturgy inspired several concurrent models for liturgical reform” (Denysenko, Li-
turgical Reform after Vatican II, 32). Denysenko makes clear that the Liturgical Movement should
be ongoing today: “While assessments of these [largely postconciliar] reforms vary, the key for the
Churches to move forward is to continue the process of studying liturgical history to recover and
update the foundations for liturgical reform. . . . One of the lessons from history is that Catholics

50
praised “active participation” in the liturgy as the source of the Christian
spirit that should flourish among believers.2 In 1928, Pope Pius XI’s Divini
Cultus urged the laity to take care not to be “strangers and silent specta-
tors” in the liturgy.3 Eminent contributors to the Liturgical Movement
include the Benedictine Lambert Beauduin, whose La piété de l’Église
appeared in 1914, Romano Guardini, Virgil Michel, Odo Casel, Josef
Jungmann, and Louis Bouyer. Pamela Jackson remarks that “Lambert Be-
auduin’s strong pastoral concern that laity and clergy alike understand the
meaning of what is happening in the celebration of the liturgy so that they
could truly experience it as source of their life as Christians finds a reso-
nance throughout [Sacrosanctum Concilium].”4 Jackson adds that when
Sacrosanctum Concilium appeared, Pierre-Marie Gy and others identified
strong links between it and Pius XII’s 1947 encyclical Mediator Dei.5
Aidan Nichols likewise identifies significant connections between Me-
diator Dei and Sacrosanctum Concilium, although he sees differences as
well. Notable among the connections is the two documents’ shared under-
standing of “the Liturgy as the continuing expression of the Father’s of-
fer to us of new holiness through the sacrificial death of Christ.”6 Indeed,
Nichols thinks that by comparison to Mediator Dei, Sacrosanctum Con-
cilium tightens “the doctrinal link between the Liturgy and salvation.”7 He
emphasizes that Sacrosanctum Concilium, like Mediator Dei, gives “a ratio-

and Orthodox have mutually benefitted from engaging in theological exchange while deliberating
liturgical reform” (Denysenko, Liturgical Reform after Vatican II, 32–33).
2. Pope Pius X, Tra Le Sollecitudini, Motu Proprio, November 22, 1903, at www.vatican.va.
3. Pope Pius XI, Divini Cultus, Apostolic Constitution, December 20, 1928, §9, at www.vati
can.va.
4. Jackson, An Abundance of Graces, 4.
5. Jackson cites Gy’s “The Constitution in the Making,” in Vatican II: The Liturgy Constitu-
tion, ed. Austin Flannery, OP (Dublin: Scepter Books, 1964). See also Pierre-Marie Gy, OP, The
Reception of Vatican II Liturgical Reforms in the Life of the Church (Milwaukee, Wisc.: Marquette
University Press, 2003). Gy concludes his book on a positive note: “If we look back to the last half
century of the Church’s liturgical life in our various countries, could we not say that, in spite of a
few divergences and the lack of sufficient time needed to understand the liturgical reform deeply
enough, the main effect of Vatican II on our spiritual life has been our experience of a deeper par-
ticipation in the liturgy?” (Gy, Reception of Vatican II Liturgical Reforms, 53).
6. Aidan Nichols, OP, “A Tale of Two Documents: Sacrosanctum Concilium and Mediator
Dei,” in A Pope and a Council on the Sacred Liturgy, ed. Alcuin Reid, OSB (Farnborough, U.K.:
Saint Michael’s Abbey Press, 2002), 9–27, at 14.
7. Ibid.

Sac r o s a nctum C oncili um i n C o n t ext 51

nale for liturgical celebration which is entirely salvational in character,” so
that both documents “are worlds away from any sub-theological ideology
of the Liturgy for which the purpose of the Liturgy might be, for instance,
to affirm the group identity of the assembly; to express gender, class, or
ethnic belonging; or to recognise in symbolic play the presence or action
of the divine in secular life and reality.”8 He praises the strong eschato-
logical dimension of the liturgy articulated by Sacrosanctum Concilium, by
comparison to Mediator Dei’s lack of that dimension.9
Leaders of the Liturgical Movement gave Sacrosanctum Concilium an
enthusiastic reception. A notable instance of this perspective is found in
Louis Bouyer’s 1964 book The Liturgy Revived: A Doctrinal Commentary
of the Conciliar Constitution of the Liturgy. Throughout the book, Bouyer
exhibits great enthusiasm for Sacrosanctum Concilium, which he praises
for articulating “the basic principles of the whole Christian spirituality,
stated with a strength and lucidity no less remarkable than the excep-
tional solemnity of their utterance.”10 He rejoices that Sacrosanctum Con-
cilium, because of its status as a conciliar Constitution, “will never be su-
perseded as the Church’s fundamental teaching concerning what she does
in her worship.”11
In order to introduce Sacrosanctum Concilium as an ongoing theolog-
ical event, I begin this chapter by surveying a book published by Bouyer
shortly after the Council: Liturgy and Architecture (1967). In this book,
Bouyer provides a condensed version of the historical overview that he of-
fers in such works as Liturgical Piety (1954) and Eucharist: Theology and
Spirituality of the Eucharistic Prayer (1966).12 He also sets forth his vision

8. Ibid., 14–15. Nichols also notes some points of difference, including “the way in which
Pius XII saw liturgical participation as offering us the opportunity for synergia, co-working, with
the protagonist of our salvation, the immaculate Lamb” (ibid., 15), a vision of liturgical participa-
tion that Nichols finds to be neglected in Sacrosanctum Concilium. Nichols criticizes Sacrosanctum
Concilium’s understanding of liturgical pedagogy: see ibid., 26.
9. See Nichols, “A Tale of Two Documents,” 10.
10. Louis Bouyer, The Liturgy Revived: A Doctrinal Commentary of the Conciliar Constitution
on the Liturgy (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1964), 5.
11. Ibid., 6.
12. See Louis Bouyer, Liturgical Piety (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press,
1955); Louis Bouyer, Eucharist: Theological and Spirituality of the Eucharistic Prayer (Notre Dame,
Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1989).

52 S a c ro sa nctum Conc ilium in C o nt ext

for the renewal of the laity’s active participation in the liturgy. In addi-
tion, Bouyer here suggests that active participation requires that the priest
and people face in the same direction during the Eucharistic prayer.13 By
interpreting active participation in this way, Bouyer’s Liturgy and Archi-
tecture will help us to understand why the ongoing theological event of
Sacrosanctum Concilium consists today largely in debates about its practi-
cal implementation.
As a pivotal figure in the Liturgical Movement prior to the Council,
Bouyer taught both at various European institutions and, as a distinguished
visiting professor, at the University of Notre Dame, the Catholic University
of America, and Brown University. Although his reconstructions of the his-
tory of the liturgy no longer hold the sway they once did, he continues to
be a central authority for anyone interested in the liturgy. He did not have a
role in the drafting of Sacrosanctum Concilium, but he influenced the docu-
ment through his writings and friendships.14 For Bouyer, Sacrosanctum
Concilium puts “the stamp of the supreme authority in the Church . . . upon
the main results of the whole liturgical movement” and “makes it so clear
that the liturgy is at the heart of the whole life of the Church.”15

13. Although active participation is at its very heart, Sacrosanctum Concilium did not discuss
the direction of the priest and people during the Eucharistic prayer. Inter Oecumenici, the 1964 in-
struction on the implementation of Sacrosanctum Concilium, “directed the creation of freestanding
altars, and established the lawfulness of the priest celebrating Mass facing the people” (Rita Fer-
rone, Liturgy: Sacrosanctum Concilium [New York: Paulist Press, 2007], 58). In his The Liturgical
Environment: What the Documents Say, 2nd ed. (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2004), 30,
Mark G. Boyer directs us to the Christological and ecclesiological significance of the altar: “The
preface of the Eucharist Prayer said during the Mass of Dedication is an integral part of the rite
of dedication of an altar. The preface refers to Christ, who offered himself to God on the altar of
the cross and commanded his followers to celebrate the same sacrifice of the Eucharist in mystery
until he returns in glory. The preface also refers to the Lord’s table from which God’s children are
nourished by the Body and Blood of Christ and are gathered together as one. Finally, it refers to the
Spirit from whom the members of the Church drink and become, in fact, a living altar.”
14. For the influence of Bouyer’s writings during the conciliar period, see for example Henri
de Lubac, SJ, Vatican Council Notebooks, vol. 1, trans. Andrew Stefanelli and Anne Englund Nash
(San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2015), 165, 206. On Bouyer’s Le rite et l’homme: Sacralité naturelle
et liturgie (Paris: Cerf, 1962), which de Lubac and many others read during the Council, see also
David M. Power, OMI, Unsearchable Riches: The Symbolic Nature of Liturgy (New York: Pueblo,
1983), 78–79.
15. Bouyer, The Liturgy Revived, 5; Bouyer, Liturgy and Architecture (Notre Dame, Ind.: Uni-
versity of Notre Dame Press, 1967), 2.

Sac r o s a nctum C oncil i um i n Co n t ext 53

Louis Bouyer’s Liturgy and Architecture
In Liturgy and Architecture, Louis Bouyer sets forth his view of the proper
renewal of the liturgy, as well as the causes of what he considers to be the
liturgy’s late-patristic, medieval, and Baroque decline. Bouyer is negative
toward Eucharistic adoration, at least during the liturgy, and he criticizes
devotional practices such as privately saying the Rosary during Mass. His
understanding of how to renew the liturgy revolves around his account of
the transition from the Jewish synagogue to the Christian church. Put suc-
cinctly, he seeks to balance word and sacrament, meal and sacrifice, partici-
pation in Jesus’ Cross and participation in his Resurrection. He insists that
believers’ liturgical participation in the Paschal mystery should be an es-
chatologically ordered awaiting of Christ’s return in glory. Throughout his
book, Bouyer finds, in Sacrosanctum Concilium, a much needed undercut-
ting of “the ‘seige’ mentality of the Church of the Counter-Reformation.”16
At the same time, he cautions that the current temptation is to rush to the
opposite extreme and, instead of rigidly refusing to change any external as-
pect of the liturgy, throw tradition out entirely. He therefore argues in favor
of creative appreciation for the living tradition as a middle ground between
rigidity and vapidity, a middle ground that should enable us to “realize both
the richness and the vast amount of freedom that the Catholic tradition
puts at our disposal.”17 This richness and this freedom come from the dis-
covery of the inner core and “plenitude” of the living tradition, which flows
from “the creative power of the Spirit.”18 Bouyer’s goal is to renew, beyond
mere rigid and misunderstood external forms, the “intelligent, active and
fruitful participation on the part of the faithful (as the Council says again
and again).”19 Such active participation consists in nothing less than “a com-
mon life in the Spirit, a common life of God with men, through the experi-
ence of which men become one together, while becoming one with God in
Christ.”20
In describing the liturgy, Bouyer uses imagery of feasting and rec-
onciliation: the liturgy “is that marriage feast of the Lamb where all are

16. Bouyer, Liturgy and Architecture, 2. 17. Bouyer, Liturgy and Architecture, 4.
18. Ibid. 19. Ibid.
20. Ibid., 4–5.

54 S a c r os anctum C oncilium in Co nt ext

called, to be reconciled in the Body of the only Son.”21 He also uses the
imagery of “scattered children” congregating and of humanity “gathering
together” in God’s house.22 He refers to hearing God’s word, to praying,
and to “the sacramental celebration of the mystery proclaimed by His
word.”23 He thus balances a number of aspects of the liturgy that must
not be isolated from one another, and he focuses on the unity of human-
ity attained through full participation in Christ.
To exemplify the liturgical balance that he seeks, Bouyer returns not
simply to the earliest Church but to the Jewish synagogue out of which
Jesus, the apostles, and many of the first Christians came. He states,
“Contemporary exegesis has underlined how the Church, as the Body of
Christ, had its preparation in the Qahal, the assembly of the People of
God, brought together to hear the word, to surrender to it in common
prayer, to be sealed in the unity of the Covenant, an alliance with God.”24
Was the synagogue simply a place of hearing the word, cut off from the
Temple’s sacrificial cult? Bouyer shows that the answer is no. In the syna-
gogue, the congregation and the rabbi all faced toward the Ark, which
represented the Ark of the Covenant that had been lost when the Temple
was destroyed at the time of the Babylonian exile. Each year, on the Day
of Atonement, the high priest had sprinkled the Ark of the Covenant—
and specifically the cover or “mercy seat” (Lv 16:2) upon which God was
believed to be invisibly present and enthroned—with the sacrificial blood
of the sin offering. The Ark of the Covenant contained the tablets of the
Decalogue and the manna, and the Ark was the central object in the Holy
of Holies, a part of the Temple into which even the high priest could
come only rarely, because God was enthroned there.
In facing toward the representation of the Ark, worshippers at a syn-
agogue were symbolically linked to the sacrificial cult of the Temple, as
well as to the word of God (Torah). In addition, the synagogue worship
had an eschatological dimension, because synagogues always faced “to-
ward the Holy of Holies of Jerusalem, to the place where the Messiah was
to appear and the diaspora to be gathered.”25 The synagogue’s liturgy thus

21. Ibid., 5. 22. Ibid.

23. Ibid. 24. Ibid., 8.
25. Ibid., 19.

Sac r o s anctum C onc il i um i n C o n t ext 55

possessed the elements of divine word and presence, sacrificial atonement,
and eschatological consummation; but what about the element of meal?
Bouyer explains that the element of a shared meal was present in the rit-
ual meals, including the Passover meal. The shared meals of communities
such as that at Qumran intentionally sought to prepare for the eschato-
logical age. Bouyer states, “In the breaking of the bread, in the blessing
of the cup of thanksgiving and their common participation, they saw an
inauguration of the messianic feast.”26 The last prayer (“the last berakah”)
over the cup contained the final portion of the Abodah prayer, which was
“the consecration prayer of the daily burnt offering in the Temple.”27 Meal
and sacrifice were thus placed together. To the Abodah prayer as recited
in the synagogue, furthermore, there was “added an invocation that the
‘memorial’ of the People, of the house of David, of the Messiah, arise, be
heard accepted before God and come to pass.”28 In the synagogue wor-
ship, therefore, the word and prayers remained intimately connected with
the Temple sacrifice and the eschatological consummation, and both were
linked with the ritual meal and its prayers.
How did this inform early Christianity? In answering this question,
Bouyer focuses upon the oldest extant Syrian churches, which he identi-
fies as “[t]he most ancient type of a Christian Church.”29 He states, “There
we have the remnants of a primitive Christianity which, even when it had
ceased to be purely Jewish, remained for a time purely Semitic.”30 How do
the Syrian churches differ from the synagogue? For one thing, they are
not oriented toward Jerusalem, but rather they face east toward the rising
sun, the most potent symbol of Christ’s return. This change signifies that
Christians await not the restoration of Israel and the rebuilding of the
Temple, but rather the new or heavenly Jerusalem, which “will be made
of the gathering of the elect in His risen body,” and which will need no
Temple (since the Lord himself will be the Temple).31 By facing east, the
liturgy—expressed by the Syrian church architecture—conveys a Chris-
tian eschatology.
A second difference is that the apse at the eastern end of the church

26. Ibid., 23. 27. Ibid., 22.

28. Ibid. 29. Ibid., 24.
30. Ibid., 25. 31. Ibid., 28.

56 S a c ros a nctum Conc ilium in Co n t ext

now contains a table or altar. Instead of facing a replica of the Ark of the
Covenant, where the divine presence dwelt enthroned on the mercy seat,
all worshippers now face the altar, the equivalent or fulfillment of the
Holy of Holies. Bouyer states, “The Christians in their churches, hearing
the word, are led by it from the Ark to the altar. And beyond the altar
itself, they look toward no other earthly place but only toward the ris-
ing sun as toward the symbol of the Sol justitiae they are expecting.”32 Es-
chatology, divine presence, meal, and sacrifice are thereby united, since
the Church remembers Christ’s saving death each time the Eucharist is
celebrated on the table or altar, and since this remembrance not only
re-presents Christ’s Passion, but also is a foretaste of our eschatological
heavenly banquet with the Christ.
Christian worshippers, then, no longer face either toward Jerusalem
or toward the Temple with its sacrificial cult and Ark. Instead, Christian
worshippers face toward the east and “the eucharistic meal has taken the
place of the former sacrifices.”33 The seat of the bishop now replaces the
seat of Moses (on which the rabbi sat); the book of the Gospels replaces
the Torah scroll. The words of the Gospel draw us toward the sacramental
action. As Bouyer puts it, “The Gospel itself, to prepare us for the eternal
gathering of the elect in the heavenly Jerusalem, leads us toward the ex-
pected Orient, whence its coming is hoped for, by inviting us to the mes-
sianic feast, the banquet of the Lamb, now already inaugurated in the eu-
charistic celebration.”34 Bouyer is careful to link meal/banquet/feast with
sacrifice, and sacrifice with eschatological communion in the risen Lord.
He observes that the Temple ritual is fulfilled “in the bloodless sacrifices
[Eucharists] of that Lamb who has been immolated once for all, and re-
mains for ever interceding on our behalf in the immediate presence of the
Father,” and he notes that “here on earth we partake of His resurrected
body. Already we drink the new life of His love by taking part of the cup
of blessing, the chalice of His Blood.”35
Bouyer points out that in some of these churches, the seat of Moses is
replaced not by the bishop’s seat, but by the enthronement of the book of

32. Ibid., 31. 33. Ibid., 32.

34. Ibid. 35. Ibid., 33.

Sac r o s a nctum C oncilium i n Co n t ext 57

the Gospels. He considers this development, even if a rare one, to be high-
ly positive, since it makes “clear that the Christian bishop, or any preacher
of the Gospel, is only the surrogate for Christ.”36 All Syrian churches are
structured so that after the readings and prayers, the clergy process to the
east (the altar), carrying the offerings, and “the congregation reassembles
itself around the altar for the eucharistic meal.”37 Since the only seats in
these Syrian churches are for the bishops and clergy, it is possible for the
congregation to move to the eastern end of the church. Bouyer strongly
praises this arrangement. He states that “the whole assembly, far from be-
ing a static mass of spectators, remains an organic gathering of worship-
pers, first centered on the Ark, for hearing and meditating upon the scrip-
tures, and finally going toward the East all together, for the eucharistic
prayer and the final communion.”38 For Bouyer, the particularly exciting
and exemplary thing is that the whole community, clergy and laity, act
together in word and sacrament, just as the rabbi and congregants do in
the synagogue. True, “[t]he presiding bishop or priest acts always as the
center,” since the body of believers is “assembled around him” (both to
hear the word and say the prayers, and to celebrate the Eucharist), but
the key point is that the bishop or priest never acts “as a single performer
before an audience having only to look at him!”39 Furthermore, although
the bishop or priest is at the center, he never directs the attention toward
himself. Instead he consistently refers the whole gathering of believers
“to a transcendent focus,” upon which all gaze together: “the word of the
Gospel, the table of the Word made flesh and our food, and finally the
eternal advent of the Lord of whom he is only the minister.”40 Jesus Christ
is at the center of this worship, and bishop or priest and believers worship
as a (hierarchically organized) “body acting together in unity.”41
Not only, then, are all the dimensions of Christian worship held
properly together in the Syrian churches—word, sacrament, meal, sacri-
fice, eschaton, and so forth—but even more importantly, the worship is
arranged so that everyone faces toward the altar and toward the (escha-
tological) east. There is hierarchy, as established by Christ, but there is
36. Ibid., 34. 37. Ibid.
38. Ibid., 35. 39. Ibid., 35–36.
40. Ibid., 36. 41. Ibid.

58 S a c ros anctum C oncilium in Co n t ext

no clericalist arrangement that deprives the laity of their full, active par-
ticipation in the liturgy. Even better, unlike the way they were treated in
the synagogue, women receive a proper liturgical place in the church, and
both women and men assemble around the altar for the celebration of the
Eucharist.
When and how did this full, active participation of the laity, and this
Christ-centeredness of worship, begin to decline? Bouyer notes that the
structure of the early churches in Rome is not known, but the shape of
the Constantinian-era churches of Italy may be discernible through study
of the ruins of Christian churches in North Africa, where the Muslim
conquest relatively quickly extinguished Christianity. A bad development
is already visible: “the seat of the bishop has been brought into the cen-
ter of the apse [on the eastern end] and . . . it is now a throne: not just
a teacher’s cathedra but the seat of honor of a high dignitary.”42 This ar-
chitectural change signals, Bouyer thinks, that the Constantinian bishop
was becoming an imperial figure, rather than a teacher and priest. Bouyer
considers this to be “the first beginnings of what is now commonly called
‘triumphalism,’ the origin of which lies in the fact that bishops had be-
come authorities of the state.”43 He hammers home his point: Constan-
tinian Christian leaders became fundamentally separated from the con-
gregation, so that they were now more linked with the state than with the
Church community. The clergy were now separated, rather than simply
distinguished, from the laity. The priests no longer linked the bishop with
the whole people, but rather served as “flunkeys” or a “court” that en-
hanced the bishop’s “dignity while separating it from the vulgum pecus.”44
With the bishop now sitting enthroned in the apse at the eastern end
of the church, the altar was moved to the center of the Church, where the
bishop had previously sat. Bouyer indicates that this situation could have
been worse. With the altar in the center of the Church, at least “when the
bishop finally went to the altar for the eucharistic meal, he had still all
his people grouped around him, just as before.”45 According to Bouyer,
however, during the pontificate of Gregory the Great the decline of the

42. Ibid., 43. 43. Ibid., 44.

44. Ibid., 45. 45. Ibid.

Sac r o s anctum C oncilium i n Co n t ext 59

liturgy accelerated precipitously. The bishop and clergy no longer joined
the congregation in order to celebrate the Eucharist. Instead, the altar was
moved to the apse, where the bishop sat enthroned. This development—
or in Bouyer’s view, this liturgical corruption—occurred as a result of
Pope Gregory the Great’s desire to move the altar to the place in St. Pe-
ter’s Basilica right above the tomb of St. Peter. This change, which influ-
enced churches throughout Europe, altered “the whole character of the
primitive celebration,” and confined the clergy to a “lofty isolation even
for the eucharist.”46
The collective worship of the People of God, the sharing in the Eu-
charist and active participation of the laity, now diminished sharply, ac-
cording to Bouyer. He grants that this change already was occurring in the
fourth century, the result of an increased frequency in people’s attending
the liturgy without receiving the Eucharist. Indeed, says Bouyer, “In the
middle ages the communion of the faithful would even disappear entirely
from the papal mass. It would never be reintroduced as a normal practice
until the last popes, John XXIII and Paul VI.”47 The celebration of the
Eucharist and the partaking in the Eucharistic meal became something
that priests and religious did, but that lay people mostly watched—with
the exception of a spiritual elite here and there. In Bouyer’s view, the beau-
tifully elaborate liturgy of the medieval period was basically a spectacle,
celebrated “not so much for the Christian people as instead of them.”48
At St. Peter’s, the positioning of the altar meant that Mass was cel-
ebrated facing the people. Bouyer considers that the notion of celebrating
the Mass facing the people, far from being the most primitive tradition
or being a stimulant to the active participation of the laity, historically
embodied the very opposite: it emerged as part of the clericalization of
the post-Constantinian Church, and represented not the active participa-
tion of the laity but (to a large degree) their fundamental exclusion. For

46. Ibid., 48.

47. Ibid., 49.
48. Ibid. For more recent studies that have demonstrated the pervasive involvement of the
laity in the medieval liturgy, see for example Eamon Duffy, The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional
Religion in England, 1400–1580, 2nd ed. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2005); Au-
gustine Thompson, OP, Cities of God: The Religion of the Italian Communes, 1125–1325, 2nd ed.
(University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006).

60 S a c ros a nctum Conc ilium in Co nt ext

the earliest Christians, in fact, “The communal character of a meal was
emphasized just by the opposite disposition: the fact that all the partici-
pants were on the same side of the table.”49 Bouyer adds that the inten-
tion of Pope Gregory (or his successors) was not to “face the people.” This
phrase was never mentioned in any pre-modern liturgical manual. Rather,
the key point for the pre-modern liturgy, in St. Peter’s as elsewhere, was
to ensure that the bishop or priest said “the eucharistic prayer, as all the
other prayers, facing East.”50 Indeed, not only the bishop or priest, but
the whole congregation, had to be sure to turn toward the east when say-
ing the prayers. Thus, as Bouyer notes, “in churches with what we now
call an altar facing the people” there would have been a significant part
of the congregation “turning their backs to the altar during the whole of
the consecration prayer.”51 Bouyer surmises that this is why most churches
did not adopt the Roman architectural model as found in St. Peter’s.
Here Bouyer explores more deeply what active participation means.
Does it mean, for example, being able to see what the priest is doing with
the elements? Bouyer points out that in the patristic era, there would have
been little to see: the bishop or priest would simply have been saying the
prayers aloud, the same prayers that the people were supposed to be fol-
lowing so as to give their Amen. In the medieval and Baroque liturgies,
the celebrant undertook numerous gestures, including “plenty of signs of
the cross, of kissing the altar, handling and elevating the elements, and,
especially after the consecration, numberless genuflexions.”52 For Bouyer,
such additions to the liturgy may be fine and good, but they are hardly
the point. If such gestures must be present, which they need not be (since
they were absent in the patristic liturgy), it is certainly not necessary for
the laity to see them. The key point is that active participation in the li-
turgical action does not mean looking at what the bishop or priest does.
That would be to define active participation in a clericalist way. Instead,
Bouyer thinks that active participation is stimulated when the bishop or
priest and congregation all face together toward the eschatological East,
toward Christ the Lord.

49. Bouyer, Liturgy and Architecture, 54. 50. Ibid., 55.

51. Ibid., 56. 52. Ibid., 57.

Sac r o s a nctum C onc ilium i n Co nt ext 61

 In rather strong terms, Bouyer observes that “we must not confuse
participating in the celebration with looking at it. The practice of looking
curiously at the eucharistic elements themselves, especially at the time of
the consecration, is a practice completely unknown to Christian antiq-
uity.”53 Even though such a practice was added in the thirteenth century
(with the double elevation), the key point remains that active participa-
tion in the liturgy cannot mean watching somebody else do something.
Bouyer’s point, implicit but clear, is that the implementation of Sacro-
sanctum Concilium’s call for active participation of the laity in the liturgy
would be significantly harmed by having the bishop or priest face the
people during the Eucharistic prayer.
After a section devoted to the development of the Eastern liturgy and
architectural forms, including iconography, Bouyer returns to the West-
ern churches and again reflects upon what he considers to be the period
of liturgical decline and corruption away from the patristic high-point. In
the early medieval period, the choir was screened off from the main body
of the church in Western churches, and the offertory procession disap-
peared. The result was that the congregation now had nothing to do but
watch, or at best perform private devotions such as the Rosary. The choir
performed the singing; the readings and prayers were in Latin; the bishop
or priest, in consecrating the Eucharist, was separated from the people.
After the thirteenth century, various visible gestures were introduced to
help the people participate, but Bouyer considers that this was simply
“the beginning of the modern tendency to substitute for actual partici-
pation a mere visualization.”54 He grants that there were some positive
developments in the medieval period, including efforts to introduce “a re-
duplication in the vernacular” of the readings and prayers (the “prone”).55
Furthermore, in churches constructed during the Counter-Reformation,
the screen between the altar, where the priest stood, and the people was
suppressed so that “the people could fully see and follow the eucharistic
celebration itself, if not yet regain their participation in it.”56 Sometimes,
53. Ibid., 58.
54. Ibid., 72. For a more historically informed perspective here, see the works by Duffy and
Thompson cited above.
55. Ibid., 75.
56. Ibid., 76.

62 S a c r os a nctum Conc ilium in Co nt ext

too, male laypeople were encouraged to use the ample space “between the
stalls of the clerics and choristers.”57 However, Bouyer laments the nine-
teenth- and twentieth-century introduction of permanent pews and the
reduction of the pulpit to a place solely for preaching, because he consid-
ers that these changes made “of our churches just the equivalent of show-
rooms or classrooms, where a passive congregation has only to see from
afar a clerical performance and passively to hear a clerical instruction.”58
In his 1954 book Liturgical Piety, after giving examples of Baroque li-
turgical failures (what he calls a “gallery of horrifying examples”), Bouyer
comments that “some readers might infer that I am completely out of
sympathy with the spirit of the Baroque period.”59 He denies having such
an attitude, and responds that “[o]n the contrary, my opinion is that that
rigid and unintelligent traditionalism, which is so prominent a feature
of the true Baroque mentality, was the providential means whereby the
Church managed to keep her liturgical treasures safe throughout a long
period when scarcely anyone was capable of understanding their true
worth.”60 Rather than only criticizing the Baroque period’s “rigid and
unintelligent traditionalism,” therefore, Bouyer in 1954 is quite willing to
strongly criticize his own contemporaries. Indeed, he accuses some of his
contemporaries of falling even deeper into the Baroque period’s formal-
ism—paradoxically while supposing themselves to be overcoming this
formalism—by trying “to disguise a rubrically correct low Mass by read-
ing and singing in the vernacular, to make it resemble as closely as possible
the style of public meeting now popular, endeavoring also to give to the
performance of the sacred rite itself a setting resembling that of the sta-
dium, of the factory, or of the movie-theatre.”61 Bouyer instead desires to
see the congregation in a semicircle gathered closely around the priest and
altar during the Eucharistic prayer.
To sum up: in Liturgy and Architecture and in many earlier works as
well, Bouyer is concerned with what he calls “the clericalisation of the lit-
urgy” in the West, the robbing of the laity of the full active participation

57. Ibid., 80. 58. Ibid., 81.

59. Bouyer, Liturgical Piety, 3, 8. 60. Ibid., 8.
61. Ibid., 9. For these criticisms, see also his “Où en est le Mouvement liturgique?,” La
Maison-Dieu 25 (1951): 34–46.

Sa c r o s anctum C oncilium i n Co n t ext 63

that, in his view, they enjoyed in the first centuries of Christianity.62 He
favors such reforms as congregational singing, the use of the vernacular,
frequent communion, communion under both species, the prayer of the
faithful, and the kiss of peace. Even if Bouyer is too strong in his criticisms
of earlier periods (and of his own day), his concern to resist “clericalisa-
tion of the liturgy” is a good one. In addition, he rightly insists upon a
balance between meal and sacrifice and between the “memorial” and “es-
chatological” dimensions of the liturgy. For Bouyer, the priest must not
be envisioned at the center. Rather, the center is Jesus Christ, to whom
the prayers of both priest and people should be directed. For Bouyer, ac-
tive participation requires that, during the Eucharistic prayer, the priest
and the people face east together, so as to signify the eschatological di-
mension of awaiting the return of Christ in glory and to accentuate the
Eucharist’s status as a foretaste of the eschatological banquet and a par-
ticipation in Christ’s Paschal mystery.

Sacrosanctum Concilium
The very first sentence of Sacrosanctum Concilium makes reference to
the Liturgical Movement’s goal of the active participation of the laity:
“It is the intention of this holy council to improve the standard of daily
christian living among Catholics” (§1).63 The importance of active par-
ticipation in the liturgy flows from the fact that, as we find in the second
paragraph, “the liturgy is each day building up those who are within into
a holy temple in the Lord, into a dwelling place for God in the Spirit,
until they reach the stature of the age of Christ’s fullness [cf. Eph 2:21–22;
4:13].” Paragraph 2 states that the liturgy, “especially . . . the divine sacri-
fice of the Eucharist,” is “the chief means through which believers are ex-
pressing in their lives and demonstrating to others the mystery which is
Christ.” The liturgy also expresses and teaches what the Church is, since
the liturgy involves visible things mediating divine realities, “in such a

62. Bouyer, Liturgy and Architecture, 81.

63. Quotations are from Sacrosanctum Concilium, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol.
2: Trent to Vatican II, ed. Norman P. Tanner, SJ (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press,
1990), 820–43.

64 S a c r osa nctum Conc ilium in C o nt ext

way that the human within it is ordered and subordinated to the divine,
and likewise the visible to the invisible, activity to contemplation, and the
present to the city of the future which we seek” (§2). The liturgy effec-
tively displays “the church to those who are outside as an ensign raised for
the nations [cf. Is 11:12], under which the scattered children of God can
be brought together into one until there is one fold and one shepherd [cf.
Jn 11:52 and 10:16]” (§2).
On the basis of this theological sketch of the liturgy’s purposes, para-
graphs 3 and 4 introduce the intention of Sacrosanctum Concilium to pro-
vide principles and practical norms for the liturgy’s renewal, with each
of the approved rites of the Catholic Church retaining equal dignity and
canonical force. Paragraph 5 then inaugurates chapter 1, titled “General
principles regarding the renewal and encouragement of the liturgy.” Sec-
tion 1 of this chapter is titled “The nature of the liturgy and its signifi-
cance in the life of the church.” Paragraph 5 emphasizes that God wills to
make himself known and to unite the whole human race in Christ, who
came not as judge but as healer. Christ brought to fulfillment God’s inter-
actions with Israel, and he did so “above all through the paschal mystery,
that is, his passion, his resurrection from the dead and his glorious ascen-
sion.”64 Understood in this way, the Paschal mystery gave rise not simply
to the sacraments, but to “the tremendous sacrament [mirabile sacramen-
tum] which is the whole church” (§5).
Paragraph 6 connects Christ’s mission from the Father with the mis-
sion that Christ gave the apostles. Like Christ, they were filled with the
Spirit and they were commissioned to preach the good news. In addition
to proclaiming Christ’s conquest of sin and his uniting us with the Father
in the inaugurated kingdom of God, the apostles were given a sacramen-
tal mission: Christ empowered them “to enact what they were announc-
ing through sacrifice and sacraments” (§6). In this way their words were
not simply words, but rather proclaimed realities in which we participate

64. Bouyer coined the phrase “paschal mystery” in a book originally published in French in
1945: see Bouyer, The Paschal Mystery: Meditations on the Last Three Days of Holy Week, trans. Mary
Benoit (Chicago: Regnery, 1950). See also Dominic M. Langevin, OP, From Passion to Paschal
Mystery: A Recent Magisterial Development concerning the Christological Foundation of the Sacra-
ments (Fribourg: Academic Press Fribourg, 2015).

Sac r o s anctum C oncilium i n Co n t ext 65

through the liturgy. As paragraph 6 explains, “people are implanted into
the paschal mystery of Christ through baptism,” so as to “become the true
worshippers whom the Father seeks.” The Eucharistic meal is a sacrament
linked with Christ’s sacrifice, since to celebrate the Eucharist is to pro-
claim “the death of the Lord until he comes” (§6; cf. 1 Cor 11:26). Para-
graph 6 goes on to say that the Eucharistic liturgy includes the reading
of God’s word (the Scripture) and the celebration of the Eucharist as the
sacramental representation of Christ’s Pasch.
Paragraph 7 treats “the sacrifice which is the mass [missae sacrificio],”
in which Christ acts in the person of the priest to offer the same sacri-
fice that he offered on the Cross. Paragraph 7 also describes the analogous
modes in which Christ is present liturgically, such as through the sacrifice
of the Eucharist and through his word (Scripture), as well as whenever the
Church is gathered to pray or sing hymns. The purpose of word and sac-
rament is to heal, unite, and elevate God’s people, “the church who calls
upon her Lord, and worships the eternal Father through him [Christ]”
(§7). Thus, the entirety of the liturgy exhibits the “great process by which
God is being perfectly glorified and human beings becoming holy,” and
so the liturgy is “the enacting of the priestly role of Jesus Christ” (§7).
Indeed, in the liturgy, the priestly action of Christ is the priestly action
of the whole mystical Body, head and members, offering true worship.
Paragraph 8 adds that the liturgy on earth participates “by anticipation in
the heavenly one, celebrated in the holy city, Jerusalem, the goal towards
which we strive as pilgrims, where Christ is, seated at God’s right hand.”
In paragraph 9, Sacrosanctum Concilium observes that the Church
must do a number of things in preparation for the liturgy, including evan-
gelization, sacramental preparation, catechesis, and works of mercy. These
other actions show that believers truly are “the light of the world” (§9), as
Christ promised. Yet, paragraph 10 adds that the Church’s other activi-
ties are not on par with the liturgy. The liturgy is “the high point towards
which the activity of the church is directed, and, simultaneously, the
source from which all its power flows out” (§10). Those who are united
to Christ through faith and baptism “assemble together in order to praise
God in the midst of the church, to share in the sacrifice [sacrificium par-
ticipent], and to eat the Lord’s supper” (§10). In the Eucharistic sacrifice

66 S a c r osanctum Conc ilium in Co nt ext

and meal, the Lord renews his covenant with us, and this covenant re-
newal sets us aflame with “the overwhelming love of Christ” (§10). Para-
graph 10 concludes that the liturgy is like a fountain from which grace
pours forth upon us, with the result that the sanctification of humanity in
Christ and the glorification of God—which together constitute the goal
of everything done by the Church—are “realised in a fully effective way.”
Thus all the dimensions of Bouyer’s balanced presentation of the litur-
gy are present in paragraphs 5–10: word and sacrament, sacrifice and meal,
faith and eschatology, human sanctification and divine glorification. Sac-
rosanctum Concilium §11, then, deepens and develops the crucial theme
of active participation in the liturgy: “If . . . this fully effective presence is
to be appropriated, believers must approach the liturgy with the disposi-
tions of a suitable heart and mind.” Such dispositions enable believers not
only to observe the proper exterior forms, but to participate interiorly in
the liturgical action. This interior participation is required if the liturgy is
to efficaciously build up each believer, and the whole community, into “a
holy temple in the Lord.” Paragraph 11 therefore strongly calls for the en-
couragement of active participation of the laity in the liturgy: “those with
responsibility for leadership in worship must take care . . . that the people
are able to take part in it in such a way that they are active, that they know
what is going on, and that they will receive benefit [ut fideles scienter, ac-
tuose et fructuose eandem participent].”65
After a couple paragraphs encouraging private devotions outside of
the liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium focuses its attention on the active
participation of the laity. Section 2 of chapter 1, composed of paragraphs
14–20, bears the title “Fostering liturgical formation and active partici-
pation.” The first sentence of paragraph 14 makes clear the centrality of
the laity’s active participation for the renewal envisioned by Sacrosanctum
Concilium: “The church [mater ecclesiae] very much wants all believers to
be led to take a full, conscious and active part in liturgical celebration.”66

65. For appreciative discussion of this passage, see Bouyer, The Liturgy Revived, 89–91.
66. For the connection here with Pope Pius X’s encouragement of active participation, see
Bouyer, The Liturgy Revived, 91–92. For strong criticism of the preconciliar liturgy, Charles E.
Miller, CM, Liturgy for the People of God, vol. 1, Foundations of Vatican II Liturgy (Staten Island,
N.Y.: Alba House, 2000), 102–3.

Sa c r o s anctum C onc ilium i n Co n t ext 67

As paragraph 14 observes, this is no secondary aim that the liturgy can do
without. On the contrary, the very “nature of the liturgy” requires the la-
ity’s active participation to be fully what the liturgy is. Likewise, the laity
can fulfill their mission only when they actively participate in the liturgy,
since this duty pertains to the baptismal priesthood of all believers. Lest
there be any doubt, paragraph 14 reiterates: “This full and active sharing
[actuosa participatio] on the part of the whole people is of paramount
concern in the process of renewing the liturgy and helping it to grow, be-
cause such sharing is the first, and necessary, source from which believ-
ers can imbibe the true christian spirit.” The conclusion follows that “all
pastoral activity” should have in view the formation of believers so that
they may participate actively in the liturgy, which makes sense given the
exalted vision of the liturgy articulated in the earlier paragraphs of Sacro-
sanctum Concilium.
Since the active participation of the laity in the liturgy requires much
more than just performing external actions, the clergy need to train the
laity in active participation, rather than simply inviting the laity to be
active. For this reason, paragraphs 15–18 focus upon the formation of
seminarians and priests in liturgical theology. Prior to the Council, sacra-
mental theology was central in seminaries; now Sacrosanctum Concilium
mandates that the liturgy also be a necessary field of seminary study, in-
deed one of the “principal areas of enquiry” (§16). The history of the lit-
urgy should be studied as well as the theology of the liturgy, and “its spiri-
tual, pastoral and juridical aspects” should receive attention, along with
the connections between the liturgy and other theological domains (§16).
The liturgy should not only be studied, but should also take a central
role in the spiritual formation of seminarians. Seminarians should learn
how “to understand the rites of worship and share [participare] in them
wholeheartedly” (§17).67 The “spirit of the liturgy” (§17) should pervade
the atmosphere of the seminary. In this way, seminarians who become
priests will not only understand what is required interiorly and exteriorly
for the active participation of the laity, but will also be able to communi-
cate these requirements, because they will have internalized them.

67. See also Vatican II’s Optatam Totius.

68 S a c r osa nctum C oncilium in Co nt ext

 Sacrosanctum Concilium, then, conceives of the laity’s active partici-
pation in a manner that requires an arduous process of entering into the
“spirit of the liturgy.” This perspective accords with Bouyer’s understand-
ing of the active participation of the laity as a “doing” rather than a “watch-
ing.” The “doing” is primarily the interior action of sharing with the priest
in the sacramental offering of Jesus Christ to the Father. Just as Bouyer val-
ues external as well as interior participation—he mentions with approval
external modes of participation such as the singing of hymns and the use of
the vernacular—so too Sacrosanctum Concilium urges that the laity should
attain to “an active part [participationem] in the liturgy, both inwardly
and outwardly” (§19). The principal element, however, is inward, which
is why Sacrosanctum Concilium emphasizes the difficulty of the liturgical
training of the laity. Paragraph 19 describes priests as needing to “conscien-
tiously and patiently work to impart a liturgical formation to the people,” a
formation suited to the mode of life and “level of religious culture” of each
person. The paragraph reiterates that priests not only should instruct the
people in active participation, but should model it by their “example.”
After a paragraph devoted to the conditions in which the Mass should
be broadcast on television or radio, the next paragraph, §21, begins the third
section of chapter 1, titled “The renewal of the liturgy.” This section sets
forth particular reforms that aim to foster active participation in the liturgy.
Paragraph 21 teaches that “the texts and rites must be organised so as to ex-
press more clearly the holy things which they represent, and so that thus
the christian people, insofar as this is possible, will be able to understand
these things easily.” Equipped with a better understanding of the meaning
of liturgical texts and rites, the laity will be able truly to participate in the
“holy things” of the liturgy “through a celebration that is expressive of their
full meaning, is effective, involving [actuosa], and the community’s own”
(§21). This project of reform accords with the desire that Bouyer repeatedly
expresses for the reform of the liturgy of his own day. Paragraph 23 adds
that liturgical “changes should not be made unless a real and proven need
of the church requires them, and care should be taken to see that new forms
grow in some way organically out of the forms already existing” (§23).68

68. For discussion see Bouyer, The Liturgy Revived, 51–56.

Sa c r o s anctum C onc ilium i n Co nt ext 69

Paragraph 24 notes that liturgical renewal requires a simultaneous biblical
renewal, since the liturgical prayers, collects, hymns, scriptural readings, ac-
tions, and signs are intelligible only to those who know Scripture; and para-
graph 25 mandates the revision of the liturgical books in consultation with
trained liturgical scholars.
Paragraph 26 introduces the way in which the unity and diversity of
the Church is liturgically expressed. Paragraph 27 strongly encourages
priests to celebrate Mass “with the faithful present and actively partici-
pating,” even though private Masses are not invalid. Importantly for the
limits on the meaning of the active participation of the laity, paragraph 28
affirms that “[d]uring liturgical celebration, everyone, whether minister
or in the congregation, should, while carrying out their own role, do all
that and only that which is their due—this being determined by the na-
ture of the celebration and by liturgical norms.” This statement makes
clear that active participation of the laity does not mean their taking over
the priest’s role.
Against the possible reduction of active participation to interior acts
alone, paragraph 29 states that the external acts of serving, reading, and
singing constitute “genuine liturgical ministry.” Moreover, exterior acts that
befit interior devotion are encouraged for the laity. Paragraph 30 states, “In
order to encourage their taking an active share [actuosam participationem],
acclamations for the people, together with responses, psalmody, antiphons
and hymns, should be developed, as well as actions, movements and bodily
self-expression. When it is appropriate, a worshipping silence should also
be kept.”69 These external acts aim to draw the laity into a deeper unity with
the priest’s actions, and thereby visibly to unify the liturgical action of priest
and people, without confusing the laity’s role with the priest’s. Along the
same lines, paragraph 31 mandates that “[w]hen the books used in the litur-
gy are being revised, great care is to be taken that the rubrics envisage parts
for the people.”
Paragraphs 33–36 have to do with the liturgy as a teaching tool, by
which believers are instructed. Here Sacrosanctum Concilium observes that
God speaks to his people in the liturgy, and that “the prayers addressed to

69. See ibid., 72–73.

70 S a c ros anctum Concilium in Co nt ext

God by the priest, who presides over the gathering in the role of Christ,
are said in the name of the entire holy people, and of all who are present”
(§33). Sacrosanctum Concilium does not use the phrase active participation
here, but it does emphasize that in all aspects of the liturgy, “the faith of
those taking part [participantium] is nourished and their minds raised to
God, enabling them to give him free and conscious service [rationabile
obsequium: see Romans 12:1] and to receive his grace more abundantly”
(§33). This is a description of active participation and its fruits.
Paragraph 34’s guidelines for renewal or reform propose that “[t]he
rites should radiate a noble simplicity; they should be brief and lucid,
avoiding pointless repetitions; they should be intelligible to the people,
and should not in general require much explanation.” Paragraph 35 then
focuses on the connection between word and sacrament. It emphasizes the
value of the sermon and mandates a fuller set of biblical readings for the
liturgy, so as to set forth the whole of salvation history. Likewise, it man-
dates instruction during the rite itself, where the rite would otherwise be
difficult for the faithful to understand. An expanded use of the vernacular
receives approval in paragraph 36. Similarly, inculturation of the liturgy re-
ceives encouragement in paragraphs 37–40, with the understanding that
“the fundamental unity of the Roman rite is preserved” (§38).
Turning to the role of the bishop and the local church, including par-
ishes, Sacrosanctum Concilium articulates the patristic theme of the cen-
trality of the bishop in the diocesan liturgy. It also calls for each diocese
to establish a liturgical commission staffed by liturgical experts and sup-
ported by pastoral liturgical institutes, along with commissions for art
and music (see §§44–46). In this way, the liturgical renewal will enter
into the Church at the local level, so that the parish’s liturgical life will
shape Christian thought and action. This fits with Bouyer’s confidence in
the fruitfulness of liturgical studies, in light of the Liturgical Movement.
Paragraph 47 inaugurates chapter 2, on “The holy mystery which is
the eucharist.” After a paragraph commenting on the sacrament of the Eu-
charist, which serves “to make his sacrifice of the cross last throughout
time until he should return,” and which is a “sign of unity, a bond of di-
vine love, a special easter meal [convivium paschale]” that recalls Christ’s
“death and resurrection” (§47), paragraph 48 reiterates the centrality of

Sac r o s a nctum Concil i um i n Co nt ext 71

the need for active participation. It states that “the church devotes care-
ful efforts to prevent christian believers from attending this mystery of
faith as though they were outsiders or silent onlookers.” Nothing could
be closer to Bouyer’s fundamental concern. Drawing upon Pope Pius XI’s
famous phrase, paragraph 48 observes that the laity, “having a good un-
derstanding of this mystery, through the ritual and the prayers, . . . should
participate in the sacred action consciously, piously, and actively [sacram
actionem conscie, pie et actuose participent].”70 This active participation
should most importantly take the form of an interior union with the Eu-
charistic prayer spoken by the priest. Thus, according to paragraph 48—
here drawing upon paragraphs 98 and 99 of Pope Pius XII’s 1947 encycli-
cal Mediator Dei—the faithful at Mass should not only “give thanks to
God” but also, and more specifically, “should learn to offer themselves
as they offer the immaculate victim—not just through the hands of the
priest, but also they themselves making the offering together with him.”
Paragraphs 49–58 specify particular reforms that seek to encourage a
deeper and more active participation of the laity in the Eucharistic liturgy.
The rites are to be made simpler, a cycle of Scripture readings developed,
the homily strengthened, the prayer of the faithful restored, the vernacular
employed, communion under both kinds allowed, and frequent commu-
nion encouraged. These reforms have to do with encouraging the laity’s
external participation, and they are reforms that Bouyer firmly supports.
Given the unity of the liturgy of the word and the liturgy of the Eucharist,
paragraph 56 calls for priests to urge the faithful “to share in the whole
mass,” rather than arriving only after the biblical readings and homily have
been completed.
Paragraphs 59–82 constitute chapter 3, titled “The other sacraments
and sacramentals.” Again Sacrosanctum Concilium’s focus is upon en-
couraging a deeper participation on the part of believers. Paragraph 61
explains that “for believers who are suitably open, the liturgy of sacra-
ments and sacramentals brings it about that practically everything which
happens in life is sanctified with the grace that flows from the easter mys-

70. I have modified Tanner’s translation, which reads: “having a good understanding of this
mystery, through the ritual and the prayers, they should share in the worshipping event, aware of
what is happening and devoutly involved.”

72 S a c ros a nctum Conc ilium in Co nt ext

tery of Christ’s passion, death, and resurrection: the source from which
all sacraments and sacramentals draw their power.” In the instructions for
reform that follow, we find mandates concerning the catechumenate for
adults, the rites of adult and infant baptism, the rites of confirmation and
penance, the rite of anointing, the rites of ordination, and the rite of mar-
riage. Paragraph 73 teaches that “extreme unction” or “final anointing”
should be called “anointing of the sick [unctio infirmorum]” so as to em-
phasize that it “is not a sacrament exclusively for those who are involved
in the final crisis of life and death.” Among the paragraphs that address
sacramentals, paragraph 80 mandates the review of the rite of consecra-
tion of virgins and the establishment of a rite for religious profession and
renewal of vows. Paragraph 81 requires that “[t]he funeral rites should ex-
press more clearly the paschal character of Christian death.”
Chapter 4 includes paragraphs 83–101, and is titled “The divine of-
fice.” This chapter mainly contains reforms that affect the lives of priests
and religious, but it also invites the laity to recite the “divine office,” or
liturgy of the hours, and it encourages the public celebration of vespers
by the laity in local churches and the recitation of the liturgy of the hours
in the vernacular. After affirming the value of the liturgy of the hours as
rooted in Christ’s uniting to himself the “whole human community” and
making “it his partner in this divine singing together of a song of praise”
(§83), Sacrosanctum Concilium mandates some revisions. It suppresses the
hour of “prime” and adapts the hour of “matins,” while emphasizing the
importance of “lauds” and “vespers.” It calls for a revision of the psalmody
and for a fuller breadth of scriptural readings, along with a better selec-
tion of the excerpts from the Fathers and Doctors and more attention to
the historical credibility of the excerpts from martyrdom accounts or lives
of the saints. With regard to the hymns found in the divine office, they
should be restored as much as possible to their original medieval form.
The choral obligations of orders of canons, monks, and nuns are specified,
and priests are urged to recite a portion of the daily liturgy of the hours as
a group rather than solely reciting it individually.
Finally, chapters 5–7 (paragraphs 102–130) offer succinct proposals
for reforming the liturgical year, liturgical music, and liturgical art in ac-
cord with the principles outlined above. Paragraphs 102–106 describe the

Sa c r osa nctum Concilium i n Co nt ext 73

liturgical year, whose purpose is to unfold “the whole mystery of Christ
over the cycle of the year” (§102), to honor the Virgin Mary, to commem-
orate martyrs and saints, and in general to form and instruct believers so
as to foster active participation. Paragraph 106 lifts up the primary im-
portance of Sunday, “the fundamental feast day” and “a day of rejoicing
and of rest from work.” Paragraphs 107–111 mandate some revisions of the
liturgical year, including the requirement that “the liturgy of the season
should be given its proper place above the feasts of the saints” (§108), the
requirement that Lent’s baptismal elements be foregrounded and that
“the consequences of sin in society” (§109) be recognized, a call for pub-
lic and collective penance during Lent, the keeping of the Paschal fast on
Good Friday (and if possible Holy Saturday as well), and the requirement
that “[o]nly those feasts commemorating saints whose importance really
is universal should be extended over the whole Church” (§111), so as not
to overshadow the feasts of the salvific mysteries that should be at the
heart of Christian spiritual life.
Regarding music, Sacrosanctum Concilium not surprisingly encourag-
es singing by the whole congregation: “When singing is used to heighten
the celebration of religious services, with ministers of worship taking part
and the people actively joining in [actuose participet], the liturgical activ-
ity takes on a richer character” (§113). Paragraph 114 likewise emphasizes
that Church leaders must ensure that “the whole gathering of believers are
able to take the active part which is proper to them in any event of wor-
ship meant to be conducted through song.” Paragraph 116 gives primacy
to Gregorian chant but allows “[o]ther sorts of sacral music, especially of
course polyphony,” and stipulates that these forms of music must “fit in
with the spirit of the liturgical event [actionis liturgicae].” In paragraph
118, the emphasis on the active participation of the whole congregation
appears once more: “Religious singing by the people is to be resourcefully
encouraged, so as to enable the voices of believers to ring out in their reli-
gious devotions and worship—and indeed in liturgical events [liturgicis
actionibus].” Paragraph 119 proposes an inculturation of music, so as to
give “suitable scope” to the use of particular cultures’ own traditions of
music. Paragraph 120 specifies that the pipe organ should have pride of
place, but “other instruments may be brought into the worship of God

74 S a c r o s a nctum Conc ilium in Co n t ext

. . . insofar as they are suitable for purposes of worship or can be made so,
insofar as they cohere with the dignity of the temple, and insofar as they
really contribute to the building up of believers.” In paragraph 121, lastly,
musicians are urged to develop music that, while exhibiting “the charac-
teristics of true worshipping music,” serves to “encourage the whole gath-
ering of believers actively to take part.” Thus the emphasis on active par-
ticipation characterizes Sacrosanctum Concilium’s instructions on music.
With respect to art, Sacrosanctum Concilium observes that while the
Church carefully separates out “works of art that are religiously consistent
with its traditions of faith, holiness and law, and that are to be regarded as
suitable for use in worship” (§122), nonetheless the Church canonizes no
form of art but instead uses art from every age. Therefore, paragraph 123
states, “The art of our time also, and the art of every race and part of the
world, should be allowed to function freely in the church, provided it is
of service to the buildings of worship and the rites of worship, exhibiting
due reverence and honour.” Paragraph 124 very briefly addresses church
architecture, and does so explicitly with active participation as the goal:
“when churches are being built, care should be taken to see that they are
suitable for the conducting of liturgical events [liturgicas actiones], and
for bringing it about that believers actively share in them.” Paragraph 128
calls for revisions that address “how churches should be built in a way that
is dignified and suitable; the design and construction of altars; the need
for the eucharistic tabernacle to be dignified, well positioned and secure;
the practicability of having a suitable place for baptism.” This paragraph
foreshadows changes in church architecture, but in a broad way, in accord
with the following principle: “What seems to be less in keeping with the
renewed liturgy should be corrected or abolished; what in fact suits it
should be kept or introduced.”

Conclusion: Sacrosanctum Concilium as

an Ongoing Theological Event
It should be clear that Bouyer and Sacrosanctum Concilium share a strong
concern to enhance the active participation of the laity in the Eucharistic
liturgy, preeminently interior participation but also external participa-

Sa c r osa nctum Concilium i n Co nt ext 75

tion.71 Bouyer and Sacrosanctum Concilium also seek to hold together word
and sacrament, sacrifice and meal, and eschatology and remembrance. Fur-
thermore, just as Bouyer is highly critical of the predominant modes of cel-
ebrating the preconciliar Roman liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium likewise
mandates a number of alterations and favors significant reform, not only
with regard to the liturgy of the Eucharist but also with regard to the other
sacramental rites, the sacramentals, the liturgy of the hours, Church mu-
sic and architecture, and so forth. In almost every instance, the motivation
of these reforms consists in enabling believers to share more deeply in the
Church’s liturgical participation in Christ’s Paschal mystery. Unlike Bouyer,
Sacrosanctum Concilium does not mention facing east together, though it
does call for an interior union of the laity with the priest during the Eu-
charistic prayer. Here the goal is that “during the sacrifice of the mass, we
pray the Lord, ‘to receive the offering of the spiritual victim’, and then raise
‘our very selves’ to their perfection in becoming ‘an eternal gift’ for himself ”
(§12).72
In connecting active participation with priest and people facing east to-
gether, Bouyer in 1967 was swimming against the current. Among liturgical
specialists in 1967, the prevalent opinion about active participation was the
one that Jack Wintz and John Feister, citing Sacrosanctum Concilium §14,
describe approvingly (in 2005) as follows: “Before Vatican II, the priest cel-
ebrated Mass in Latin with his back to the people, making the action of the
Mass seem far away. It was easy for the faithful to fall into the role of specta-
tors. Now the assembly is more actively engaged, helping us to experience
‘all of us’ celebrating the Eucharist with the priest.”73 As an enthusiastic pro-
71. With regard to the relationship of external and internal liturgical participation, Pamela
Jackson rightly observes, “The Council’s liturgical reforms restored various forms of external par-
ticipation to make it easier for worshippers to participate internally in the spiritual realities medi-
ated by the liturgy” ( Jackson, An Abundance of Graces, 58). At the same time, Jackson describes
“the first goal of the Liturgical Movement” as the fostering of “intelligent internal participation
in the Church’s liturgical worship” (ibid., 60). For a similar perspective, see Clara Dina Hinojosa’s
“Full, Conscious and Active Participation,” in Full, Conscious and Active Participation: Celebrating
Twenty-Five Years of Today’s Liturgy, ed. Michael R. Prendergast (Portland, Ore.: Pastoral Press,
2003), 5–11.
72. The interior quotations come from the Roman Missal, prayer over the gifts for Monday
within the octave of Pentecost.
73. Jack Wintz, OFM, and John Feister, “Road Map for the Future: Teachings of Vatican II,”
in Vatican II Today: Calling Catholics to Holiness and Service, ed. Judy Ball and Joan McKamey

76 S a c ros a nctum Conc ilium in Co n t ext

ponent of Sacrosanctum Concilium, Bouyer helps us to appreciate the docu-
ment as an ongoing theological event, because he presses us to specify what
we mean by liturgical “active participation” in Christ’s Paschal mystery.
The Episcopalian scholar Richard Kieckhefer observes that when Lit-
urgy and Architecture “appeared in 1967, Bouyer was seeking many of the
same goals as other reformers. He was as insistent as anyone on overcoming
the clericalist approach to liturgy, with its assumption that liturgy is some-
thing done by the clergy on behalf of the laity.”74 Kieckhefer notes that
as a young scholar, Bouyer had advocated the celebration of the Eucharist
facing the people. But while other anti-clericalist liturgical reformers con-
tinued to hold that to have the priest face the congregation would be the
best way to enhance the active participation of the laity in the liturgy, by
1967 “Bouyer envisioned more venturesome ways to attain the reformers’
goals.”75 Kieckhefer thinks that Bouyer’s broad historical knowledge gave
Bouyer an unusually wide perception of the various options available in
pursuing the goals of liturgical reform.76
The Catholic liturgist and church-designer Richard Vosko bemoans the
fact that, with regard to church art and architecture, “[d]ifferent camps have
arisen since Vatican II, each with its arguments. The feelings are deep and it
may take generations before a common ground is realized. Unfortunately
the eucharistic liturgy has become the touchstone for these disagreements.”77
Vosko lists four basic principles set forth by the central conciliar and post-

(Cincinnati, Ohio: St. Anthony Messenger Press, 2005), 1–9, at 4. See also Charles Miller, Liturgy
for the People of God, vol. 1, Foundations of Vatican II Liturgy, 103–4.
74. Richard Kieckhefer, Theology in Stone: Church Architecture from Byzantium to Berkeley
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 281. When Bouyer served on the Commission that re-
formed the liturgy in the year following the Council, he was deeply disappointed by what he found
to be the “claim of recasting from top to bottom and in a few months an entire liturgy it had taken
twenty centuries to develop,” and he has scathing things to say about the leading figure in oversee-
ing the reform, Archbishop Annibale Bugnini (Bouyer, The Memoirs of Louis Bouyer: From Youth
and Conversion to Vatican II, the Liturgical Reform, and After, trans. John Pepino [Kettering, Ohio:
Angelico Press, 2015], 219; cf. 224–25). His concerns about the “hasty reform” of the liturgy—a
revision that he nonetheless grants has “excellent elements” and “scattered pearls”—do not touch
upon Sacrosanctum Concilium, whose theological perspective and program of reform retained his
support (Bouyer, Memoirs, 221, 224).
75. Kieckhefer, Theology in Stone, 281.
76. See ibid., 281, 292.
77. Richard S. Vosko, God’s House Is Our House: Re-imagining the Environment for Worship
(Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2006), xi.

Sac r o s anctum C onc ilium i n Co nt ext 77

conciliar documents: (1) the universal call to holiness, (2) the Church as the
sacrament of unity, (3) the obligation of the baptized “to participate in wor-
ship as partners and not spectators,” and (4) the necessity that architecture
reflect the above three points.78 Writing in 2005, Vosko warns that “[o]n the
liturgical front some church authorities and laity clearly wish to return to
a pre-Conciliar mode,” which Vosko associates with clericalist emphasis on
the role of the priest in the liturgy.79 In accord with the need to encourage
the active participation of the laity in the liturgy, Vosko emphasizes, much
like Bouyer, that “a worthy worship place does not begin with an architec-
tural or artistic idea but a liturgical one. Thus the building must first serve
the worship of the assembly and foster its engagement.”80 Vosko’s liturgical
ideas allow for the distinction between priest and people but seek to mini-
mize it where possible, as does Bouyer through his emphasis on the priest
and people being in close proximity during the Eucharistic prayer. Much
like Bouyer, Vosko holds that “care should be taken not to create a sense of
division between clergy and laity especially at the eucharistic table.”81 Like
Bouyer, too, Vosko is critical of the way in which the liturgy developed in
the medieval and Baroque eras. He states in this regard that “as the laity par-
ticipated less and less during the liturgy they became preoccupied with their
private prayers or with the pageantry carried out by the clergy and choir.”82
In underscoring the need for “active, conscious participation,” how-
ever, Vosko argues that churches should be designed so that the altar is in
the middle, surrounded on all sides (in a circular way) by the pews of the
congregation.83 In his view, this design “can and most often does create the
kind of worship setting where the participation of the whole congrega-
tion is expected.”84 By contrast, he considers that noncircular churches in
which rows of pews all face the altar from the same direction have adopted
a design that “discourages and often makes impossible the participation ex-
pected of every member of the assembly.”85 Moreover, he argues that such
designs “convey quite a different notion of the church from those favored
by the Council,” because they favor a clericalist notion of the Church.86
78. Ibid. 79. Ibid., xiv.
80. Ibid., xv. 81. Ibid., 95.
82. Ibid., 91. 83. Ibid., 58.
84. Ibid. 85. Ibid., 59.
86. Ibid.

78 S a c ro s a nctum Conc ilium in Co nt ext

 The differences between Bouyer and Vosko in this respect are not as
wide as might first seem to be the case. Bouyer certainly thought that rows of
pews all facing the altar from the same direction was far from ideal and could
foster a clericalist understanding of the liturgy.87 Vosko seeks to overcome
clericalist understandings of the liturgy by encircling the priest with the peo-
ple, whereas Bouyer advocates arranging the people in a semicircle close by
the priest. But for Bouyer this arrangement does not fully address the prob-
lem of active participation in the Eucharistic liturgy, because he considers
that facing the altar together and facing east together are a significant part
of participating actively in the eschatological action that is the Eucharistic
liturgy.88 By facing east together in close proximity to one another, priest and
people face toward the Christ who will come in glory. According to Bouyer,
the congregation thereby signifies that even now it is sharing in the escha-
tological heavenly banquet of the Lord. Altar and table are joined together,
and in participating in the sacrificial offering, we participate in the meal.
Joseph Ratzinger insightfully remarks in his 1999 book The Spirit of the
Liturgy that “if we want to discover the kind of doing that active partici-
pation involves, we need, first of all, to determine what this central actio is
in which all the members of the community are supposed to participate.”89
Ratzinger observes that the liturgy enables us to participate in Christ’s sac-
rificial self-offering, so that in the liturgy “the difference between the ac-
tio Christi and our own action is done away with. There is only one action,
which is at the same time his and ours—ours because we have become ‘one
body and one spirit’ with him.”90 Caught up in the Trinitarian life, believers

87. In my view, such an outcome is unlikely.

88. Vosko’s theological reflections are often cliché-ridden and vague in their reference. Thus
in his afterword he remarks that “the Church has grown into a powerful institution. Now it is
going through a challenging time of transition. The old paradigms are changing. The future of the
Church will depend not only on respecting tradition but also using the imagination. The objective
is to build upon foundations in order to rise to new heights. This is why all matters pertaining to
worship are important. We have learned that the liturgical life of the Church is both a source and a
summit. The roots are well known but the destination is not. The quest just might be found in the
journey” (ibid., 231).
89. Joseph Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy, trans. John Saward (San Francisco: Ignatius
Press, 2000), 171.
90. Ibid., 174. Thus, Ratzinger concludes that “if the liturgy degenerates into general activity, then
we have radically misunderstood the ‘theo-drama’ of the liturgy and lapsed almost into parody. True
liturgical education cannot consist in learning and experimenting with external activities. Instead one

Sa c r o s anctum C onc ilium i n Co n t ext 79

give thanks to the Father, through-with-in Christ our Head, in the Holy
Spirit. Believers do so in communion with the heavenly liturgy (which we
yearn to join), with all the earthly communities of the whole Church (we
name the bishop of our diocese and the pope as the head of the universal
college of bishops), and with those believers now undergoing purgation.
Centrally, our thanksgiving is motivated by and shares in the Paschal sac-
rifice of Christ, which is made present in the Mass. Thus active participa-
tion primarily means devout interior participation in the Eucharistic prayer,
though it includes exterior acts as well.
The differences among the above scholars—and many others could be
named—make clear that the theological event of Sacrosanctum Concilium
is still ongoing. All parties in the discussion agree with the insistence of
Sacrosanctum Concilium that the whole assembly is called to active litur-
gical participation in Christ’s Paschal mystery, and that this is the central
goal of liturgical reform. Most agree, too, that the active participation of
the laity in the liturgy does not imply a contest between priest and la-
ity over who has more “active agency.”91 Sacrosanctum Concilium demon-
strates that we are all called in the liturgy to participate actively in Christ’s
Paschal mystery, though in different modes, in accord with the differen-
tiation between the baptismal and ministerial priesthood. Disagreements
remain about how best to strengthen the active liturgical participation of
the laity in Christ’s Paschal mystery, and in my view there are advantages
to the priest and people facing east together during the Eucharistic prayer.
But no matter how this matter is settled, the ongoing theological event
of Sacrosanctum Concilium grounds us in the central liturgical desidera-
tum: that all Christians, united liturgically in Christ’s Pasch, interiorly of-
fer our “bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is
[our] spiritual worship” (Rom 12:1).

must be led toward the essential actio that makes the liturgy what it is, toward the transforming power
of God, who wants, through what happens in the liturgy, to transform us and the world” (ibid., 175).
91. For the tug-of-war over “active agency,” see Vincent J. Miller, Consuming Religion: Chris-
tian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture (New York: Continuum, 2004), 215. Miller is focus-
ing on “how the liturgy can serve as a setting for lay practice and a formation for lay agency outside
the liturgy” and, in this context, his account of active agency emphasizes that “a fundamental asym-
metry remains between the passive scripted style of liturgical agency and the active, creative appli-
cation of the wisdom of the tradition to daily life envisioned for the laity outside of the eucharistic
gathering” (ibid., 214, 217).

80 S a c rosanctum Conc ilium in C o nt ext

C h a p t e r 3

}
TRUE AND FALSE
REFORM
Lumen Gentium in Context

In her Mystery of the Church, People of God: Yves Congar’s Total Ecclesiol-
ogy as a Path to Vatican II, Rose Beal shows that Congar’s unpublished
treatise De Ecclesia profoundly shaped the key chapters of Lumen Gen-
tium.1 For Congar as for Lumen Gentium, the mission of the Church is
to enable the whole world to enter into the people of God, which is the
body of Christ and the temple of the Spirit. Beal considers that “[i]n its
main lines, the Second Vatican Council achieved the ecclesiology that
Congar had sought for decades.”2 She adds that Congar, after the Coun-
cil, found himself defending elements of the Church that he had taken
more for granted prior to the Council, notably “the incorporation of the
1. Rose M. Beal, Mystery of the Church, People of God: Yves Congar’s Total Ecclesiology as a Path
to Vatican II (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2014).
2. Ibid., 214.

81
hierarchy as a necessary part of an ecclesiological synthesis”—an element
that receives full appreciation in Lumen Gentium.3
In Yves Congar’s True and False Reform in the Church (1950, revised
edition 1968), which influenced Pope John XXIII’s decision to call the
Second Vatican Council and which has been called Congar’s “most origi-
nal book and the most important,”4 Congar states that the widespread de-
sire for reform of the Church is “the fruit of a deep Christian conscious-
ness coming to grips with human reality and with the apostolic needs
of the present. It is not about intellectual or aesthetic exercises, nor is it
concerned about some false notion that the church might have mistaken
the faith and that it might be necessary to lead it dogmatically back to
the gospel.”5 The same confidence that the Church has not misunder-
stood the content of faith, and the same desire to engage present-day ap-
ostolic needs, is found in Lumen Gentium. This Constitution should be
read in light of the reforming impulses to which Congar alludes, since
Lumen Gentium seeks to restore the bishops to their full apostolic posi-
tion vis-à-vis the pope and seeks also a renewal of the place of the laity
in the Church, not least through an insistence upon the universal call to

3. Ibid., 215.
4. Jean-Pierre Jossua, OP, personal letter to Gabriel Flynn, cited in Flynn, “Yves Congar and
Catholic Church Reform: A Renewal of the Spirit,” in Yves Congar: Theologian of the Church, ed.
Gabriel Flynn (Leuven: Peeters, 2005), 99–133, at 133n113.
5. Yves Congar, OP, True and False Reform in the Church, trans. Paul Philibert, OP (Col-
legeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2011), 337. For discussion of Congar’s ecclesiology in True and
False Reform in the Church, see also Aidan Nichols, OP, Yves Congar (London: Geoffrey Chapman,
1989), chapter 10; as well as Joseph Famerée, L’ecclésiologie d’Yves Congar avant Vatican II. Analyse
et reprise critique (Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1992). Paul Philibert observes: “It is clear
that Archbishop Angelo Roncalli (later to become Pope John XXIII) discovered and read True
and False Reform during his years as papal nuncio in France. He asked in response to reading it, ‘A
reform of the church: is such a thing really possible?’ A decade later, he presided over the opening
of the Second Vatican Council which he had convened. In his opening address at the council, he
described its goals in terms highly evocative of Congar’s description of authentic reform” (Philib-
ert, “Translator’s Introduction,” in Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, xi–xvi, at xii).
For crucial background, see also Jared Wicks, SJ, “Tridentine Motivations of Angello Roncalli/
Pope John XXIII before and during Vatican II,” Theological Studies 75 (2014): 847–62; Wicks,
“Vatican II Taking Hold of Its (and Pope John’s) Council Goals, September 1962–May 1963,” Jo-
sephinum Journal of Theology 19 (2012): 172–86. See also, for creative ways of connecting Trent
(and the Tridentine period) and Vatican II, while differentiating them in accord with the new chal-
lenges that Vatican II seeks to address, George Weigel, Evangelical Catholicism: Deep Reform in the
21st-Century Church (New York: Basic Books, 2013); Thomas Joseph White, OP, “The Tridentine
Genius of Vatican II,” First Things, no. 227 (November 2012): 25–30.

82 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

holiness. Lumen Gentium should also be read in light of Congar’s rejec-
tion of the “notion that the church might have mistaken the faith and
that it might be necessary to lead it dogmatically back to the gospel.” The
Constitution exhibits serene confidence in the divine foundation of the
Church, the holiness of its divine gifts, and the truthfulness of its procla-
mation of faith.
In the preconciliar period and the first year of the Council, Congar
was sometimes thought to have overemphasized the element of reform.
In his posthumously published My Journal of the Council, he records
on 9 December 1962 that Cardinal “Ottaviani reproaches me for saying
sometimes good things, sometimes bad things in my Vraie et fausse Ré-
forme.”6 Although Congar does not say what the “good things” are, they
likely have to do with Congar’s insistence upon the unchanging divine
elements of the Church,7 whereas the “bad things” are likely his reform
proposals. For Ottaviani, Congar complains, “Everything [that the Curia
says or does] is praiseworthy, everything must be praised. They know only
ONE line: the one that is homogeneous and favourable to the assertion
of their authority.”8
Joyfully, Congar perceived in early February 1963 that Pope “John XIII’s
idea” was “to make the Church move into a largely collegial and episcopal
way of operating. . . . It really seems that the internal result of the Council
will be this: to put in place WORLD-WIDE organisms and no longer
simply Romano-Catholic ones.”9 From an early stage, Congar was involved

6. Yves Congar, OP, My Journal of the Council, trans. Mary John Ronayne, OP, and Mary Cec-
ily Boulding, OP, ed. Denis Minns, OP (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2012), 249.
7. Indebted to Congar, Avery Dulles observes: “From the Catholic perspective, the Church
is intrinsically holy in its formal or constituent elements—the word of God, the sacraments, the
ecclesiastical office, and the gifts and graces bestowed by the Holy Spirit, who has been poured
forth upon the Church as its life-giving principle” (Avery Dulles, SJ, “Church, Ministry, and Sacra-
ments in Catholic-Evangelical Dialogue,” in Catholics and Evangelicals: Do They Share a Common
Future?, ed. Thomas P. Rausch, SJ [New York: Paulist Press, 2000], 108).
8. Congar, My Journal of the Council, 249.
9. Ibid., 255. For Congar’s understanding of Councils, see his “The Council as an Assembly and
the Church as Essentially Conciliar,” trans. Alain Woodrow, in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic:
Studies on the Nature and Role of the Church in the Modern World, ed. Herbert Vorgrimler (London:
Sheed and Ward, 1968), 44–88. In reflecting upon Karl Rahner, SJ’s contention that Vatican II inau-
gurated the “world church,” John W. O’Malley, SJ, observes: “What is striking about Vatican II is not
any prominent role played by ‘the new churches’ of former colonies but how dominated it was by Eu-
ropeans. The leading figures were almost exclusively from the Continent, and those few that were not,

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o nt ext 83
in consultations regarding the schema De Ecclesia that would become Lu-
men Gentium. Late in 1962, Congar urged in the pages of his journal that
the Council “ought to limit itself to ONE question only, namely a treatise
on the Church, in itself and in relation to the world.”10 Meeting in early
January 1963 with the influential Belgians Émile de Smedt and Gérard
Philips, along with Cardinal Léon-Joseph Suenens, Congar helped to
work out a four-chapter structure for De Ecclesia, focusing on the mys-
tery of the Church, the bishops, the laity, and Mary. At another January
1963 meeting, this time with Philips, Edward Schillebeeckx, Piet Smul-
ders, Joseph Ratzinger, Karl Rahner, Alois Grillmeier, Otto Semmelroth,
and Rudolph Schnackenburg, Congar discussed and critiqued the Ger-
man proposal for De Ecclesia. In his entry for 4 March 1963, similarly, he
reports spending three enjoyable hours with Philips, Charles Moeller, and
Rahner working on “a new version of Chapter II of De Ecclesia.”11
At the very end of the Council, in his entry for 7 December 1965, Con-
gar looks back at the Council and sums up his work. In addition to his
contributions to consultations and his work in helping to draft numerous
chapters, including a number of chapters of Lumen Gentium, he observes
that “objectively, I did a great deal to prepare for the Council, elaborating
and diffusing the ideas that the Council consecrated.”12 This assessment is
accurate. As John O’Malley points out, Congar “was brought to Rome by
John XXIII for the preparatory work for the council. Once the council
got under way, he became an almost ubiquitously influential peritus. He

like the American Jesuit John Courtney Murray and Archbishop Paul-Émile Léger of Montreal, were
European in the broad sense. The council was even more deeply Eurocentric in that the issues it dealt
with originated in the history of Western Europe. Europe, its concerns, and the legacy of its history
provided the framework within which Vatican II operated” (O’Malley, “What Happened and Did
Not Happen at Vatican II,” in O’Malley, Catholic History for Today’s Church: How Our Past Illumi-
nates Our Present [Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 2015], 115–32, at 116; cf. Rahner, “Towards
a Fundamental Theological Interpretation of Vatican II,” Theological Studies 40 [1979]: 716–27, espe-
cially 718, 724). With Catholic Christianity now reduced in Europe to relatively few active believers,
and with an Argentinian—Pope Francis—as Bishop of Rome, it is providential that (as O’Malley
goes on to say) “a wider vista was trying to break through” at the Council (O’Malley, “What Hap-
pened and Did Not Happen at Vatican II,” 117). For a recent example of this vibrant “wider vista,”
rooted in the scriptural testimony to divine revelation, see Cardinal Robert Sarah et al., Christ’s New
Homeland—Africa: Contribution to the Synod on the Family by African Pastors, trans. Michael J. Miller
(San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2015).
10. Congar, My Journal of the Council, 235. 11. Ibid., 265.
12. Ibid., 870.

84 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

was sought for his opinion on almost every major issue before the assem-
bly.”13 The result was that, in the words of Gabriel Flynn, “his thought is
enshrined in its [the Council’s] pivotal documents.”14
Throughout his life, Congar consistently opposed a vision of the
Church in which the pope alone is the center, to the diminishment of
other elements of the Church such as the bishops and the laity.15 In so do-
ing, he may have left himself vulnerable, at least when his writings came
to be employed by thinkers less committed to Scripture and Tradition
than himself, to the weaknesses of what he termed the “anti-Roman at-
titude.”16 But in opposing an overemphasis on the papacy, Congar rightly
understood himself to be insisting upon two unchanging divine elements
of the Church, namely the bishops’ full stature as successors of the apos-
tles and the priesthood of all believers.
In an article in the first issue of Concilium, published in 1964, Congar
offers a richly biblical and theological portrait of the “people of God,” ful-
ly including the hierarchy and understood Christologically through the

13. John W. O’Malley, SJ, What Happened at Vatican II (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer-
sity Press, 2008), 119–20.
14. Flynn, “Yves Congar and Catholic Church Reform,” 101. See also Gabriel Flynn, “Mon
Journal du Concile: Yves Congar and the Battle for a Renewed Ecclesiology at the Second Vatican
Council,” Louvain Studies 28 (2003): 48–70; J. J. Scarisbrick, “An Historian’s Reflections on Yves
Congar’s Mon Journal du Concile,” in Yves Congar, ed. Gabriel Flynn, 249–75.
15. See, for example, Congar, My Journal of the Council, 874.
16. See Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Office of Peter and the Structure of the Church, trans. An-
drée Emery (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986 [original German ed. 1974]), 182, quoting the first
edition of Congar’s Vraie et fausse réforme dans l’Église (Paris: Cerf, 1950), 69–70. With regard
to the deep strife and general collapse of faith after the Council, especially in Europe (a phenom-
enon already emerging in 1965, and still plaguing the Church today), J. J. Scarisbrick suggests that
Congar, like many reformers, was naïve about the impact that his ideas, however valid, would have
upon rank-and-file believers (and about the way some of his ideas would be misused by “radical
liberals” in the Church): “No one could have predicted the size of the disasters which befell the
Church in the wake of the Council. But we can legitimately ask whether Congar was as sensitive
as he should have been to the seriously unsettling effect on many good, devout souls of the rapid
changes which he had vigorously promoted. In a very revealing passage early in the Diary he re-
ports that Italian bishops were said to be ‘bewildered’ because the Council has thrown into doubt
so much that they had taken as ‘classiques et sacrées.’ What they were saying was truly ominous.
One cannot help wondering whether it was exactly such feelings, more intense perhaps, which later
caused so many priests and religious, male and female, to quit. So much that they had been taught
to regard as important, distinctive, precious and, if not de fide, then non-negotiable, had been dis-
carded or demoted, that it was easy to wonder whether much else would soon be jettisoned. . . .
Faced with the Italians’ dilemma, Congar showed neither comprehension nor sympathy” (Scaris-
brick, “An Historian’s Reflections on Yves Congar’s Mon Journal du Concile,” 269–70).

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o n t ext 85
image of the Body of Christ.17 Congar conceived of his own position as
reformist, but rooted always in a desire for “the church’s complete return
to the Gospel.”18 On this view, true reform means a “return to the Gospel,”
which ceaselessly renews the Church in history. Thus, in the 1968 edition
of True and False Reform in the Church, Congar praises Lumen Gentium
for presenting “the church coming forth from God, but committed to hu-
man history as it moves laboriously to its culmination,” 19 since Lumen
Gentium thereby exhibits the ecclesiology that true reform requires: the
Church exists as “at once holy and always in need of purification” and as
following “the path of penance and renewal” (§8).
In order to introduce Lumen Gentium as an ongoing theological
event, therefore, this chapter begins by examining the first two parts of
Congar’s True and False Reform in the Church. As a second step, I sur-
vey the paragraphs of Lumen Gentium in light of Congar’s work on true
and false reform, since the doctrinal teaching of Lumen Gentium reforms
earlier understandings of constitutive elements of the Church and does
so in a “true” manner, namely one that illumines rather than undermines
the Church’s enduring divine gifts of dogma, sacraments, and hierarchical
offices.20 As Avery Dulles rightly observes, “Vatican II could almost be
called Congar’s Council.”21
17. See Yves Congar, OP, “The Church: The People of God,” in The Church and Mankind:
Dogma, ed. Hans Küng and Edward Schillebeeckx, OP, Concilium, vol. 1 (Glen Rock, N.J.: Paulist
Press, 1964), 11–37. See also Congar’s Le Concile de Vatican II. Son église: Peuple de Dieu et corps du
Christ (Paris: Beauchesne, 1984).
18. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 5. For Congar’s postconciliar assessments
on how to interpret the Council, see Andrew Meszaros, “Vatican II as Theological Event and Text
according to Yves Congar,” forthcoming in the Josephinum Journal of Theology. Note that Congar
eschews a historicist view, according to which no “return” to the “Gospel” would be possible—since
rather than allowing for a unified “Gospel,” historicism perceives an irreducible diversity of texts
and perspectives emerging out of specific cultural contexts that can no longer be returned to in any
meaningful way.
19. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 80.
20. My purpose is not to suggest that Lumen Gentium is an action-plan for reforming the
Church, since in fact the conciliar Decrees (not Lumen Gentium) are where we find specific man-
dates for renewed practice. For the relationship of Lumen Gentium to the specific practical man-
dates for reform found in the Decrees of Vatican II, see Jared Wicks, SJ, “Vatican II in 1964: Major
Doctrinal Advances, but Also Fissures on Addressing the Modern World,” Josephinum Journal of
Theology 20 (2013): 4–19, at 10–12.
21. Avery Dulles, SJ, “Yves Congar: In Appreciation,” America 173 (15 July 1995): 6–7. For a
succinct introduction to the contributions of Congar and other figures of the nouvelle théologie, see

86 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

Yves Congar’s True and False Reform in the Church
In True and False Reform in the Church (I employ the 1968 second edi-
tion, whose main lines are unchanged from the original 1950 edition),
Yves Congar cites a number of articles from the decades prior to 1950 that
beg for Church reform, articles written by theologians from Germany
and Austria who asked at least for freedom of discussion. Congar does
not doubt that the Church is in need of such criticism and reform. He
thinks that since the sixteenth century, the Church has been overly sensi-
tive to public criticism, which the Church has perceived as a threat to its
very foundations rather than as constructive criticism by loyal and obedi-
ent Catholics. Congar also thinks that apologists have often deified the
Church as though the Church were perfect, when in fact it is obviously
imperfect. At the same time, he holds that “love of the church” is required
for good criticism, as is—most importantly—“a return to the sources of
theological and pastoral thinking within the living rivers of a Catholic
tradition rediscovered in its deepest expressions.”22 These “living rivers”
have divine revelation as their ever-present fount, and thus the Church’s
teaching is no merely human work. Although he hopes for reform of cer-
tain structures and habits into which the Church (especially since Trent)
has fallen, therefore, Congar has no doubt that secular “ideas of the ‘out-
dated’ or of ‘change’ do not bear upon Christianity in itself or upon its
dogmas and its hierarchical structure.”23 These unchangeable elements are
divine both in origin and in the realities they make manifest.
What true reform should do, then, is to enable the Church to mediate
the divine realities more fully, and thereby enable the Church to be hu-
man not in a fallen way but in a sanctified way. In 1950, Congar gives the
example of the liturgy: “People want a Mass that is genuinely the praise
and the self-offering of a community united in faith, not just a ritual that
goes its own way page after page as people, who may or may not follow

Gerald O’Collins, SJ, “Ressourcement and Vatican II,” in Ressourcement: A Movement for Renewal
in Twentieth-Century Catholic Theology, ed. Gabriel Flynn and Paul D. Murray (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2012), 372–91. As a friend accurately told Congar on November 13, 1965, “You are
winning all along the line” (reported in Yves Congar, OP, My Journal of the Council, 841).
22. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 35, 40.
23. Ibid., 45.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 87
the Mass, watch.”24 The goal is for people to enter fully into the divine
mysteries mediated by the Church, rather than merely to watch, uncom-
prehending, as such mysteries pass by. The same holds, Congar points out,
for dogma: it must become real for believers, not merely abstract. Congar
suggests that the problem often has to do with accretions that the Church
has received over the centuries and that can now be mistaken for neces-
sary elements of the Church. These accretions obscure the authentic man-
ifestation of the gospel, and thereby play into the hands of cultural crit-
ics of Christianity who see hypocrisy and artifice everywhere. As Congar
puts the problem, “it is truly difficult to think in an evangelical way when
one carries the weight of triumphalism, prestige, certainty, and power.”25
From this perspective, chapter 1 of True and False Reform in the
Church examines “The Church’s Holiness and Our Failures.” He begins
by contrasting the patristic vision of the Church (which lasted through
the first millennium) with our modern perspective. For the Fathers, the
Church was “a descent to earth of heavenly realities,” “a mystery of holi-
ness,” a Spirit-filled body constituted visibly by the sacraments, and thus
“a divine reality.”26 The divine reality of the Church was not merely limit-
ed to the interior dimension of the Church, since the Church was viewed
as a unified whole whose public, exterior dimension could not be easily
distinguished from an interior, mystical dimension. Reconciliation itself
was public and social, not a private, individual affair. The Church was
seen as truly excellent, and it was so, by comparison with the pagan world.
Tradition was valued over novelty in every domain. Since the Church was
viewed in this way, the personal failings and hypocrisies of individual be-
lievers did not threaten people’s view of the Church in the way that such
personal failings do in the subjectivity-focused culture of modernity.
Congar observes that the modern focus on personal authenticity has
produced criticism not only of individual hypocrites but also of the whole
Church. In 1950, he points to the scandal caused by the Church’s rejec-
tion of modern historical progress, which appears inauthentic to modern
people because it denies the obvious “truth that reality has this dimension
of becoming.”27 The Church seems repressive and fortress-like against the
24. Ibid., 46. 25. Ibid., 49.
26. Ibid., 55. 27. Ibid., 59.

88 L u me n Ge ntium in Conte x t
new-found freedoms and privileges of humanity. And at the same time,
the Church now understands itself differently from the way that the pa-
tristic Church did: the Church now seems to be focused on its juridical
ecclesiastical structures, rather than on participatory expression of the
heavenly mysteries. Ecumenically, Congar finds that Catholics today, in
their quest for authenticity, “have become more sensitive to the weakness-
es of their church,” more willing to admit its historical and present-day
faults.28
Congar then embarks upon a more detailed tour of the ecclesiology
of not only the Fathers, but also the Bible and the Magisterium. Bibli-
cally speaking, Israel understood itself as a sinful people; whereas Christ
inaugurated the kingdom of saints, but a kingdom that is not yet con-
summated and that therefore still contains both wheat and weeds. Paul
is painfully aware of the extent of sinfulness among his communities—
both personal sin and ecclesial divisions caused by false doctrine—despite
his equal assurance of the power of the Spirit. The same thing is found in
the letters of John and in the Book of Revelation. Congar argues that the
Church is more, though not less, than the Israelite people of God: the
Church is now “the Body of Christ, the Spouse of Christ.”29 For Con-
gar, the phrase “people of God” conveys the (fallen human) fallibleness to
which the people of Israel admitted, whereas the phrase “Body of Christ”
conveys the Church’s Spirit-filled faithful mediation of truth.
For their part, the Fathers think of the Church in terms of the moon,
enlightened and made holy not by its own resources (which are dark) but
by the divine Sun; and they also think of the Church in terms of the Bride
of Christ, sinful in itself but purified and made virginal by Christ. The key
is that, whatever the sins of the members, “the Spirit remains forever in
the church, which remains forever holy because of this.”30 Although the
Church is holy, its holiness does not come from its members (who are
sinners), but from its Head, who works by the grace of the Spirit, through
the holy sacraments and holy teachings, to incorporate his members ful-

28. Ibid., 61.

29. Ibid., 69.
30. Ibid., 73. See also Congar’s later study, I Believe in the Holy Spirit, 3 vols., trans. David
Smith (New York: Crossroad, 1997).

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 89
ly into himself, a process that will not be completed until the eschaton.
Congar sums up by saying that the Fathers “showed that there is an in-
corruptible sanctity which comes to the church from its faith, from the
sacraments, and from the hierarchical powers of the priesthood,” despite
the evident sinfulness of the Church’s members, for which the Church
continually repents.31
This way of understanding the divine and (fallen) human dimensions
of the Church enabled the leaders of the Council of Trent, as Congar
shows, to insist upon the culpability of the bishops for causing the scan-
dalous situation to which the Protestant Reformation responded, with-
out thereby speaking of a sinful Church. In more recent papal statements,
says Congar, there is a general admission of the guilt of the Church’s lead-
ers, but the divine mission and holiness of the Church per se are not ques-
tioned. Here, in the 1968 text, Congar takes the opportunity also to cite
Lumen Gentium at some length. The point is that since the Church is not
only divine but also (fallen) human, it constantly needs reform.
Congar next reflects speculatively upon the holiness of the Church.
He observes that since God is infinitely holy, the Church can be holy only
insofar as it participates in God. As he says, “If the church is holy and
infallible in itself, that is only insofar as it is from God; it is so accord-
ing to the aspect that it comes from God, and to the degree that it is of
God.”32 Insofar as the Word incarnate and the Spirit teach and sanctify
in the Church, the Church is holy. But insofar as the Church “is from us,
it is subject to our limitations and our failures.”33 As Congar points out,
the difficulty consists in distinguishing the divine and human elements
without, as it were, dividing the Church in two. Given that the Church
is obviously human, how can we say that the Church itself does not sin,
without positing a hidden Church-within-the-Church?
In response, Congar makes some important distinctions. First, the
Church can be seen as the congregation of believers. This emphasizes the
human element. But the Church also communicates the faith to believers,
and here we see the divine element as mediated and possessed by humans.

31. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 76.

32. Ibid., 83.
33. Ibid., 84.

90 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

Similarly, the Church is made up of the baptized, and yet the Church be-
stows baptism. We easily see the congregation of baptized believers, and
we know that they are sinners (albeit being sanctified). It is more difficult
to perceive the Church that is in some way prior to believers, that is to
say the Church that gives faith and that gives baptism. Congar empha-
sizes that there is “a reality of the church as mystery, anterior to its real-
ity as congregatio (collectio) fidelium.”34 The Church is already present in
Christ, both in God’s eternal plan and at the moment of the Incarnation,
when Christ becomes Head of the entirety of humanity. Furthermore, the
means by which Christ builds up his Church are prior to the congrega-
tion of believers. Congar identifies these holy means as “the deposit of
faith (and principally the revelation of the Holy Trinity); the sacraments
of the faith, instituted by Jesus Christ, as the means for being united to
the mystery of his passage to the Father; and, finally, the ministries or ap-
ostolic powers.”35
In this context, Congar addresses the question whether the Church
existed already in Israel. He thinks it did, but Jesus lifted up the people
of God in the new covenant, by revealing the fullness of faith (the Trin-
ity) and by giving both the sacraments, whose power comes from his Pas-
sion, and the apostolic powers with their prophetic, priestly, and royal
office—as well as by sending his Spirit upon the Church at Pentecost.
The Church, then, is holy in its divine “faith and its sacramental life,” as
well as in its offices.36 But this holiness must then be truly communicated
to the believers who are the members of the Church, and thus who are
the Church. These believers are sinners being sanctified. When believers
are fully sanctified, in the eschaton, then finally “the church will be the
true temple, the true spouse, and the integral Body of Christ—the whole
Christ.”37
According to Congar, if one insists upon speaking of the Church only
in its aspect of mystery, its divine aspect, then one practices a “theology of
glory” that falsifies the Church.38 When the Church is looked at from the

34. Ibid., 85. 35. Ibid., 85–86.

36. Ibid., 86. 37. Ibid., 87.
38. Ibid. A “theology of glory” is a disparaging phrase coined by Martin Luther as a contrast to
an appropriate “theology of the cross.”

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o n t ext 91
side of its members (who are indeed the Church), the Church is caught
up in sin and in need of constant reform. It is only when the Church is
looked at from the side of the means of salvation, which the Church pos-
sesses in Christ, that the Church is holy. Both perspectives on the Church
are correct; both speak about the real, visible Church. As Congar states,
“It is the same church that is the people of God destined to a historical
existence and that is also a divine institution as the universal sacrament of
salvation.”39 The Church cannot be divided into a visible and an invisible
Church.
Congar identifies four valid ways of speaking about the “Church”:
(1) the Church as “constituted through faith and the sacraments of faith”
and thus as “considered in its formal and constitutive principles which
come from God”; (2) the Church as made of up humans, the community
of believers; (3) the Church as seen in its representative bearers of divine
powers received from God, that is to say the hierarchy (as when we say
that “the Church teaches”); and (4) the Church as the conjunction of
“the divine formal principle with the human material principle.”40 In his
view, the fourth way of speaking of the Church stands out for its ability to
encompass the total reality of the Church, divine and human. He there-
fore defines the Church as “the result of the synergy of a gratuitous divine
gift that is pure in itself and a human activity that is characterized by hu-
man freedom, limitations, and natural fallibility.”41 The objective holiness
of the Church, in its divine aspect as mediating divine mysteries, serves
to make holy the sinful and limited members of the Church, who are in
the process of being sanctified. The saints on earth are in constant need
of sanctification, the only exception being the Virgin Mary, who thereby
stands as an icon of holy Church.
Congar also specifies that the Church in its divine aspect—the Church
as a mystery constituted by holy divine gifts—is in fact the work of the
Holy Spirit. This is why we can say in the Creed that we believe in the holy
Catholic Church: we mean that we believe in the Holy Spirit’s uniting the
Church in holiness. The holiness of the Church, therefore, “can only be

39. Ibid. 40. Ibid., 88–89.

41. Ibid., 90.

92 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

affirmed by faith in the Holy Spirit,” since it is the Spirit’s activity that be-
stows the Church’s objective holiness.42
Congar proceeds to apply these principles. With regard to its divine
aspect—its faith (the content of revealed truth), its sacraments, its offices,
its charisms, and its place in the divine plan—the Church is holy and par-
ticipates “in divine infallibility,” even when these gifts have been mediated
through humans (such as the prophets and apostles).43 This is the domain
that allows us to say rightly that “the church is impeccable, infallible, and
virginal,” because the Church is constituted by divine gifts that are truly
given (without, it should go without saying, thereby making these gifts au-
tonomous from the divine giver).44 Congar affirms that “with respect to
these things in themselves, there is no question of limitation, aging, or be-
ing out of touch,” and he adds that “with respect to its essential principles,
the church is incapable of failure and has no need to reform itself.”45 In its
real possession of these gifts through the work of the Spirit, the Church
is Christ’s holy Bride and Body. But the human aspect remains fully pres-
ent and active, of course, since the members of the Church can misuse the
principles or can be too weak to exercise them rightly. The Church’s mem-
bers do not have the power to fundamentally distort the divine gifts, and
so the Church’s holiness and truth cannot be lost; the sovereign God gives
and sustains the gifts, prior to and independent of merely human activ-
ity. But quite another matter is “the use that human beings make of these
gifts—humans with all their freedom, their weakness, their instability, and
their essential fallibility.”46 Here we find the Church in constant need of
reform.
With regard to the human aspect of the Church, or the aspect of the
Church that is not yet fully configured to Christ, Congar distinguishes
two kinds of failures that require reform so that the divine gifts of the
Church might have their full efficacy. The first kind of failure is the sins
of the people who make up the Church. These sins inevitably wound the
Church and hamper its mission of worship and evangelization. The sec-
ond kind of failures consists not in sins, but in “historical faults brought

42. Ibid., 92. 43. Ibid., 93.

44. Ibid. 45. Ibid.
46. Ibid., 95.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 93
about through narrow-mindedness and slowness to respond.”47 Again,
the fact that during their earthly lives all the faithful (except the Virgin
Mary) are sinners cannot mar the holiness of the Church; nor can the sins
of the members undermine God’s eternal plan of election or predestina-
tion. But sinners, insofar as they are sinners, are not yet fully inserted into
the holy Church.
When sinners abuse the gifts that God bestows upon the Church
or turn away interiorly from God, does this mean that the Church sins?
Congar prefers to say that in and through its sinful members, “the church
knows temptation and sin” and “is spotted by diverse stains.”48 So long as
the Church lives in this world rather than fully in the kingdom of God,
such sins and stains will constantly emerge, requiring penitence on the
part of the members, including penitence for sins committed in the name
of the Church by its leaders. In this sense, the Church itself must con-
tinually ask forgiveness from its Lord, asking him to heal its self-inflicted
wounds, wounds that do much damage in the world. There was no perfect
period of the Church’s history when such sins did not mar the Church’s
members and require the penitence of the Church. Even the earliest
Church, as seen in the New Testament, is marred by sins. Furthermore,
not all the visible members of the Church are in fact united by charity to
Christ or are necessarily among the elect; all the members are sinners, but
some have interiorly parted from Christ more decisively. Here Congar
uses Christ’s metaphor of a field containing weeds and wheat.
Is the presence of sinners in the Church, who weaken the Church’s
witness and cause scandal, indicative that something has gone wrong with
God’s plan? On the contrary, the Church is precisely the place for sinners
to be, since “[t]he church’s proper work is . . . to ceaselessly purify sinners
from their sin” as “the place and the instrument for the application of
Christ’s redemption.”49 Even though Christ has definitively accomplished
redemption and given the Church infallible means of grace (through the
working of the Spirit), nonetheless each generation of members of the
Church manifests sin’s presence in a new and inevitably damaging way.
In the Church as the mystical Body, the process of the redemption and

47. Ibid. 48. Ibid., 97.

49. Ibid., 99.

94 L u me n Ge ntium in Conte x t
conquest of such sin is underway, as the power of Christ’s Passion and
Resurrection are applied to and appropriated by sinners. The important
point here is the need for public confession of sin and active repentance.
Thus the liturgy for the dedication of a church building includes Luke
19:1–10, the story of Zaccheus: “when Jesus comes under his roof, he ac-
knowledges that he is a sinner, and he rectifies the injustices that he has
committed.”50
The purpose of the Church is to serve people in their moving from
mere worldliness to being truly the repentant people of God who are un-
dergoing sanctification. Thus, as Congar puts it, “The church according
to its first meaning (as institution of salvation [the divine and holy as-
pect]) incessantly brings holiness into the church in the second sense of
the word (as the community of the faithful and the people of God).”51
Drawing heavily on distinctions developed by the Benedictine theolo-
gian Anscar Vonier, Congar emphasizes that the Church, as the mystery
of salvation constituted by the divine means of grace, is not sinful, even
though the Church’s members (other than Mary) are all sinners during
their earthly lives. It follows that one can properly speak of the sins of the
“people of God” but not of the sins of the Church.
What then should we say of the Church as the people of God? Here
we can speak not only of sins, but, as Congar has already mentioned, also
of sociological and historical mistakes. Christendom, for example, often
tended to obscure the true features of the Church, whether behind nar-
row social attitudes (such as—although Congar does not explicitly say so
here—attitudes toward monarchy, toward women, and toward Jews) or
behind the acquisition and administration of worldly power. In Congar’s
view, “the church reappears and shines forth more clearly when the con-
ventional (but inauthentic) facades of the Christian world fall apart.”52
Taking up the third way of understanding the world “Church”—
namely as the hierarchy (the organ through which the Church speaks
and acts)—Congar grants that not only do popes and bishops commit
personal sins that harm the Church’s witness, but also they commit sins
and exhibit blind spots precisely in their hierarchical roles. When a pope,

50. Ibid. 51. Ibid.

52. Ibid., 101.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 95
because of a personal blind spot or a personal vice, blunders in handling a
particular prudential matter, this harms the Church’s witness. Certainly,
when it is a matter of definitive teaching or the administration of the sac-
raments, the Church’s hierarchy will not be able to undermine the holi-
ness and truth that Christ gives his Church, in the Spirit, as the means of
salvation. But clergy certainly can obscure the greatness of the sacraments
by their careless celebration of the liturgy, for example; and the Church’s
liturgical forms also can contain elements, added at particular time peri-
ods, that no longer illumine the beauty of the sacramental reality. Congar
points to examples of sociological blunders such as the liturgical use of
Latin even when few understand it, and to the failure to inculturate the
liturgy in non-Western (missionary) countries.
Likewise, although definitive magisterial teaching has an infallibil-
ity guaranteed by the Spirit, who preserves the truth of the faith, it is
nonetheless the case with regard to conciliar (and papal) definitions that
“[t]he work of the persons involved remains influenced by their own limi-
tations, even in the final product, the definition of dogma. God’s guaran-
tee to spare the church of error is nonetheless marked by circumstances,
and the resulting human statement is not beyond improvement.”53 In-
deed, in his private views, as distinct from his formal articulation of dog-
ma, a pope can be heretical, as medieval theologians already recognized.
In the lengthy process of the development of doctrine, too, there can be
all sorts of impediments caused by either sin or sociological and historical
factors. Congar adds that especially “in the area of social doctrine”—per-
haps he has slavery or religious freedom in view—“the development of
theological truth is conditioned by the state of the world.”54 At a lesser,
but still deeply influential, level, catechetical instruction and preaching by
the clergy can fall to a very low standard.
Does this mean that the Church, possessed of infallibility with regard to
doctrine and sacraments, is no more than a merely human institution with
regard to practical or prudential matters? Citing Charles Journet, Congar
accepts that the Church has a certain “practical infallibility” analogous to
its doctrinal infallibility, but he adds that in both cases the Church’s infal-

53. Ibid., 103.

54. Ibid.

96 L u me n Ge ntium in C onte x t
libility must be understood in a limited sense. In other words, in prudential
matters (matters of government) the Church is preserved from going astray
definitively; but Congar emphasizes the limitations of this preservation.
Thus he reminds us that the “men who exercise the most sacred author-
ity can be lacking in information or intelligence. They can spoil occasions,
alienate people, provoke irreparable damage by their narrowness or their
lack of understanding.”55 As examples, he points to the high-ranking cler-
gy whose mutual acts of offence deeply exacerbated the eleventh-century
East-West split; as well as the high-ranking clergy whose corrupt actions
paved the way for the sixteenth-century Reformation. Even popes make se-
rious prudential errors: examples are Pope Liberius (d. 366), who signed the
formula of Sirmium; Pope Honorius (d. 638), who misunderstood and in-
dulged Monotheletism; Pope Paschal II (d. 1118), who gave way to the pres-
sure exercised upon him by Emperor Henry V; and Pope Pius VII (d. 1823),
who signed the Concordat of Fontainebleau. As Congar observes, “There
is no point in going into detail about the faults of so many popes, bishops,
priests, and religious. This history is rather well known and the church has
suffered abuse because of it.”56
Drawing on John Henry Newman’s Preface to the third edition of his
Via Media, Congar nonetheless mentions a few examples to help us see what
he means. He observes that in Christendom, in the post-Constantinian
feudal context, “prelates and popes have exercised powers deriving from
another competence than that of their strictly spiritual jurisdiction: rights
of overlords, arbiters, moderators of Christendom, judges of the Christian
princes,” and so forth.57 Obviously such prelates and popes were not im-
mune from misusing these prudential powers, and they did misuse them,
thereby causing scandal and leading to bitter reaction—as can be seen in
the anti-Catholicism of secular polities from the Enlightenment onward.
There were “acts of simony, nepotism, abuse of power, violent constraint,
[and] use of spiritual arms for temporal ends,” due to the fact that “in a
world subjected to the church, the spiritual power naturally took on a spirit
of jurisdiction.”58 Popes and bishops have no infallibility in this domain,
and they made errors that damaged the Church, even if God does not allow

55. Ibid., 105. 56. Ibid., 106.

57. Ibid., 107. 58. Ibid., 108.

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o n t ext 97
his Church to go prudentially astray in the way that a merely human insti-
tution (none of which lasts for very long) does. As Congar comments, “The
scandal comes . . . from the contrast between these concrete experiences of
the church, on the one hand, and the church’s claims to a supernatural sanc-
tity, on the other, without distinguishing between the two contexts so as to
see the facts about its holiness and its failures.”59 The laity, too, are deeply
implicated in such failures, and also in the damaging intransigence that can
resist the needed penitence and renewal.
Is the history of the Church, then, a mere juxtaposition of pure sacra-
ments and dogma with deeply impure political and sociological process-
es? If so, then how could the two aspects truly be a unity, so as to be re-
ally one Church? In fact, says Congar, there is only one Church, in which
the divine and human aspects are fused. As “the communion of men and
women in whom the Spirit and the energies of Jesus Christ are active and
at work,” the Church in history exhibits the means of grace, the fallenness
of sinners, and the work of redemption.60 The sins of the members—even
of the hierarchy—are not sins of the Church in a strict sense, but they can
still rightly be called “the faults of the body, since ‘we are all members of
one another.’ ”61 For Congar, the best way to think of the Church, then,
is as a “holy church of sinners,” keeping in view that the sinfulness of the
members is not an isolated domain, but rather is undergoing sanctifica-
tion, due to the work of the Holy Spirit, through “the constitutive prin-
ciples of the church as the instrument of our salvation.”62
Chapter 2 of True and False Reform in the Church treats “Why and in
What Way Do the People of God Need to Be Reformed?” Here Congar
begins with the principle of historical development: as the Old and New
Testaments show, God’s plan unfolds in such a way that each period, in
the light of its own pressing problems, contributes fruitfully to the un-
derstanding and embodiment of the revelation that the people of God
has received. God values our agency, our response to grace, and so God
works through history despite the limitations and sinfulness of each his-
torical period and of each historical agent. No period of salvation history,

59. Ibid., 109. 60. Ibid., 112.

61. Ibid. 62. Ibid., 116.

98 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

including our own, represents the final and definitive form; instead what
we have is true development (and thus not rupture) over successive stages.
But how can this apply to the Church, since after all the new covenant
in Jesus Christ is the last stage, and no further stage is to be expected?
Congar responds that, indeed, the inauguration of the Church and the
gift of its “deposit of apostolic faith, of the sacraments, of the apostolic
powers” are “definitive” and “unchangeable.”63 But there can still be plen-
tiful development, since we continue to await the eschatological consum-
mation. For one thing, what the Church does ministerially is not an end
in itself; everything is a means, and will not be present in the consummat-
ed kingdom. For another, the work of evangelization necessarily unfolds
historically and in a wide variety of cultures, and all these people must
be brought to Christ. Furthermore, these people for whom Christ died
are, in fact, a changing humanity: “Humanity lives, grows, and becomes
diverse, evolving even across time, filling up the changes of time as it fills
the space of its progressive developments.”64 It follows that, in order to
evangelize the world, to which the members of the Church belong, it is
fitting and indeed necessary that “the church (even though it is change-
less with respect to what it receives from on high) has to follow human-
ity in expanding and evolving and thus experience a parallel development
within itself.”65
How is it, though, that a developing Church remains changeless with
regard to the deposit of faith? Congar argues that in the dialogue with the
world—a dialogue in which the Church can sometimes, because of a de-
sire to preserve past forms and also sometimes because of a laudable cau-
tion, be too slow to perceive the contributions that the world makes—the
Church is able “to develop or to adapt her forms to new realities,” without
changing the Church’s “essential structures.”66 The development simply en-
ables essential structures of the Church (the deposit of faith, sacraments,
and offices) to be understood more deeply in light of, and in the context
of, the “new realities” of history. Congar notes that “reform” constitutes
only one aspect of “the whole process of the gradual self-realization of the

63. Ibid., 127. 64. Ibid., 130.

65. Ibid. 66. Ibid., 134.

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o n t ext 99
church’s life,” which, it should be emphasized, “is guided by an interior law
of development and by a transcendent impulse of the Holy Spirit” rather
than merely drifting on the tides of history.67
Turning to the specific content of reform, Congar begins with the re-
form made necessary by the perennial temptation to substitute means for
ends. In Congar’s view, scholastic theology has fallen into this tempta-
tion at least since the sixteenth century, by promoting a school-theology
generally adverse to new modes of thought and to addressing new prob-
lems.68 Erasmus stands as a hero in this section, both for his sensivity to
the need for pastoral and biblical reform, and for his moderation (by
contrast to Luther). Congar is concerned with Christendom’s temptation
to substitute temporal flourishing, temporal achievements, for spiritual
ends. But his central goal consists in persuading clergy not to stand in the
way of any and all change by “an excessive attachment to historical forms
that give the church its cultural expression, and are by that very fact dated
and partial.”69 In particular, he urges the older generation of clergy—he
wrote this book while in his forties—to avoid squelching the “fresh ener-
gies and ideas” of the younger generation.70
Throughout the book, he seeks to maintain a moderate tone, both
through his repeated insistence on the unchangeableness of the deposit
of faith, and through his recognizing that “it is wise and indeed more true
if we do not let ourselves too quickly give credit to a judgment that eccle-
sial institutions may be out-of-date or obsolete. Often we are happy, fi-

67. Ibid.
68. This position overlooks the achievements of Salamancan Thomism, among other over-
sights. For a succinct exposition see Romanus Cessario, OP, A Short History of Thomism (Washing-
ton, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2005).
69. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 149.
70. Ibid. Tragically, in fact, Congar’s ideas in True and False Reform in the Church and in other
writings from this period got him into trouble with the Vatican. In a move precipitated by an ar-
ticle on the worker-priest controversy but rooted in the Vatican’s broader concern about his writ-
ings on ecumenism, the laity, and reform in the Church, Congar’s Dominican Superior removed
him from his teaching position in 1954. In the period between 1954 and 1956, he lived in Jerusalem
and Cambridge, where he endured painful isolation and was forced to sharply curtail his scholarly
writing. For discussion of this terrible period of Congar’s life, see Étienne Fouilloux, “Friar Yves,
Cardinal Congar, Dominican: Itinerary of a Theologian,” trans. Christian Yves Dupont, U.S. Cath-
olic Historian 17 (1999): 63–90, at 76–79. Between 1956 and 1960 he lived in a Dominican friary
in Strasbourg, France, but he remained under suspicion and did not resume his teaching activity.

100 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

nally, that the church hung onto what once appeared as anachronisms.”71
He gives examples, nonetheless, of episodes in which Christians held on
too long to real anachronisms rather than seeking to find (and to defend
through new forms, which often turn out to reprise the earliest practice)
the deeper meaning of the action under consideration. With his own
time in view, Congar speaks warmly of “epochal moments of great transi-
tion.”72 From the vantage point of 1950, he argues that the key issues today
are pastoral and catechetical, as they also were, he suggests, in 1500—and
reform in 1500 might have staved off the rupture produced by the Refor-
mation. The reform that he calls for will revitalize the “evangelical spirit”
of the Church in a way that, by contrast to all defensiveness, “generously
agrees to attune itself to the structures of the emerging world and of a
renewed society—which it also needs to baptize.”73
In chapter 3, Congar investigates “Prophets and Reformers.” The key
here is the need for reformers “to become familiar with the principle of
life itself, going deeper than habits and customs.”74 Again the lead-up to
the Reformation plays a significant role; Congar suggests that if the ec-
clesiastical reformers of the fifteenth century (and there were many) had
been able to think outside the late-medieval system in which they were
raised, the eventual rupture could have been avoided. True reformers have
the capacity to focus afresh on the end (and thus on the deepest prin-
ciples) rather than on the means. From the same perspective, “[p]rophets
always push God’s people to growth.”75 Significantly, Congar argues that
true prophets and reformers must acutely, through personal experience,
perceive and appreciate the divine aspects of the Church, so as to be able
to renew the people’s perception of them.
The second part of True and False Reform in the Church is devoted al-
most entirely to presenting four conditions for authentic reform without
schism. The first is “the primacy of charity and of pastoral concerns.”76

71. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 151.

72. Ibid., 158.
73. Ibid., 167. Here one should think of the reform decrees of the Council of Trent, which
became incarnate in pastoral bishops such as Charles Borromeo, in whose image the episcopate of
most of Europe was transformed in the seventeenth century.
74. Ibid., 170. 75. Ibid., 174.
76. Ibid., 215.

L um e n Ge ntiu m i n C o n t ext 101

Charity enables the reformist impulse to avoid falling into sectarianism
or a one-sided clinging to a particular point-of-view. The key is that, for
the true reformer, “the church has to remain a given, not only intellectu-
ally but also existentially”; the reformer seeks to renew a holiness that the
Church in fact possesses, not to criticize the Church so as to make it holy
or to make its truth conform with one’s own thinking.77
The second condition is to “remain in communion with the whole
Church.”78 This enables the reformer not to become a narrow partisan for
a partial truth, which is an inevitable temptation for a religious genius
(Congar has Luther especially in view). As Congar puts it, “Only through
communion with the whole body, which itself is subject to the guid-
ance of the magisterium, can someone grasp a truth in its totality.”79 The
“whole body” here includes not only the whole Church as it presently ex-
ists on earth, but the Church from the apostles onward. The true reformer
is not an innovator or a revolutionary, since to be such would be to mis-
understand the nature of the Church and thus be unable to reform the
Church. Indeed, true reform will be tested, and ultimately approved and
adopted, by the whole Church. The Spirit who moves the true reformer
also moves the whole Church, and reform therefore cannot be opposed
to obedience to the hierarchical Magisterium or reject the Magisterium’s
role in the service of unity. True reform seeks more unity, not less. It is for
this reason that the Magisterium must constantly be alert and open to lis-
tening to true reform movements. Here Congar calls for a specific reform,
namely for there to be, “alongside the central power, in the midst of the
top administration of the church, a substantial representation of all the
elements of the Orbis, of all the tendencies of the periphery”—a “supreme
advisory council” representing the various nations and, more importantly,
the various problems that the Church faces around the world.80 In a 1968
addendum to this passage, Congar recognizes with delight that Vatican II
explicitly moves in this direction.
The third condition consists in “having patience with delays.”81 Im-
patience produces schism; patience allows for the proposed reforms to

77. Ibid., 217. 78. Ibid., 229.

79. Ibid., 230. 80. Ibid., 262.
81. Ibid., 265.

102 L u men Ge ntium in C onte x t

be gradually sifted and, if approved, adopted. Impatience signals that one
merely wants the Church to confirm one’s own zealous intellectual views.
It indicates that one is overly sure of oneself, not sufficiently open to the
possibility one might be wrong. By contrast, patience signals an appre-
ciation for lived development, which is the only way that true reform can
happen. As Congar says, “Everything that involves life experience, at least
here below, presupposes delays which cannot be sidetracked or avoided.
Only what’s done in cooperation with the nature of time itself can con-
quer time.”82 Congar is again critical especially of Luther, who set him-
self up “against the church and against the integrity of its tradition,” as for
instance in his rejection of the sacramental priesthood.83 Congar warns
against confronting the Church with an ultimatum. Instead, true reform
should act “in and for ecclesial life by opening up creative or adaptive pos-
sibilities that the authorities do not disavow,” by way of an experimental
initiative from which the whole Church can ultimately benefit.84 In this
way, the periphery (the local church) can contribute creatively, rather than
having everything flow from the central authority (Rome). Yet, while call-
ing for patience on the part of reformers, Congar encourages the Church’s
leaders not to be too slow to accept change; there are times when the
Church must act before a rupture occurs.
Finally, the fourth condition is “genuine renewal through a return to the
principle of tradition (not through the forced introduction of some ‘novel-
ty’).”85 Congar explores the way in which new elements—for example, new
ideas from human culture, or new ideas that come to the fore as responses
to current needs and problems, or new ideas that belong to inculturation—
can be brought into the Church. Focusing on the new idea in itself would
be a mistake. Instead, one must focus on the particular aspect of the Church
that is at stake. By focusing on the Church, and thus on the reality of faith,
one can accomplish “a genuine ‘renewal’ (a true ‘development’) that is a re-
form in and of the church.”86 In this way, the introduction of a new aspect
from the human dimension of the Church will not harm the divine dimen-
sion of the Church, but will instead serve the Church’s divine deposit.

82. Ibid., 267. 83. Ibid., 270.

84. Ibid., 280. 85. Ibid., 291.
86. Ibid., 292.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o n t ext 103

 Congar emphasizes that “we must study Catholic Tradition and not
turn to masters foreign to the Tradition.”87 On this view, Modernism mis-
understood true development, because the Modernists focused not on
reforming Christianity from within its deepest principles, but on intro-
ducing principles exterior to Christianity that they thought would make
Christianity palatable. Congar applies this insight to contemporary ecu-
menism, arguing that we need an ecumenism that recognizes “that the
church of Christ and of the apostles exists,” rather than beginning in a
manner that ignores the existing catholicity and unity of the Church.88 In
a nutshell, says Congar, anyone who seeks reform of the Catholic Church
“will be obliged to begin with a return to the fundamental principles of
Catholicism. It will be necessary first of all to consult the tradition and to
become immersed in it.”89
What, in Congar’s view, is Tradition? It has to do with the Church’s
continuity-in-development over the centuries since the gift of the un-
changing apostolic deposit. Congar states, “Tradition is the presence of
the principle in all the stages of its development. It is therefore sources
(Scripture, the events of the primitive church), the thought of the Fathers,
the faith and the prayer of the whole church (liturgy), the authentic inves-
tigations of the church’s doctors and spiritual masters, the development of
piety and doctrine.”90 But once this is understood, Tradition cannot be
seen merely as something from the past. It also involves the contemporary
operation of the deposit, the “principle,” in the Church. Today as much as
ever, Tradition is active in the life of the Church. This does not mean that
the student of Tradition can focus on today’s Church rather than return-
ing to the deepest sources, but it does mean that today’s Church is the
living subject of Tradition. Among the “strictly normative” aspects that
the Church hands on in its Tradition are “the Sacred Scriptures, dogmatic
definitions, doctrine unanimously embraced”; then at a second level, as

87. Ibid.
88. Ibid., 293.
89. Ibid. In hindsight, one observes with amazement how quickly this crucial principle of res-
sourcement was forgotten by many theologians in the postconciliar period.
90. Ibid., 294. See also Congar’s Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and Theological Essay,
trans. Michael Naseby and Thomas Rainborough (New York: Macmillan, 1967), originally pub-
lished in French in two volumes appearing in 1960 and 1963, respectively.

104 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

an “exceptionally authoritative norm,” the liturgy; and lastly “a great num-
ber of doctrinal expressions, historical experiences, and particular contri-
butions of different moments or different aspects of the tradition.”91
What then does a ressourcement of the Tradition involve? It is not a mere
antiquarian study of ancient sources, since it necessarily involves “absolute
respect for ecclesial expressions that are permanent and always viable.”92 At
a second level, the practitioner of ressourcement should exhibit “a critical
and intelligent respect for transitional forms, in a spirit of loyal respect and
affection for all the forms.”93 But how can one distinguish between perma-
nent ecclesial expressions and “transitional forms” that can be discarded if
new circumstances warrant the implementation of reform? Congar suggests
that obtaining the ability to distinguish between permanent and transition-
al expressions requires “earnestly studying the very sources of Catholicism”
and “being penetrated by the spirit of the church.”94 We cannot assume that
we have this “spirit of the church”; rather, it is something that may come
to us through earnest study of the deepest sources. If we are indeed “pen-
etrated by the spirit of the church,” then we will be able to go “beyond what
the church said with respect to a particular problem in the past,” because we
will see the motivations—the inner dynamic—that resulted in the formula-
tion of the Church’s response. Having grasped the inner dynamic, we can
engage present problems in the same spirit and with appreciation for the
deepest dynamic of the Church’s Tradition.
As Congar goes on to say, the above understanding of ressourcement
emerged from the liturgical movement, which predated the biblical and
patristic renewals. He observes, “Already the first efforts of this return to
the sources have shown much promise. In this threefold return to litur-
gical, biblical, and patristic sources, the movement of ressourcement has
found its true character.”95 Although Congar values historical research
tremendously, he thinks that ressourcement has a different focus. Namely,
“Ressourcement consists in a recentering on Christ and on the paschal
mystery.”96 It goes right to the very heart of Christianity. The study of the

91. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 294.

92. Ibid., 295. 93. Ibid.
94. Ibid. 95. Ibid.
96. Ibid.

L um e n Ge ntiu m i n C o n t ext 105

history of theology is an important mode, but historical research must be
rooted in a primary focus on the Paschal Mystery of Christ. Congar adds
that this focus requires the commitment of one’s whole life to Christ. He
observes, “Without the commitment of a corresponding life, a reform ef-
fort, even profiting from an intellectual return to the sources and a recen-
tering, will not arrive at the necessary spirit of evangelization or at the
fullness of authenticity and efficacy.”97
Thus, a true reformer must enter deeply into the Church’s sources, but
not as a mere scholar. Congar portrays the Liturgical Movement as espe-
cially exemplary in this respect, given its pastoral and Christological fo-
cus and its commitment to “the dogmatic, sacramental, and hierarchical
structure of the church.”98 On this basis and only on this basis—return to
the sources, recentering on the Paschal Mystery, and conversion of life—
can true reform proceed in the Church. As Congar puts it more techni-
cally with regard to the discernment and assimilation of a new element
(an innovation that constitutes a development rather than a rupture), “in
order for an adaptation not to be mechanical or purely exterior, but rather
to represent a development of Christian principle, the Christian principle
must both guide and assimilate the new element,” namely “by discerning
the aspects or parts of the new element which are appropriate for express-
ing the principle’s growth.”99 It is the Church’s essential structures that
govern true development, because development expresses ever more fully,
and in new contexts, the apostolic deposit.
Congar concludes (writing in 1950) that “all the big problems facing
contemporary Catholicism are such that solving them with quick and me-
chanical adaptations would lead to catastrophe.”100 While advocating re-
form, Congar well recognizes “the seriousness of what is involved. Before
all else, the church has to safeguard its very being as well as the integrity
of its principles. Depositum custodire—‘Guard what has been entrusted to
you’ (1 Tim 6:20).”101
97. Ibid. Here one should see H. Outram Evennett, The Spirit of the Counter-Reformation, ed.
John Bossy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), which nicely describes the spiritual-
ity underlying true reform, and which praises the work of the Fathers of the Council of Trent.
98. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 296.
99. Ibid. 100. Ibid., 298.
101. Ibid., 310.

106 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

Lumen Gentium
According to Congar, the Church bears an unchanging divine apostolic de-
posit consisting of the gospel (found in inspired Scripture, and proclaimed
dogmatically), the sacraments, and the hierarchical offices. Yet there is
room for development and reform nonetheless, since the Church can gain
a greater understanding of these divine aspects, and since the divine aspects
can be obscured by elements that may have suited an earlier historical mo-
ment but do not suit our own. What do we find when we explore Lumen
Gentium in this light?
The opening paragraph of Lumen Gentium, which inaugurates the
first chapter of the Constitution, expresses the Church’s participation in
the holiness of Christ through the Holy Spirit. It states, “Since Christ is
the light of the nations, this holy synod, called together in the holy Spirit,
strongly desires to enlighten all people with his brightness, which gleams
over the face of the church, by preaching the gospel to every creature.”102
The resplendence of Christ is manifested in the Church. Only thereby can
the Church be, in Christ, “a sacrament or instrumental sign of intimate
union with God and of the unity of all humanity” (§1). This sacramental
signification of the Church indicates the importance of the Church’s pres-
ence in history.
The second paragraph then offers a brief synopsis of salvation history.
The history of the Church stems from the very outset of creation, since
from the outset God had already “decided to raise human beings to share
in the divine life” (§2). The Church, prepared for in Israel and prefigured
from the first chapters of Genesis, is the community of those who “share
in the divine life.” This community is manifested at Pentecost and will be
consummated at the eschaton.
Paragraph 3 identifies the Church as “the kingdom of Christ already
present in mystery.” Through the sacraments of this kingdom, Christ
sanctifies us (see Jn 12:32; Jn 19:35; 1 Cor 5:7; and 1 Cor 10:17). The Eu-
charist is “the sacrifice of the Cross” as “celebrated on the altar,” and in

102. Quotations are from Lumen Gentium, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2, Trent
to Vatican II, ed. Norman P. Tanner, SJ (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1990),
849–900.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 107

this way it effects the redemption of those who receive it in faith and love.
The Eucharist is also a meal through the sharing in “the eucharistic bread,”
and in this way it represents and produces the Church’s unity. Thus the
Church mediates in the Eucharist the power of healing and deification, a
power that only God has.
The Holy Spirit’s role in making the Church holy is addressed in para-
graph 4. If the Church were not holy—in its faith, sacraments, and of-
fices—then believers would have far greater difficulty, to say the least, in
receiving “through Christ access to the Father in one Spirit (see Eph 2,
18)” (§4). Pentecost does not simply sanctify the apostolic community
alone, as distinct from the later Church. Rather, Pentecost indicates the
ongoing holiness of the Church, since the “Spirit was sent to sanctify the
church continually” (§4), for the purpose of uniting believers to the tri-
une life. In light of paragraph 3’s discussion of the Eucharist, paragraph
4 describes the Holy Spirit’s work of sanctifying the Church with regard
to the content of faith and to the Church’s offices as follows: “He [the
Spirit] leads the church into all truth (see John 16:13), and he makes it one
in fellowship and ministry, instructing and directing it through a diver-
sity of gifts both hierarchical and charismatic, and he adorns it with his
fruits.” Although the Church will enjoy the perfect fullness of truth only
in the life to come, the Church’s definitive teaching is true and salvific,
just as the Church’s unity is real though not yet perfected. Its ministry or
offices, too, are holy because the Holy Spirit ensures that they are fitted to
their purpose.
At the same time, the paragraph also makes clear the constant need
for reform of the Church insofar as, in its human aspect, the Church can
grow old and dull. Paragraph 4 comments, “Through the power of the
gospel he [the Spirit] rejuvenates the church, continually renewing it and
leading it to perfect union with its spouse.” The Church would not need
renewal and rejuvenation if its union with Christ were already perfect.
The Church is sanctified by the Spirit who “dwells in the church and in
the hearts of the faithful as in a temple” and who “bears witness to their
adoption as children” of God, but the Church in its human aspect con-
stantly needs renewal so as to attain “to perfect union with its spouse”
(§4). Paragraph 4 concludes that the Spirit’s work ensures that “the uni-

108 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

versal church appears as ‘a people made one by the unity of the Father and
the Son and the holy Spirit.’ ”
Paragraph 5 depicts the Church as founded by Jesus Christ and thus
as the inaugurated, but not yet consummated, kingdom of God. Christ
reveals the kingdom, and indeed the kingdom is the presence of Christ.
When people are united to Christ by faith and the sacraments, people
become members of the kingdom, but they have to grow into full matu-
rity through sanctification. The kingdom thus will not be perfect until
the eschaton. Yet, because of the gifts and mission that it receives from
Christ, the Church “has formed the seed and the beginning of the king-
dom on earth” (§5). This paragraph describes both the human aspect of
the Church, composed of people in the process of sanctification, and the
Church’s divine aspect, since the Church could not be the inaugurated
kingdom if the Church lacked the divine gifts that paragraphs 3 and 4
discussed.
Paragraph 6 surveys biblical images of the Church that complement
the image of kingdom: a sheepfold whose door is Jesus Christ; a flock led
by Jesus through human shepherds; a vineyard with Christ as the true vine
and people as the branches; a household in which God’s family dwells; a
temple with the people as living stones; the holy Jerusalem; and the holy
bride of Christ. These images emphasize the participation of humans in
Christ and exhibit the union of divine and human elements in the Church.
Paragraph 6 concludes by emphasizing that the Church yearns for a per-
fect communion in the divine things that Christ has revealed: the Church
“is like an exile who seeks and savours the things that are above, where
Christ is seated at the right hand of God, where the life of the church is
hidden with Christ in God until it appears in glory with its spouse (see
Col 3:1–4).” Just as Congar does, Lumen Gentium envisions the Church
as divine in its foundation (“hidden with Christ in God”) and journeying
toward a full sharing in the divine mysteries in which it now imperfectly
“seeks and savours.”
Paragraph 7 begins with Christ’s death and Resurrection, by which he
redeemed humanity, made it a new creation, and, by sending his Spirit,
constituted his Mystical Body. Regarding the Church’s divine gifts, para-
graph 7 states, “In this [mystical] body the life of Christ is communicated

L um e n Ge ntium i n Co nt ext 109

to believers, who by means of the sacraments in a mysterious but real way
are united to Christ who suffered and has been glorified.” After speaking
of baptism and the Eucharist, which unite believers in one Body, the para-
graph goes on to discuss the Spirit’s distribution of diverse gifts, the way
in which the members of the Body suffer with and rejoice in Christ, and
the headship of Christ over his Body. The paragraph praises Christ’s lord-
ship: “through his supereminent perfection and activity he fills the whole
body with the riches of his glory (see Eph 1:18–23).” As befits the divine as-
pect of the Church, Christ “perpetually distributes the gift of ministries in
his body which is the church; and with these gifts, through his power, we
provide each other with helps towards salvation, so that doing the truth in
love, we grow up in all things into him who is our head (see Eph 4:11–16)”
(§7). The Spirit of Christ, given to his Body, functions like the soul does to
a material body, by giving life, movement, and unity to the Church for the
purpose of continually renewing the Church. The paragraph concludes by
connecting divine gifts and human journeying: “ ‘For in him [Christ] the
whole fullness of deity dwells bodily’ (Col 2:9); and he fills with his di-
vine gifts the church, which is his body and his fullness (see Eph 1:22–23),
so that it may aspire towards and arrive at the whole fullness of God (see
Eph 3:9).”
Paragraph 8 cautions that the earthly “society . . . equipped with hi-
erarchial structures, and the mystical body of Christ, a visible assembly
and a spiritual community, an earthly church and a church enriched with
heavenly gifts, must not be considered as two things, but as forming one
complex reality comprising a human and a divine element.” Reflecting
upon the unity of the human and divine elements in the Church, the
paragraph goes so far as to compare the Church to the mystery of the In-
carnation. Just as the Word’s humanity serves the Word in the work of sal-
vation, so also the human elements of the Church serve the Spirit’s build-
ing up of the Church by means of “heavenly gifts.” Paragraph 8 notes that
Christ established the Church upon the apostles led by Peter, and Christ
gave his Church the mission of evangelization. The Church can accom-
plish this mission only because of its divine constitution as “the pillar and
foundation of the truth” (1 Tm 3:15). The Church, in its fullness, “subsists
in the catholic church, governed by the successor of Peter and the bishops

110 L u men Ge ntium in C onte x t

in communion with him” (§8).103 The hierarchical Church led by Peter
and his successors is the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. But
paragraph 8 allows for the ways in which other Christian communions
share in the divine gifts given to the Church (such as Scripture and bap-
tism) and enjoy degrees of participation in the one Church. Paragraph 8
notes with regard to the Church that “outside its structure many elements
of sanctification and of truth are to be found which, as proper gifts to the
church of Christ, impel towards catholic unity.”104
Paragraph 8 also makes clear that the Church must follow the path of
the crucified Christ. The Church exists to spread self-sacrifice, not self-
aggrandizement of any kind. Just as Christ did, the Church must draw
close to the poor and afflicted. But unlike the perfectly sinless Christ—
and here the analogy of the Incarnation breaks down—the Church itself
is made up of human sinners. Paragraph 8 explains that “the church, con-
taining sinners in its own bosom, is at one and the same time holy and al-
ways in need of purification,” for which reason the path of the Church—
as Congar emphasizes—is one of “penance and renewal” (§8). The human
weakness of the Church means that its afflictions come not only from
outside, but from the Church’s own members. Even so, the Church “re-
veals his [Christ’s] mystery faithfully in the world—albeit amid shadows”
(§8). The Church’s strength for pursuing its mission does not come from
itself, but rather from Christ.
Chapter 2 begins with paragraph 9 and focuses on “The people of
God.” Paragraph 9 first explains the scope of salvation history: in all times
and places, God has always accepted those who fear him and do what is
right (cf. Acts 10:35), but he chose Israel to be his particular people be-
cause he willed to save humanity not merely as individuals, but as a people
united in worship and truth. Through his covenants with Israel and his
sending of the prophets, he gradually instructed and sanctified Israel, in
preparation for the coming of Christ. Christ more perfectly revealed God

103. The phrase “subsists in [subsistit in]” replaced “is” during the drafting of the docu-
ment. How to interpret this replacement has been a matter of controversy. For discussion, see
Benoît-Dominique de La Soujeole, OP, Introduction to the Mystery of the Church, trans. Michael J.
Miller (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2014), 123–29.
104. See Vatican II’s Unitatis Redintegratio and Nostra Aetate.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 111

and established the new covenant “in his blood (see 1 Cor 11:25)” (§9). In
this new covenant, he united Jews and Gentiles to himself through his
Spirit, thereby forming his Church as “the new people of God” (§9; see
1 Peter 2:9–10). The head of this “messianic people” (§9) is Christ. In-
dwelt by the Spirit and having received the law of love, this people has the
status of adopted children in the Son and has as its goal the perfect king-
dom of God, of which it is the inauguration on earth as a “communion of
life, love and truth” (§9).
Thus, rather than being merely another people among the nations of
the earth, this people “constitutes for the whole human race a most firm
seed of unity, hope and salvation” and serves “as the instrument of salva-
tion for all,” with an evangelizing mission to the whole earth (§9). In addi-
tion to the terms “people of God” and “messianic people,” paragraph 9 de-
scribes the Church as “the new Israel,” a “temple” of the Holy Spirit, and a
“visible sacrament” of “saving unity” that is in history but is not limited to
a particular geographic boundary. The people of God receives from Christ
the “means suitable for visible and social unity,” and the people of God
holds fast to “perfect fidelity” as “the worthy spouse of its Lord” by the
grace of the Spirit (§9). Paragraph 9 also grants the fallen human aspect
of the Church, since it concludes by presenting the Church as constantly
“renewing itself ” under the Spirit’s action.
Paragraph 10 focuses on the priesthood of all believers in relation to
the ministerial priesthood. Regarding the former, the paragraph states
that “by the regeneration and anointing of the Holy Spirit the baptised
are consecrated as a spiritual dwelling and a holy priesthood,” so that they
can offer “spiritual sacrifices” and constitute a holy sacrifice to God (§10).
All the baptized “exercise their priesthood in receiving the sacraments, in
prayer and thanksgiving, through the witness of a holy life, by self-denial
and by active charity” (§10). The ministerial priesthood exists to serve the
priesthood of all believers, by forming and governing the people of God.
The paragraph specifies that all believers “join in the offering of the Eu-
charist,” but it is the ministerial priests who act “in the person of Christ”
in offering the sacrifice of the Eucharist to God on behalf of the whole
people of God (§10). Paragraph 11 addresses baptism, confirmation, and
the Eucharist, with an emphasis on the latter’s unitive power and signifi-

112 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

cation. The other sacraments are then discussed: penance (which recon-
ciles us with God and with the Church); anointing of the sick; holy or-
der; and matrimony, which symbolizes and participates in the charitable
unity of Christ and the Church. Marriage is the basis of the family—“the
domestic church,” in which the parents are the first “preachers” of the
faith to their children (§11)—and children are born as members of human
society and by baptism become adoptive children of God. The key point
here is that all humans are “called by the Lord, each in their own way, to
that perfect holiness whereby the Father is perfect” (§11).
In paragraph 12, Lumen Gentium turns to the sensus fidei, the “super-
natural sense of the faith” granted to the people of God, a sense that is in-
fallible when the whole people, clergy and laity (and religious), together
affirm doctrine. The sensus fidei is not a reflection of the autonomy of the
laity, let alone of their ability to construct their own versions of Chris-
tianity—not least because the clergy also belong to the people of God
that possesses the sensus fidei. The sensus fidei testifies to the fact that the
people of God receive the word of God, penetrate more deeply into it,
and apply it, all of which takes place through the movement of the Spirit
and “under the guidance of the sacred magisterium to which it [the whole
people of God] is faithfully obedient” (§12). Paragraph 12 goes on to em-
phasize the gifts of the Holy Spirit to the people of God for the purpose
of “the renewal and the building up of the church.”
Paragraph 13 addresses the unity of the Church in relation to the di-
versity of the members. The Church does not impose a uniformity but
rather allows for a diverse catholicity, which enables believers from vari-
ous cultures and regions to contribute to the Church and thereby “to
recapitulate the whole of humanity, with all its riches, under Christ the
head in the unity of his Spirit” (§13). This point explains how there are
churches and other ecclesial bodies within the Catholic Church that re-
tain their own rites and traditions.105 There are plenty of differences that
are not Church-dividing, and that therefore can be protected and guided
in some way by the papacy in its task of ensuring the unity of the Church
in truth and love. Paragraph 13 also praises the ways in which churches in

105. See also Vatican II’s Orientalium Ecclesiarum.

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o n t ext 113

particular areas of the world help needy churches in other areas.106 The
paragraph ends by affirming that “to this catholic unity of the people of
God, which prefigures and promotes universal peace, all are called, and
they belong to it or are ordered to it in various ways, whether they be
Catholic faithful or others who believe in Christ or finally all people ev-
erywhere who by the grace of God are called to salvation.”
In paragraph 14, attention is given to the necessity of the Church for
salvation: “those cannot be saved who refuse to enter the Church or to re-
main in it, if they are aware that the catholic church was founded by God
through Jesus Christ as a necessity for salvation.” To be fully a member of
the Church, one must be filled with the Spirit and charitably embrace the
Church’s faith, sacraments, and hierarchical structure as given by Christ.
Thus the key to the people of God is its constitution by God, and to be
fully a member of the people of God one must recognize the binding
character of the God-given means of salvation and depend entirely upon
them rather than upon one’s own resources. The paragraph adds that
those who publicly and sincerely profess their desire to be Catholic are
fully joined to the Church, even while they are only catechumens.
What about non-Catholic Christians? Paragraph 15 reaches out to
baptized believers who merit the name Christian even though they “do
not profess the faith in its entirety [Protestants] or do not preserve the
unity of communion under the successor of Peter [Orthodox].” With re-
gard to the former, it praises all who honor Scripture as the authoritative
“norm for believing and living” and who “lovingly believe in God the al-
mighty Father and in Christ, the Son of God and savior.” Protestant Chris-
tians practice the sacrament of baptism, along with “other sacraments that
they recognise and accept in their own churches or ecclesial communities”
(§15). Paragraph 15 sets apart the Orthodox churches, which “possess the
episcopate, celebrate the sacred eucharist and foster devotion to the vir-
gin mother of God.” The paragraph goes on to lift up the “communion of
prayers and other spiritual benefits” and the “true bond in the holy Spirit”
(and in martyrdom) enjoyed by Catholics with other Christians. Since the
Spirit is the Spirit of unity, we can be sure that “the Spirit arouses in all of

106. See also Vatican II’s Christus Dominus.

114 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

Christ’s disciples desire and action so that all may be peacefully united, in
the way established by Christ, in one flock under one shepherd” (§15).107
The Catholic Church prays for this more perfect unity and at the same
time “exhorts its children to purification and renewal so that the sign of
Christ may shine more clearly over the face of the church” (§15).
Paragraph 16 discusses the Jewish people, emphasizing the perma-
nence of God’s election; and it also discusses Islam, some of whose beliefs
are consonant with Judaism and Christianity.108 It refers as well to those
who search for God “in shadows and images” (§16) and to those who are
ignorant of Christ but who are sincerely seeking to find God and obey
conscience. All such persons, by God’s grace, “can obtain eternal salvation,”
and in fact even those who deny God’s existence but yet strive to act up-
rightly may be saved through God’s grace (§16). The point is that although
Christ and the Church are the path of salvation, others may participate in
that path by sincerely following the promptings of grace, which God does
not withhold from anyone. This optimistic tone is dampened by a note of
caution: “More often, however, deceived by the evil one, people have gone
astray in their thinking and exchanged the truth about God for a lie and
served the creature rather than the creator (see Rm 1:21, 25)” (§16).
Not least because idolatry is alive and well, Christ’s command to evan-
gelize must be obeyed today. Christ commanded his apostles to go forth
preaching, baptizing, and celebrating the Eucharist, and this work must
continue, since God “constituted Christ as the principle of salvation for
the whole world” (§17). Lest it seem that only a few are called to evange-
lize, paragraph 17 emphasizes that every Christian has a duty to spread
the faith.109 Although everyone can proclaim the faith and even baptize
new believers, priests have the special responsibility of “building up the
body through the eucharistic sacrifice” (§17), which stands at the heart
of evangelization. Thus the people of God reaches out in various ways to
embrace the entire human race, in hopes that “the fullness of the whole
world may move into the people of God, the body of the Lord and the

107. See also Vatican II’s Unitatis Redintegratio. See Jared Wicks, SJ’s “Lutheran-Catholic Dia-
logue: On Foundations Laid in 1963–64,” Concordia Theological Journal 39 (2013): 296–309.
108. See also Vatican II’s Nostra Aetate.
109. See also Vatican II’s Ad Gentes.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o n t ext 115

temple of the holy Spirit” (§17), so that in Christ the whole human race
may truly give glory to the Father.
Chapter 3 takes up the topic of “The hierarchical constitution of the
Church and in particular the episcopate.” The hierarchy of the Church
serves the mutual cooperation of the people of God on the path to sal-
vation. After grounding the offices of the Church in a permanent di-
vine gift—“Christ the Lord instituted a variety of ministries which are
directed towards the good of the whole body”—paragraph 18 describes
Christ’s commissioning of the apostles, led by Peter. Chapter 3 affirms the
primacy of Peter and “his infallible magisterium” (§18), in accord with
the First Vatican Council. It presents the apostles and their successors
(the bishops) as a “college” led by Peter and his successors, “while the chief
corner-stone is Christ Jesus himself (see Rev 21:14; Mt 16:18; Eph 2:20)”
(§19). The succession of today’s bishops (and pope) goes back to the very
beginning, as does their enduring divine office of teaching, sanctifying,
and governing. Paragraph 20 emphasizes that the bishops are fully suc-
cessors of the apostles: “by divine institution the bishops have succeeded
to the place of the apostles as shepherds of the church: and the one who
hears them hears Christ but whoever rejects them rejects Christ and him
who sent Christ.”
The main purpose of this section is to ensure that the bishops are not
considered mere stepchildren of the pope.110 Indeed, the bishops possess
“the fullness of the sacrament of order,” a fullness that “is conferred by
episcopal consecration” (§21)—a clarification about episcopal consecra-
tion that is an instance of doctrinal development. At the right hand of
the Father, Christ works through the bishops to bestow the divine gifts of
the gospel and of the sacraments. Paragraph 21 states that the bishops are
chosen by Christ to be “the ministers of Christ and the dispensers of the
mysteries of God (see 1 Cor 4:1).”
Paragraph 22 praises the collegial character of the body of bishops,
headed by the bishop of Rome and made especially manifest in Church
Councils, where the bishops (precisely as united to the pope, and not oth-
erwise) exercise “supreme and full power over the universal church.” The

110. See also Vatican II’s Christus Dominus.

116 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

college of bishops represents the diversity of the Church and also, united
under the pope, the unity of the Church. So as not to be misunderstood,
paragraph 22 also strongly affirms the pope’s “full, supreme and universal
power over the church, a power he is always able to exercise freely.”
These points seek to clarify the constitution of the Church in its of-
fices, which belong to the divine aspect of the Church (as Congar em-
phasizes). Paragraph 23 adds that the bishop, in his diocese, serves as a
principle of unity, just as the pope does for the whole Church. Bishops
should be concerned not only about their dioceses but also about the
whole Church. Indeed, “All the bishops . . . have a duty to promote and
defend the unity of faith and discipline common to the whole church”
(§23). The paragraph encourages the collaboration of bishops, not least
through such things as missionary work and charitable aid. The para-
graph also approves of certain groupings of local churches, “especially the
ancient patriarchal churches” with their own rites and traditions.111 Such
diversity exhibits not discord but catholicity.
Paragraph 24 specifies that bishops receive their commission directly
from Christ. The paragraph states, “The bishops, as successors of the apos-
tles, receive from the Lord, to whom all power in heaven and on earth has
been given, the mission to teach all nations and to preach the gospel to
every creature, so that all may gain salvation through faith, baptism and
the keeping of the commandments.” To accomplish this mission of teach-
ing and sanctifying, the bishops are empowered by the Holy Spirit. With
regard to the “canonical mission of bishops,” there are various ways in
which someone can be appointed to the episcopacy, including direct ap-
pointment by the pope (§24). The pope can also reject an appointment or
refuse apostolic communion to a candidate for the episcopacy, in which
case “the bishop cannot be admitted to office” (§24).
Paragraph 25 emphasizes that teaching the gospel is the primary task
of bishops. Bishops do not possess the charism of infallibility in their
teaching, except when they concur with one another and with the pope
in definitively teaching a doctrine, as for instance in Church Councils.
Even so, a bishop’s teaching should be greeted with reverence by the faith-

111. See also Vatican II’s Orientalium Ecclesiarum.

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o nt ext 117

ful in his diocese. Paragraph 25 states that “the faithful ought to concur
with their bishop’s judgment concerning faith and morals which he deliv-
ers in the name of Christ, and they are to adhere to this with a religious
assent of the mind.” Out of respect for the teaching office of the pope,
given to him by Christ, the faithful should also respond with this “reli-
gious assent of the mind” to the teachings of the pope on faith and morals
even when he is not defining doctrine ex cathedra.112
Paragraph 25 addresses the infallibility of the pope. Like the infalli-
bility of bishops when defining doctrine with the pope, the infallibility
of the pope is limited to the interpretation of “the deposit of divine rev-
elation that is to be guarded as sacred and faithfully expounded” (§25).
Given this significant limitation, the pope can teach infallibly “on faith or
morals,” by means of a “definitive act” that he undertakes “as the supreme
teacher of the universal church” (§25). In this regard, paragraph 25 states
that “his definitions are rightly said to be irreformable of themselves, and
not from the consent of the church, for they are delivered with the as-
sistance of the holy Spirit which was promised to him in blessed Peter;
and therefore they have no need of approval from others nor do they ad-
mit any appeal to any other judgment.” Both alone and in union with the
whole college of bishops, the pope can teach infallibly only on matters
of divine revelation. In such instances, the Holy Spirit ensures that the
pope’s (or the Council’s) decisions are in accordance with divine revela-
tion, “to which all must conform” (§25). Christ gives his Church the mis-
sion of proclaiming the gospel and sends the Spirit to ensure that in its
definitive teaching of faith and morals, the Church does not distort the
content of the gospel. What is at stake is the transmission of divine revela-
tion so that it might be “sacredly preserved” and “faithfully expounded”;
there is no “new public revelation” that can be added to the deposit of
faith (§25). The Holy Spirit also brings about the interior assent of the
faithful to the decision of the pope (or of the bishops in union with the
pope), by inspiring the whole Church to receive the whole divine deposit
that Christ has given his Church, including the gift of the teaching office.

112. See Augustin-Marie Aubry, Obéir ou assenter? De la “soumission religieuse” au magistère

simplement authentique (Paris: Desclée, 2015).

118 Lu me n Ge ntium in C onte x t

 Paragraph 26 explains that every local church, in preaching the gospel
and celebrating the Eucharist under the direction of its bishop, makes “tru-
ly present” the Church of Christ, because in each local church, no matter
how small or poor, “Christ is present by whose power the one, holy, catho-
lic and apostolic church is gathered together” (§26). In each local church
God calls together his people in the Holy Spirit “by the preaching of the
gospel of Christ” and the celebrating of the Eucharist (§26), so as to make
manifest the charity and unity that bond believers together in the Body
of Christ. Paragraph 26 goes on to describe the sanctifying office of the
bishops, who administer the divine gifts of the sacraments (united always
to the ministry of the word). The bishop is in charge of all celebrations of
the Eucharist in his diocese, and has charge of the other sacraments as well.
In accord with their sanctifying office, bishops must lead by the example of
a holy life.113
With regard to the governing office of the bishops, paragraph 27 em-
phasizes that the bishops are “vicars and legates of Christ” (rather than of
the pope) and exercise a “proper, ordinary, and immediate” power in the
name of Christ in their dioceses (§27). The pope’s “supreme and univer-
sal power” (§27) does not overthrow the bishops’ power, but affirms and
strengthens it in accord with Christ’s will that the apostles and their suc-
cessors be led by Peter. The bishops exercise their power under that of the
pope, but their power nonetheless “is proper to themselves” so that the
bishops truly are “presidents of the peoples they govern” (§27). Paragraph
27 portrays the bishops’ power through the images of a head of a house-
hold and of a good shepherd. True governance must be service, even to the
point that the one governing is willing to die for those whom he serves. As
one subject to weakness and failure, the bishop should have sympathy for
those who go astray. The bishop should “listen to his subjects whom he
looks after as truly his children” (§27) and should consider all persons in
his diocese as part of his charge, caring for them by praying, preaching the
gospel, and undertaking works of charity on behalf of all. The unity of the
faithful with the bishop should be like the Church’s union with Christ and
Christ’s with the Father.

113. For these paragraphs, see also Vatican II’s Christus Dominus.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 119

 In discussing “the divinely instituted ecclesiastical ministry,” para-
graph 28 describes the office of priests, who “by virtue of the sacrament of
order . . . are consecrated in the image of Christ,” in order “to preach the
gospel and nourish the faithful and celebrate divine worship.”114 With-
out minimizing the dignity of the proclamation of “the divine word to all
people,” the priestly office is identified above all with the celebration of
the Eucharist, in which priests act in the person of Christ and “in the sac-
rifice of the mass make present and apply . . . the one sacrifice of the new
covenant, that is, the sacrifice of Christ who once and for all offers him-
self as an unblemished victim to the Father (see Heb 9:11–28)” (§28). As
they teach, sanctify, and govern their congregations under the bishop’s au-
thority, priests make the universal Church present in their local churches.
Priests must cooperate with and obey the bishop as their father, and the
bishop must treat them “as sons and friends” (§28). Priests must be an ex-
ample to all people by their lives and must especially seek out those who
have fallen away from the Church. Again unity is the central theme: in-
deed, paragraph 28 concludes with the hope that the Church will help to
“wipe out every cause of division so that the whole human race may be
brought into the unity of God’s family” (§28). More briefly, paragraph 29
treats the office of deacons, and it restores the order of permanent dea-
cons in the Church.
Chapter 4, beginning with paragraph 30, discusses the laity. The para-
graph emphasizes the dignity of the laity’s role: “The sacred pastors are
well aware of how much the laity contribute to the well-being of the whole
church” (§30). The people of God consists of clergy, religious, and laity;
and all the baptized who are not clergy or religious are “laity.”115 Not only
bishops and priests, but also the laity are “sharers in Christ’s priestly, pro-
phetic and royal office” and play a crucial part in the Church’s mission of
evangelization (§31). The laity work to sanctify the world from within the
world. As paragraph 31 states, “It is the special vocation of the laity to seek
the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and ordering these in
accordance with the will of God,” thereby fostering “the sanctification of

114. See also Vatican II’s Presbyterorum Ordinis and Optatam Totius.
115. In postconciliar canon law, by contrast, all religious who are not clergy are counted as laity.

120 L u men Ge ntium in C onte x t

the world.” Like clergy and religious, the laity “are called to holiness” (§32),
as befits the fact that the rich diversity of the Church aims always at unity
in Christ. Indeed, the laity should conceive of their pastors as their broth-
ers in Christ; there is no elite in the Church, even though there is a hier-
archical order given by Christ for the purpose of ministry and service. Al-
though the laity’s task is to evangelize the world and in this way to ensure
“the growth of the church and its continual sanctification,” the “apostolate
of the laity” can and often does include “a more immediate cooperation in
the apostolate of the hierarchy” (§33) in service to the Church.116
The laity share in Christ’s priestly office through “offering spiritual wor-
ship” in the Eucharistic celebration and by the tasks of their daily life in
the world, by which they consecrate the world to God (§34). They share
in Christ’s prophetic office by understanding the faith and infusing “family
and society” with the teachings of faith,117 so that the hope given in Christ
will “be expressed through the structures of secular life,” which must be
transformed by personally and socially overcoming the domination of de-
monic powers (§35). In the witness borne to Christ by the laity, faith and life
must form a unity; no aspect of life can remain untouched by faith. Married
life is of particular importance, insofar as “[t]he christian family proclaims
aloud both the virtues of the kingdom of God here and now and the hope
of a blessed life to come” (§35). Even if laity are not directly involved in the
Church’s offices, they must work for the “growth of the kingdom of Christ
on earth” and therefore must “try diligently to deepen their knowledge of
revealed truth” in prayer and study (§35). Finally, the laity share in Christ’s
royal office by their “royal freedom” in overcoming “the reign of sin within
themselves,” and by leading others “to the King, to serve whom is to reign”
and valuing “the whole of creation and its orientation to the praise of God”
(§36). Transformation from sinfulness to holiness is the key theme here.
The result will be a world in which there will be “a more equitable dis-
tribution” of the goods of creation, “universal progress in human and Chris-
tian freedom” in the light of Christ, and reform of “those secular structures
and conditions which constitute an inducement to sin” (§36). The laity

116. For these paragraphs, see also Vatican II’s Apostolicam Actuositatem.
117. See also Vatican II’s Inter Mirifica.

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o n t ext 121

thereby prepare the world for the gospel and empower the Church to pro-
claim the gospel more widely. Paragraph 36 concludes by urging the laity to
remember that temporal matters are all contained within God’s dominion,
so that although human society “is governed by its own principles” rather
than by the Church, any view of society must be rejected “which claims to
construct society without any reference to religion, and which attacks and
undermines the religious freedom of the citizens.”118
Paragraph 37 speaks of the laity’s right to receive “the help provided by
the word of God and the sacraments,” since these enduring divine gifts are
for the whole Church. It describes the right of the laity also to make known
their opinions on matters pertaining to the Church, so long as this is done
with “respect for the truth,” with prudence, and in “a spirit of reverence
and love” toward the hierarchical priesthood (§37). At the same time, the
laity (like the clergy and religious) should be prompt to obey the decisions
of those who exercise hierarchical authority in the name of Christ. Such
obedience imitates the salvific obedience of Christ. The laity should also
pray for their pastors. Reciprocally, the pastors of the Church should listen
carefully to the laity and place them in positions of trust in the Church,
and should not attempt to limit the laity’s just freedom to act indepen-
dently in the sphere of secular affairs. If laity are configured to Christ as
they should be, they will “be a witness to the world of the resurrection and
life of the Lord Jesus” and will “spread throughout the world that spirit
which is the life of the poor, the meek and the peacemakers” (§38).
Chapter 5 is titled “The universal call to holiness in the church.” The
divine aspect of the Church is signaled strongly once again at the outset
of this chapter: “The church . . . is held to be indefectibly holy as a matter
of faith,” because of the work of Christ and the Spirit (§39). In accord with
the beatitudes and with Christ’s command that we must “be perfect” as
the Father is perfect (Mt 5:48), paragraph 39 insists that God calls all peo-
ple to holiness and that the Church’s holiness is manifested in countless
ways, as believers are sanctified more and more. It commends particularly
the practice of the evangelical counsels. Those who have been justified in
faith and baptism “are therefore really made holy,” but this holiness needs

118. See also Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae.

122 Lu men Ge ntium in C onte x t

to be not only maintained but perfected (§40). There is recognition here
of the need to grow in holiness, and therefore of the presence of imperfec-
tion and sin (the Church in its human aspect). The holiness of the mem-
bers of the Church enriches not only the Church but also the societies in
which believers live. The saints are the great exemplars of this impact. De-
spite the variety of vocations, there is only “one holiness cultivated by all
who are led by the Spirit of God” (§41), and bishops, priests, religious, and
laity must be holy, by loving God and neighbor, avoiding vice, proclaiming
the gospel, and giving their lives for others. Paragraph 41 notes that mar-
ried couples “offer to all an example of untiring and generous love” and
“bear witness to and cooperate in the fruitfulness of mother Church,” and
the contributions of widows and single people are also commended. The
paragraph encourages both laborers, who imitate Christ the carpenter, and
those who, as a result of poverty or illness, “are united in a special way with
Christ in his suffering for the world’s salvation” (§41).
Concretely, paragraph 42 explains that charity for God and neighbor
grows in us when we listen to God’s word, participate in the sacramental
life of the Church, and deliberately lead a life of “prayer, self-denial, active
fraternal service and the practice of all the virtues.” In its highest form,
charity expresses itself through martyrdom, and all must be willing to suf-
fer for Christ “along the ways of the cross amid the persecutions which
the church never lacks” (§42). Virginity or celibacy also bears witness to
Christ, through the person’s total commitment to following Christ for
the sake of the kingdom. Likewise, embracing voluntary poverty and obe-
dience is a way of being configured to the Christ who “emptied himself,
taking the form of a servant . . . and became obedient unto death” (Phil 2:7–
8) for the sake of the salvation of the world. Paragraph 42 warns that all
Christians must avoid being “held back from the pursuit of perfect char-
ity by using this world’s goods and being attached to riches in a way that is
against the spirit of evangelical poverty.”
The sixth chapter focuses on religious, those who vow to live in chasti-
ty, poverty, and obedience for the sake of Christ.119 Chastity, poverty, and
obedience, the “evangelical counsels,” are “a divine gift which the Church

119. See also Vatican II’s Perfectae Caritatis.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o nt ext 123

has received from its Lord and maintains always with the help of his
grace” (§43). Paragraph 44 emphasizes that “the religious state . . . makes
clear to all believers the heavenly goods that are already present in this
world” and “foretells the resurrection that is to come and the glory of the
heavenly kingdom.” By imitating Christ’s manner of life, religious show
forth the exalted demands of the kingdom of God and make manifest the
power of Christ and the Spirit. By formally recognizing (and regulating)
vowed religious as a canonical state of life, the Church fosters the flour-
ishing of the religious life and “shows through its liturgical action that it
is a state consecrated to God” (§45). Paragraph 46 addresses the question
of whether religious, by denying themselves certain earthly goods, are im-
peding their own personal fulfillment. The answer is certainly no, since
the counsels “contribute not a little to the purification of the heart and
to spiritual freedom” (§46). In their self-denial, religious are configured
to Christ and freed to serve others in monasteries, schools, hospitals, and
missions; and by their prayer they hold others “present in the bowels of
Christ and cooperate spiritually with them, so that the building up of
the earthly city may be always founded in the Lord and directed towards
him” (§46). They are participating personally in the reform and renewal
of the Church. The chapter concludes with an exhortation to religious to
“persevere and make greater progress in the vocation to which God has
called them, for the richer holiness of the church” and for the glory of the
Trinity, the source of all holiness (§47).
Chapter 7 explores “The eschatological character of the pilgrim church
and its union with the heavenly church.” To contrast the earthly Church
with the heavenly Church, as though the former were human and the lat-
ter divine, would miss the point entirely. It is one Church that “will reach
its completion only in the glory of heaven, when the time for the restora-
tion of all things will come” (§48). Paragraph 48 focuses on the work of
Christ at the right hand of the Father in constituting his Body the Church
“as the universal sacrament of salvation” and in leading all people to the
Church, whose members are strengthened by the Eucharist. The full “res-
toration” and renewal of all things, promised by God, has begun in Christ
and even now “by means of the Spirit continues in the church” (§48). His-
tory therefore is not a mere delay of the eschaton; rather, history is the place

124 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

of Christ’s transformative work through the Holy Spirit, bringing about the
ecclesial unity of humans with God. The Church on earth is the pilgrim
Church, with imperfect but real holiness and with a covenantal mission to
evangelize the world in self-sacrificial love, which requires believers to “put
on the armour of God, so that we can stand up against the snares of the
devil and resist in the evil day” (§48). Indeed, paragraph 48 emphasizes that
believers must be on guard to live always for Christ in love, so that “we may
deserve to enter the nuptial celebration with him and be counted among
the blessed (see Mt 25:31–46), and not be ordered, like the evil and lazy ser-
vants (see Mt 25:26), to go down to the eternal fire.” The Church, which
like Christ endures suffering in the present age, yearns for Christ’s coming
in glory, for “the arrival of the new heavens and new earth in which justice
dwells,” and for the resurrection of the dead to glorified life (§48).
Paragraph 49 refers to the various states in which Christians now live:
on earth, in purgatory, and in heavenly union with Christ, enjoying the be-
atific vision of the triune God. Since all in Christ form one Church, those
on earth enjoy a communion with the saints in heaven, who “intercede for
us to the Father, displaying the merits they gained on earth through the one
mediator between God and humanity, Christ Jesus” (§49). Paragraph 50
explains the Church’s prayers for the dead and honoring of the saints, the
holy angels, and the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the lives of the saints, config-
ured as they are to Christ, “God makes vividly manifest to humanity his
presence and his face” so that we can see what union with Christ looks
like and so that we can be led by them to a deeper communion with Christ
(§50). As paragraph 50 makes clear, what is at stake is the affirmation of the
work of salvation: God “is wonderful in his saints and in them is glorified.”
The union of the Church in heaven and the Church on earth is manifested
supremely in the liturgy, where those whom Christ has united to himself
join together in one song of praise, so that it is true to say that “[w]hen we
celebrate . . . the eucharistic sacrifice we join very closely the worship of the
heavenly church” (§50). Paragraph 51 cautions, however, against excesses in
the cult of the saints, since what counts is the love that makes us “one fam-
ily in Christ,” communicating with one another “in mutual love and in the
one praise of the most holy Trinity” in a foretaste of the supreme beatitude
of the new Jerusalem.

L um e n Ge ntium i n Co nt ext 125

 Paragraph 52 begins the final chapter of Lumen Gentium, on “The
blessed virgin Mary, mother of God, in the mystery of Christ and the
church.”120 Mary possesses the “supreme office and dignity of being
the mother of God the Son, and therefore she is the specially loved daugh-
ter of the Father and the shrine of the Holy Spirit; and by this gift of
pre-eminent grace she surpasses by far all other creatures in heaven and
on earth” (§53). But why should Mary, who after all is a member of the
Church, be discussed in a document on the Church? The answer is that
not only is Mary the preeminent member of the Church, but also Mary
is the Church’s “model [typus]” and “exemplar” in faith (§53; cf. §63), as
well as the “image and the beginning of the church” (§68). Even more, she
is the “mother in the order of grace” (§61) of all members of the Church,
because of her unique cooperation with Christ—which continues today
through her “motherly love” (§62) for all believers. Paragraph 55 presents
her as the fulfillment of the people of Israel, “the exalted daughter of Sion.”
Since she was “predestined to be the mother” of God, she was “[e]nriched
by the first instant of her conception by the splendour of a most singular
holiness” (see Lk 1:28) so that she could embrace “the salvific will of God
wholeheartedly and without being held back by any sin” (§56). Assent-
ing by grace to God’s word and receiving God’s Word made flesh into her
womb, she freely and faithfully cooperated with God as the new Eve, with
the effects of her obedience reversing the effects of Eve’s disobedience.
Surveying the biblical testimony, paragraph 57 remarks that the
“union of the mother with the Son in the work of redemption is mani-
fest from the instant of the virginal conception of Christ right on to his
death.” Paragraphs 58 and 59 provide biblical evidence of this coopera-
tion, most importantly Mary’s associating “herself with a mother’s heart

120. The first and final chapters of Lumen Gentium mirror the structure of Henri de Lubac’s
1953 Méditation sur l’Église, which appeared in English in 1956 as The Splendor of the Church, trans.
Michael Mason (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1956). There was debate at the Council over whether
to publish a separate document on the Blessed Virgin Mary, or to include this theme in the docu-
ment on the Church. By a narrow margin, the Council Fathers voted to treat Mary within Lumen
Gentium in order to underscore that Mary is a member of the Church. During the Council, Pope
Paul VI added to the Litany of Loreto the title “Mother of the Church,” a title that emphasized her
unique relationship to all other members of the Church. See Cesare Antonelli, Il dibattito su Maria
nel Concilio Vaticano II. Percorso redazionale sulla base di nuovi documenti di archivio (Padova: Ed-
izioni Messaggero di Sant’ Antonio, 2009).

126 L u me n Ge ntium in Conte x t

with his sacrifice” and, at the foot of the Cross, “lovingly consenting to
the immolation of the victim that had been born from her” (§58). She
was in the upper room with the apostles in the days prior to Pentecost,
and her cooperation with her Son in his redemptive suffering received its
crown when, having completed her life on earth, she “was taken up body
and soul to heavenly glory” in full configuration with her Savior (§59).
Does Mary’s role undermine Christ’s stature as the one Mediator (see
1 Tm 2:5–6)? Paragraph 60 insists that, on the contrary, “the maternal role
of Mary towards humanity in no way obscures or diminishes this unique
mediation of Christ; rather it shows forth its power.” Her work is founded
entirely upon the grace that flows from his mediation, and completely de-
pends upon his mediation at every instant. From eternity, God willed for
her to be the “mother of God” and willed for her to have not merely a bio-
logical role but to share, as a real mother, in the life of her Son (§61). En-
tirely by the grace of her Son, she cooperated with her Son in an extraor-
dinary way. She shares uniquely in the “one mediation of the redeemer”
through her “participated cooperation” with her Son (§62). Since she is
Christ’s mother, she is the mother of all who belong to his Body “in the
order of grace” (§61), and even now she prays constantly for her children.
Certainly “no creature can ever be counted along with the incarnate Word
and redeemer,” but Christ can and does enable believers to participate in
him and in his work, and Mary is the supreme example of this (§62).
As mother and virgin, Mary is like the Church, since the Church “is
also rightly called mother and virgin” (§63) in bringing forth children
through the Holy Spirit by faith and obedience, and by virginally keeping
“integral and pure the faith she has given to her spouse” (§64). Like Mary,
the Church is holy. Indeed, paragraph 65 notes that “in the most blessed
Virgin the church has already attained the perfection by which it is without
stain or wrinkle (see Eph 5:27).” By contemplating Mary, the Church draws
closer to Christ, because the Church thereby enters “with reverence more
and more deeply into the inmost mystery of the incarnation” and becomes
more like Christ (§65). We must bear Christ in our hearts as Mary did in
her heart and womb.
Paragraph 66 specifies that the veneration of Mary “differs essential-
ly from the cult of adoration which is given to the incarnate Word and

Lum e n Ge ntium i n Co n t ext 127

equally to the Father and the holy Spirit.” Devotion to Mary, if properly
practiced, leads to her Son. With an eye to the fallen human aspect of the
Church, however, paragraph 67 cautions that theologians and preachers
should “carefully . . . avoid all false exaggeration” about Mary’s privileges
and “should sedulously avoid . . . anything that might lead our separated
brothers and sisters or any other people into error concerning the true
teaching of the church” (§67), although a narrow minimalism should also
be avoided. The chapter, and Lumen Gentium as a whole, concludes by
noting that Mary, as “the image and beginning of the church which will
receive fulfilment in the age that is to come,” “shines forth as a sign of
sure hope and comfort for the pilgrim people of God” (§68)—and does
so not only for Catholics but also for Orthodox. The Council asks Mary’s
intercession for unity among Christians and, indeed, for the gathering of
all peoples “in peace and harmony into one people of God to the glory of
the most holy and undivided Trinity” (§69).

Conclusion: Lumen Gentium as an

Ongoing Theological Event
In his 1968 Afterword in True and False Reform in the Church, Yves Con-
gar defends the Council’s teaching and criticizes elements of preconciliar
theology such as “the heretofore simplistic interpretation of the Scrip-
tures, and other simplistic (but traditional) interpretations of supernatu-
ral realities.”121 At the same time, Congar expresses concerns about the
postconciliar situation of the Church. He lists five ways in which pro-
test in the Church could go too far: (1) by destroying Catholic unity or
wounding the bond of mutual love; (2) by calling “into question the hi-
erarchical structure of the church’s pastoral life, given to us by the Lord’s
own institution”; (3) by denying or irresponsibly questioning “the articles
of doctrine, for which one rather ought to be willing to give one’s life”;
(4) by excluding certain persons as useless; and (5) by protesting in the
middle of the celebration of the liturgy. On this list, numbers two and
three especially show Congar’s commitment to what he describes in True

121. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 341.

128 Lu men Ge ntium in Conte x t

and False Reform in the Church as the divine elements of the Church: the
content of faith, the sacraments, and the offices of the Church. These ele-
ments are given by Jesus Christ and are unchangeably holy. Like Henri de
Lubac, Congar rejects (as de Lubac put it in his 1969 commencement ad-
dress at Saint Louis University) “a ‘pluralism’ which is not the pluralism
of the theological schools but that of entirely different beliefs from those
of the normative faith.”122
Edward Schillebeeckx’s influential Church: The Human Story of God
(1989) represents a different perspective. Schillebeeckx holds that “the
four marks [one, holy, catholic, and apostolic] do not describe our real
churches in their historical forms.”123 For Schillebeeckx, the real Catholic
Church in history, comprising particular local churches, therefore lacks
central elements that Congar and Lumen Gentium say that it possesses.
In light of “the liberating freedom of Jesus Christ,” Schillebeeckx critiques
the Church’s “feudal and hierarchical structure of authority” and “the
form of its authoritation and hierarchical mediation.”124 Indeed, he leaves
little positive room for the “hierarchical structure of authority” and “hi-
erarchical mediation” that Congar considers to be a divinely given and
unchanging element of the Church. Although Schillebeeckx grants that
the Church must inevitably have a leadership that exercises authority, he
challenges the term “hierarchy” because “in all official documents of the
Roman Catholic church ‘hierarchy’ is used specifically as an argument for
rejecting any democratic exercise of authority and thus democratic par-
ticipation in the government of the church by the people of God.”125 For
Schillebeeckx, not only has the Church obscured the liberative freedom

122. Henri de Lubac, SJ, “The Church in Crisis,” Theology Digest 17 (1969): 312–25, at 319. For
discussion of this address, see Joseph A. Komonchak, “Vatican II as an ‘Event’,” in Vatican II: Did
Anything Happen?, ed. David G. Schultenover, SJ (New York: Continuum, 2007), 24–51, at 24–26.
De Lubac published his essay also in French, and he expanded it into a short book: see de Lubac,
“L’Église dans la crise actuelle,” Nouvelle revue théologique 91 (1969): 580–96 and de Lubac, L’Église
dans la crise actuelle (Paris: Cerf, 1969).
123. Edward Schillebeeckx, OP, Church: The Human Story of God, trans. John Bowden (New
York: Crossroad, 1990), 197; this book originally appeared in Dutch in 1989.
124. Ibid., 214. For a valuable critique of Schillebeeckx’s Christology, see Thomas Joseph
White, OP, The Incarnate Lord: A Thomistic Study in Christology (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic
University of America Press, 2015), 470–86.
125. Schillebeeckx, Church, 217.

L um e n Ge ntium i n C o n t ext 129

of the gospel of Jesus Christ—which in today’s world requires a funda-
mentally democratic Church—but also the Church has neglected the
fact that “what the ministry says, even in dogmatic statements, about this
offer of salvation in Jesus can only be understood in the totality of the
whole of human history.”126 The latter point means that the actual truth-
content of a dogmatic statement, including dogma about the Church (as
taught in Lumen Gentium), will not be apparent until the eschaton, when
the “totality of the whole of human history” will be known. This view
severely relativizes the Church’s dogmatic teaching, even if for Schille-
beeckx dogmatic formulations, in their historical context, can be “a legiti-
mate and even permanent milestone.”127
In 1968, Congar’s main concern is still the need for “co-responsibility”
and for “the full participation of everyone in those affairs and activities
that concern everyone.”128 He hopes that synods of bishops, councils
of priests, and parish councils will solve many of the postconciliar (and
preconciliar) problems, by re-instantiating the Church’s tradition of “the
coexistence of a hierarchical principle along with a communitarian frame-
work in virtue of which all parties were invited to take part in the matura-
tion of decisions by way of councils, discussions, and collegial gatherings
(in the broad sense of the word).”129 I agree with Congar that, within the
context of the “hierarchical principle,” discussions in which all parties are
involved are important. He is certainly right that an overbearing exercise
of ecclesial authority, such as he and his work were subject to in the 1950s,
is neither appropriate nor charitable. I also agree with Congar that reform
of the Church is constantly needed, in order to make clearer (rather than
undermine or negate) the divine elements of the Church.
Congar recognizes in 1968, however, that “the church cannot admit
a situation of being called into question all the time.”130 This is not be-
cause the Church does not dare to face questions or to change its prac-

126. Ibid., 224.

127. Ibid. Schillebeeckx concludes, “Community, ministry, theology: these three are themselves
fundamentally dependent—in a process in which they are relativized—on the living God, who brings
his creation in Jesus Christ, through our history, to a final consummation after history” (ibid., 228).
128. Congar, True and False Reform in the Church, 345.
129. Ibid., 346.
130. Ibid., 158.

130 Lu me n Ge ntium in Conte x t

tices, modes of expression, or nondefinitive teachings, but rather because
the Church has been divinely commissioned to hand on divine revelation
under the guidance of the Spirit and to mediate the means of salvation to
the human race. If the Church’s truthfulness is “called into question all
the time” then this situation undermines the Church’s evangelizing mis-
sion and makes conciliar texts such as Lumen Gentium useless.
Maureen Sullivan appropriately foregrounds Congar’s contributions to
Lumen Gentium.131 But Sullivan’s conclusion that Congar understood the
Church as “divinely founded, but in the hands of humans” misses the true
depth of Congar’s theology of the Church.132 For Congar, the Church is
even now in divine “hands” (Christ and the Spirit), while at the same time
being “in the hands of humans.” It is divine not solely in its founding, but
also now; and even in its founding, the human element was fully present.
In his 1978 book Église catholique et France moderne, Congar highlights
this union of divine and human elements, in response to the one-sided
perspective of some contemporary reformers: “This same Church whose
human tares they condemn is from Jesus Christ, from the living and holy
God. The Church is not a mere human creation. As the concrete form of
Christianity she is given prior to Christians, namely in Christ.”133 Congar
makes clear that Christ’s Church possesses enduring truth about divine re-
alities, so that Catholic theology cannot be envisioned as free to move in
any direction but instead must be authoritatively governed by Scripture and
Tradition. He emphasizes that the Church’s “dogma and her theologies are
radically given in the Word of God whose witness is the Scriptures.”134 In

131. For emphasis on the fact that in acknowledging the work of the individual drafters we
should appreciate that the final texts are documents of the Church that transcend the individuals’
viewpoints, see Innocent Smith, OP, “Ecclesial Authorship, the Council, and the Liturgy: Reflec-
tions on a Debate between Ratzinger and Lefebvre,” Angelicum 92 (2015): 93–113. See also Gérard
Philips, L’Église et son mystère au IIe Concile du Vatican. Histoire, texte et commentaire de la Consti-
tution Lumen Gentium, 2 vols. (Paris: Desclée, 1967–1968).
132. Maureen Sullivan, OP, The Road to Vatican II: Key Changes in Theology (New York: Pau-
list Press, 2007), 19.
133. Yves Congar, OP, Église catholique et France moderne (Paris: Hachette, 1978), 13–14; cited
in Nichols, Yves Congar, 181 (Nichols’s trans.). See also Congar, “What Belonging to the Church
Has Come to Mean,” trans. Frances M. Chew, Communio 4 (1977): 146–60, where he seeks a solu-
tion to the current situation by proposing a “threshold Church,” distinct from the Church in its
fullness, but related to it in the way similar to how the catechumenate is related to the Church.
134. Congar, Eglise catholique et France moderne, 13–14 (Nichols’s trans.).

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o n t ext 131

this way, he insists upon the divine elements of the Church, upon which are
grounded the Church’s holiness: “There exists in the Church an element of
transcendent purity.”135
As Congar suggests in Église catholique et France moderne, if much
preconciliar theology overemphasized the divine elements by neglecting
the human aspects and disallowing reform, much postconciliar theology
has overemphasized the human aspects by neglecting the divine elements
and supposing that everything can or should be changed. At the outset of
her exposition of Lumen Gentium, Sullivan sums up her view of its mes-
sage: “We shall see that the church had changed—from a static, timeless
entity to a dynamic, pilgrim people on a journey to their ultimate des-
tiny, the fullness of truth found only in God.”136 For Congar, by contrast,
there are “timeless” or divine elements present in a fully historical fashion
within the “dynamic, pilgrim people on a journey.” Congar does not his-
toricize the divine elements of the Church, even while he locates them
carefully in history.
Sullivan allows that “sin will never so dominate the church that it
could be totally unfaithful to God’s truth, a truth that unfolds ever more
fully through history.”137 However, on the grounds that “all expressions
of theological truth are conditioned by their moment in history,” she ob-
serves that “our grasp of theological truths needs to be influenced by the
council’s acknowledgment of the church as an eschatological reality.”138 In
her view, “theological articulations of the faith” are ever-changing and im-
perfect “attempts to articulate revelation in human words and systems of
thought,” so that dogmatic efforts “to articulate revelation” are not neces-
sarily true—although, eschatologically speaking, “error will not have the
final word.”139 She concludes that the Church’s expressions of divine rev-
elation are “simply the vehicles through which we attempt to bring God
to birth again in each new generation.”140 Congar and Lumen Gentium,

135. Ibid. See also the analysis in Andrew Meszaros’s “Vatican II as Theological Event and Text
according to Yves Congar.”
136. Sullivan, The Road to Vatican II, 91. 137. Ibid., 115.
138. Ibid., 109. 139. Ibid., 116.
140. Ibid. See also Christopher Cimorelli and Daniel Minch, “Views of Doctrine: Historical
Consciousness, Asymptotic Notional Clarity, and the Challenge of Hermeneutics as Ontology,”
Louvain Studies 37 (2013): 327–63; and the response of Eduardo J. Echeverria, “The Essentialist

132 L u men Ge ntium in Conte x t

by contrast, teach that the Church’s dogmas are Christ’s enduring gifts of
saving truth.
The ongoing theological event of Lumen Gentium today recalls be-
lievers to the nature and mission of the Church. Enlightened by Christ,
the work of the pope, of the bishops, and of the whole people of God
must “promote and defend the unity of faith and discipline common to
the whole church” (§23), so that the world may be consecrated to God
through the Spirit. The simple purpose of all of this is stated by Paul:
“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellow-
ship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (1 Cor 13:14).

versus Historicist Debate about the Truth Status of Dogmatic Formulations: A Critique of the
Cimorelli/Minch Proposal,” Louvain Studies 38 (2014): 356–69. Echeverria observes that for Ci-
morelli and Minch (and, I would add, for many others), “inadequacy of expression seems to mean
inexpressibility of divine truth. No, they do not deny the existence of divine or transcendent truth
(C/M 344). Rather, they deny that divine truth may be determinately and hence truly known, in-
adequately, but not falsely, analogically, but no less meaningfully. Therefore, since C/M posit a rad-
ical epistemic break here between dogmatic formulations and reality, or concepts and reality (C/M
356), such that divine truth is unformulatable, we are not surprised to hear them claim that ‘there is
no constant, asymptotic progression towards Truth or full possession of the divine through certain
knowledge of revealed truths’ ” (Echeverria, “The Essentialist versus Historicist Debate about the
Truth Status of Dogmatic Formulations,” 357–58).

L um e n Ge nti um i n C o nt ext 133

C h a p t e r 4

}
NATURE AND GRACE
Gaudium et Spes in Context

As Susan Wood has observed, Henri de Lubac drew a “clear connection

. . . between his own work on the supernatural and themes developed in
Gaudium et Spes.”1 In his work on the nature-grace relationship, de Lubac
sought to articulate the intimacy of the relationship between human na-
ture as created and the divine gift of grace: grace is no mere add-on.2 In

1. Susan K. Wood, SCL, “Henri de Lubac and the Church-World Relationship in Gaudium et
Spes,” in The Legacy of Vatican II, ed. Massimo Faggioli and Andrea Vicini, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Pau-
list Press, 2015), 226–47, at 227. Rightly, in my view, Wood argues that Gaudium et Spes §22’s use of
the term “vocation” avoids certain pitfalls that would otherwise be associated with de Lubac’s ap-
proach. She remarks, “Since a person’s supernatural vocation is only known through revelation, vo-
cation sidesteps the problem of exigencies of nature. . . . In the theological controversy this exigency
was understood as an exigency on the part of the human person, which became a right the person
claimed from God. The notion of vocation prevents this kind of misunderstanding” (ibid., 235).
2. The recognition that human nature desires a happiness that no created reality can satisfy
is contained in chapter 7 of the Preparatory Theological Commission’s (neo-scholastic) Schema
de deposito fidei pure custodiendo, titled “De ordine naturali et supernaturali,” which was delivered
to all the Council Fathers in late summer 1962. For discussion see Giovanni Turbanti, Un concilio

134
introducing Gaudium et Spes as an ongoing theological event by reference
to de Lubac’s The Mystery of the Supernatural, as I will do in this chapter, I
do not mean to imply that Gaudium et Spes reprises the preconciliar con-
troversy over nature and grace or even that Gaudium et Spes must be read
in light of de Lubac’s book. After all, Gaudium et Spes, like the other con-
ciliar texts we have studied, ranges quite widely, displays a diversity of for-
mative influences (including Pope John XXIII’s encyclicals), and does not
attempt to resolve the finer points of theological controversies. Instead, in
choosing de Lubac’s book for the present chapter, I seek to draw attention
to a point made by Pope John Paul II in his Crossing the Threshold of Hope:
“The Council proposed, especially in Gaudium et Spes, that the mystery of
redemption should be seen in light of the great renewal of man and of all
that is human.”3 In his encyclicals, too, John Paul II frequently emphasized
Gaudium et Spes’s presentation of Christ vis-à-vis human nature. For ex-
ample, with reference to Gaudium et Spes §22, John Paul II insists in Dives
in Misericordia that “man cannot be manifested in the full dignity of his
nature without reference—not only on the level of concepts but also in an
integrally existential way—to God” (§1).4 For John Paul II, the reality that
human nature is fueled by the desire for union with God is “one of the ba-
sic principles, perhaps the most important one, of the teaching of the last
Council [Vatican II]” (§1), and this insight should affect our understand-
ing of Gaudium et Spes as an ongoing theological event.
Henri de Lubac does not appear to have had a great deal of direct
influence on Gaudium et Spes (other than on its section about atheism),
even if one may rightly posit significant indirect influence.5 In his 1985

per il mondo moderno. La redazione della constituzione pastorale “Gaudium et spes” del Vaticano II
(Bologna: Il Mulino, 2000); see also Jared Wicks, SJ, “More Light on Vatican Council II,” Catholic
Historical Review 94 (2008): 75–101. De Lubac responded critically to one passage in the Schema
de deposito fidei pure custodiendo, but his criticism had to do with a passage related to his work on
development of dogma, not to his work on the relationship of nature and grace.
3. John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope, trans. Jenny McPhee and Martha McPhee, ed.
Vittorio Messori (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), 48. Bishop Karol Wojtyła, the future Pope
John Paul II, befriended de Lubac during the Council.
4. This observation leads John Paul II to conclude: “The more the Church’s mission is cen-
tered upon man—the more it is, so to speak, anthropocentric—the more it must be confirmed and
actualized theocentrically, that is to say, be directed in Jesus Christ to the Father” (Dives in Miseri-
cordia, Encyclical Letter, November 30, 1980, §1).
5. For discussion, see Jared Wicks, SJ, “Further Light on Vatican Council II,” Catholic Histori-

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 135

interview Entretien autour de Vatican II: Souvenirs et reflections, de Lubac
mentions that he worked on the text of Gaudium et Spes “only in its later
stages.”6 He was a peritus attached to the Mixed Commission that, be-
ginning in early 1963, worked upon what eventually became Gaudium et
Spes. Notably, Gaudium et Spes §22 paraphrases a central passage from de
Lubac’s 1938 book Catholicism.7 De Lubac and Gaudium et Spes strongly
agree that the mystery of humanity can be understood only through the
mystery of Christ. In Entretien autour de Vatican II, de Lubac observes ap-
provingly with regard to Gaudium et Spes (and to the Council as a whole):
“Without any exaggeration, one can say that the Council broke away
from extrinsicism which (was) the illness of modern Catholicism ‘which
had misunderstood the full character of the desire of nature’ (Congar)
purposefully avoiding the vocabulary of the two ‘orders.’ ”8
In this chapter, then, de Lubac’s The Mystery of the Supernatural will
serve as an entrance point for exploring Gaudium et Spes as an ongoing
theological event. De Lubac published this book in 1965, apparently in
part as a response to criticisms of his Surnaturel during the conciliar de-
bate over the document that would become Gaudium et Spes.9 According

cal Review 95 (2009): 546–62, a review essay treating Henri de Lubac’s posthumously published
Carnets du Concile, ed. Loïc Figoureux, 2 vols. (Paris: Cerf, 2007). Wicks describes three “mo-
ments” in which de Lubac tried to directly influence Gaudium et Spes during its development.
6. See Henri de Lubac, Entretien autour de Vatican II. Souvenirs et reflections (Paris: Cerf,
1985), 45. See also his Carnets du Concile as well as his At the Service of the Church: Henri de Lubac
Reflects on the Circumstances That Occasioned His Writings, trans. Anne Elizabeth Englund (San
Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993), chapter 7 and Appendix 7. For reflection on de Lubac’s experience
of the Council, see Loïc Figoureux, “Henri de Lubac et le concile Vatican II, espoirs et inquiétudes
d’un théologien,” Cristianesimo nella Storia 34 (2013): 249–71.
7. See David L. Schindler, “Introduction,” in Henri de Lubac, SJ, The Mystery of the Supernatu-
ral, trans. Rosemary Sheed (New York: Crossroad, 1998), xi–xxxi, at xxvii.
8. De Lubac, Entretien autour de Vatican II, 28, cited in Wood, “Henri de Lubac and the
Church-World Relationship in Gaudium et Spes,” 237 (Wood’s translation).
9. That is the contention of Karl Heinz Neufeld, SJ, “In the Service of the Council: Bishops
and Theologians at the Second Vatican Council (for Cardinal Henri de Lubac on His Ninetieth
Birthday),” trans. Ronald Sway, in Vatican II: Assessment and Perspectives: Twenty-Five Years After
(1962–1987), vol. 1, ed. René Latourelle, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1988), 74–105, at 91, citing
Acta Synodalia S. Concilii Oecumenici Vaticani II, 26 vols. (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana,
1970–1980), III/V, 519ff.; and H. Fesquet, Diario del Concilio (Milan: 1967), 621. Neufeld states that
during discussions on Schema 13 (the future Gaudium et Spes), “A speaker launched into an offensive
against ideas that he attributed to de Lubac in Surnaturel concerning the relationship between na-
ture and the supernatural, or, more precisely, against the signification he gave to the ‘natural desire’

136 G a u di um e t Sp e s in C onte x t
to de Lubac, The Mystery of the Supernatural develops “point by point, in
the same order and without changing the least point of doctrine, the ar-
ticle published under that title [by de Lubac] in Recherches in 1949.”10 The
Mystery of the Supernatural therefore provides us with a synthesis of his in-
fluential view of the relationship of nature and grace—and of Church and
world—as he understood it in the years before and during the Council.
After surveying The Mystery of the Supernatural, I summarize Gaudium
et Spes in the second section of the chapter. Gaudium et Spes emphasizes
the centrality of Christ from a standpoint of appreciation for the modern
world’s existential aspirations and dialogic spirit, alongside an awareness
of the many challenges that threaten the modern world. Insisting both
upon the integrity of human nature’s capacities (even though wounded by
sin) and upon human nature’s God-given orientation toward graced ful-
fillment in Christ, Gaudium et Spes proposes that the modern world and
the Church mutually require each other for true human development,
peace, and happiness.11

of man for God. What was at stake here was nothing less than the basic idea underlying the subse-
quent text of Gaudium et spes: the question of the correct understanding of being a Christian in the
world” (Neufeld, “In the Service of the Council,” 91). In response, says Neufeld, de Lubac produced
“two new volumes, which appeared in 1965 and which attempted to give a clearer presentation of
his position: Augustinisme et Théologie moderne and Le Mystère du Surnaturel. Had these two works
been read attentively, there should have been no further misunderstandings concerning this ques-
tion. Naturally, de Lubac also did what he could to exclude such misunderstandings as far as possible
from the drafted text of Gaudium et spes” (Neufeld, “In the Service of the Council,” 92).
10. De Lubac, At the Service of the Church, 123. See Henri de Lubac, SJ, Surnaturel (Paris: Au-
bier, 1946); de Lubac, “Le Mystère du surnaturel,” Recherches de science religieuse 36 (1949): 80–121,
which appears in English as “The Mystery of the Supernatural,” trans. Anne Englund Nash, in de
Lubac, Theology in History (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1996), 281–316. For further discussion
of nature and grace, see Henri de Lubac, SJ, A Brief Catechesis on Nature and Grace, trans. Rich-
ard Arnandez, FSC (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1984). See also de Lubac’s 1965 book—a companion
to The Mystery of the Supernatural—titled Augustinianism and Modern Theology, trans. Lancelot
Sheppard (New York: Crossroad, 2000). For a helpful introduction to and contextualization of
the development of de Lubac’s thinking on nature and grace, see Raul Berzosa Martinez, La Te-
ología del Sobrenatural en los Escritos de Henri de Lubac: Estudio Historico-Teologico (1931–1980)
(Burgos: Aldecoa, 1991). See also Georges Chantraine, SJ, “The Supernatural: Discernment of
Catholic Thought according to Henri de Lubac,” in Surnaturel: A Controversy at the Heart of
Twentieth-Century Thomistic Thought, ed. Serge-Thomas Bonino, OP, trans. Robert Williams (Ave
Maria, Fla.: Sapientia Press, 2009), 21–40. For further background see Bernard Comte, “Le père de
Lubac, un théologien dans l’Église de Lyon,” in Henri de Lubac: La rencontre au coeur de l’Église, ed.
Jean-Dominique Durand (Paris: Cerf, 2006), 35–89.
11. Henri de Lubac’s insistence upon the “natural desire for the supernatural,” as distinct from

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 137

Henri de Lubac’s The Mystery of the Supernatural
De Lubac opens The Mystery of the Supernatural by arguing that his view
of nature and grace, a view that he contends simply is “the traditional idea”
and “the old tradition” from the Fathers onward, is currently under threat
from two directions.12 First, there is the dualist, or separatist, view of na-
ture and grace, which denies that grace bears any relation to nature. Even
though this view no longer has many adherents, he says, it is still bearing
bitter fruit “in the sphere of practical action,” since the secular world pro-
ceeds as though grace did not exist.13 Second, there is an immanentist con-
flation of nature and grace that supposes, as in Marxist or Hegelian theory,
that the dialectic of history will produce from within itself the transcen-
dence that we desire.
In order to understand how these two extremes arose and how they
can be overcome, de Lubac reflects upon what he calls the “new theory” of

a natural desire for God or a natural desire to see the divine essence, was and is controversial be-
cause of the paradox contained in the phrase. Opponents of de Lubac’s position recognize that
human nature is ordered to Trinitarian communion (in the graced order that God has willed),
and they also affirm that human nature, because of its rational dynamisms, can be satisfied with
nothing less than God (distinct, however, from the supernatural gift of Trinitarian communion).
For opponents of de Lubac’s position, his formulation inevitably implies—despite his efforts to
show the contrary—that human nature as such possesses a supernatural dynamism distinct from
the dynamism of grace, which thereby risks making grace superfluous. The contemporary debate
is too extensive for me to cite here, but see for example Steven A. Long, “Obediential Potency,
Human Knowledge, and the Natural Desire for the Vision of God,” International Philosophical
Quarterly 37 (1997): 45–63; Nicholas J. Healy, Jr., “Henri de Lubac on Nature and Grace: A Note
on Some Recent Contributions to the Debate,” Communio 35 (2008): 535–64; Lawrence Feingold,
The Natural Desire to See God according to St. Thomas Aquinas and His Interpreters, 2nd ed. (Ave
Maria, Fla.: Sapientia Press, 2010); David Braine, “The Debate between Henri de Lubac and His
Critics,” Nova et Vetera 6 (2008): 543–90; Christopher J. Malloy, “De Lubac on Natural Desire:
Difficulties and Antitheses,” Nova et Vetera 9 (2011): 567–624; Edward T. Oakes, SJ, “The Surna-
turel Controversy: A Survey and a Response,” Nova et Vetera 9 (2011): 626–56; Reinhard Hütter,
Dust Bound for Heaven: Explorations in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas (Grand Rapids, Mich.:
Eerdmans, 2012), chapters 5 and 6; Thomas Joseph White, OP, “Imperfect Happiness and the Fi-
nal End of Man: Thomas Aquinas and the Paradigm of Nature-Grace Orthodoxy,” The Thomist
78 (2014): 247–89; David Grummett, “De Lubac, Grace, and the Pure Nature Debate,” Modern
Theology 31 (2015): 123–46.
12. Henri de Lubac, SJ, The Mystery of the Supernatural, trans. Rosemary Sheed (New York:
Herder and Herder, 1967), xi. I have employed the 1967 edition rather than the 1998 Crossroad edi-
tion. The translation is the same in the two editions, with the exception that the Latin quotations
are all translated (by John M. Pepino) in the 1998 edition.
13. Ibid.

138 G a udi um e t Sp e s in Conte x t

“pure nature,” which claims to be able to set forth the constitutive elements
and dynamisms of a hypothetical human nature existing without grace and
without sin.14 This theory, absent among the Greek Fathers and absent also
in the West (according to de Lubac) until the sixteenth-century Domini-
can Thomas de Vio Cardinal Cajetan, rose to preeminence in the Baroque
period, although it was criticized even by some Baroque commentators
such as Francisco Toletus. In the 1920s and 1930s, however, a number of
theologians contested the theory of pure nature, or at least Cajetan’s cred-
ibility, and in the 1950s further theologians did so, building upon the cri-
tique that de Lubac had issued in the 1940s. In his 1908 L’intellectualisme
de saint Thomas, the Jesuit scholar Pierre Rousselot had already pointed
out Cajetan’s error. Still earlier, in the late nineteenth century Théodore
de Regnon recognized that he could (in de Lubac’s words) “find no ex-
plicit affirmation in St Thomas of the concrete possibility of a purely natu-
ral order—remembering always that this means a complete order, bearing
within it its own final end, in the modern sense of the expression.”15
It would seem that if for humans a “purely natural” end or “pure nature”
is not even hypothetically possible, then the distinction between human na-
ture and graced human nature would be impossible to describe.16 Absent a
concept of “pure nature,” how could we know what human “nature” is, as
fully differentiated from grace? De Lubac responds that the answer con-
sists in accepting a paradox. He fully grants that created spirit, as such, is
not naturally a supernatural reality: “The fact that the nature of spiritual
being, as it actually exists, is not conceived as an order destined to close in
finally upon itself, but in a sense open to an inevitably supernatural end,
does not mean that it already has in itself, or as part of its basis, the smallest
positively supernatural element.”17 Certainly, too, human nature has “its
own proper stability and its own definite structure.”18 But, paradoxically,
this does not mean that human nature, as graced, has a twofold ultimate
end—that is to say, a proportionate natural end, identified through the hy-
pothesis of “pure nature,” and the graced end of beatific vision.
In explaining what he means here, de Lubac appeals to the perspec-

14. Ibid., 7. 15. Ibid., 15.

16. Ibid., 15–17. 17. Ibid., 41.
18. Ibid.

Gau d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 139

tive of the Fathers, which he thinks was shared by Thomas Aquinas.19 He
states, “In the old teaching, which remains for us the traditional one, the
argument was based on no such duality of ends. The supernatural, which
always represented God’s will for the final end of his creatures, put no ob-
stacle in the way of the normal development or activity of nature in its
own order.”20 Thus there was never a need to dissociate “the two orders
completely,” because grace permits the activity of nature in such a way
that this activity need not constitute an end in its own right.21 The great-
ness of grace means that it can never be simply “juxtaposed” with nature
(as in the case of two ends), as though nature and grace were “contained
in the same genus, of which they form as it were two species.”22 Grace
is infinitely above nature, and therefore it will not work simply to align
humans’ graced end with a natural end as though we were speaking of
the same kind of thing, or as though humans could in fact theoretically
be perfected without divine assistance. As soon as such a supposition is
entertained, the absolute necessity of grace for human perfection is im-
paired, and the meaning of “beatitude” is naturalized in an unacceptable
fashion. De Lubac’s concern is that setting up a natural beatitude along-
side a supernatural beatitude inevitably flattens the latter, so that noth-
ing “remains peculiar to the supernatural order, except the word.”23 As
examples of this problem, he mentions theories of a “direct natural vision
of God” and of a “natural possession” of God.24
Against such univocal understandings of nature and grace, de Lubac
insists that nature cannot produce a “beatitude” in any way comparable
to the God-given beatitude for which God made humans. For his op-
ponents, he states, “the two series—‘pure nature’ and supernaturalized
nature, or nature called to the supernatural—flowed along parallel chan-
nels in complete harmony. . . . Without anything apparently to distinguish
them, one is called ‘natural’, the other ‘supernatural.’ ”25 On such a view,

19. According to de Lubac, Aquinas never accepted “a completely natural perfection [of the
human person] which can be adequately defined by pure philosophy” (ibid., 49).
20. Ibid., 45. 21. Ibid., 46.
22. Ibid., 48. 23. Ibid., 52.
24. Ibid., 52–53. He credits these phrases, with which he obviously disagrees, to his Jesuit con-
temporaries Pedro Descoqs and Charles Boyer.
25. Ibid., 53.

140 G a ud i um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
grace presents God as the “supernatural good” of humans, whereas nature
presents God as the “natural good.” This distinction involves a merely
nominal difference, since grace has here become a mere parallel nature.
Furthermore, postulating God as the “natural good” or proportionate end
of humans presumptuously offers God to humans through the work of
human nature itself, in a way that patristic thinkers would not have dared
to suppose could be done without God’s own free gift, since (after all)
God “dwells in unapproachable light” (1 Tm 6:16).
What about the distinction between seeing God’s essence (the gift of
beatific vision) and seeing God as first cause (the proportionate end of
human nature)? Here, citing Bernard of Clairvaux, de Lubac questions
whether the distinction can really be effectively conceived in this way.
What would it mean to be blessed by seeing God as first cause, without
seeing God’s essence? Furthermore, de Lubac argues that the fact that our
soul is an image of the Trinity indicates that in the highest aspect of our
humanity, we are made for the enjoyment of the Trinity. The idea that any
human, however hypothetical, could be happy without God’s aid, simply
by the exercise of natural powers, strikes de Lubac as not only mistaken,
but as the source of a false view of the sufficiency of natural morality.
Does this mean, however, that the supernatural (i.e., grace) is required
in justice by created human nature, so that grace can no longer be God’s
free gift but instead becomes merely a requisite of nature? De Lubac an-
swers no: in fact the central problem with the hypothesis of pure nature
is that it leads precisely to a God whose giving of himself to humans is
no longer free, but pertains to a natural order that requires it (the debi-
tum naturae, that is, the debt that the Creator God owes himself in justice
once he determines to create humans). Even if the “formal hypothesis” of
pure nature is “legitimate,” it is so only when devoid of content and when
it points to an abstract “human nature” that is utterly inconceivable in
light of the actually existing human nature that we know.26

26. Ibid., 64. Étienne Gilson, with whom de Lubac was in correspondence and who shared de
Lubac’s concerns regarding nature and grace, likewise feared that “modern Scholasticism” (from
Francisco Suárez onward) focuses on essence (possible being) rather than on existence (actual be-
ing). See for instance his remark in his Being and Some Philosophers, 2nd ed. (Toronto: Pontifical
Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1952), 119.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 141

 If we have only the end of supernatural beatitude, however, this would
seem to entail that our spiritual powers—our intellect and will, which
belong to our natural constitution—have supernatural beatitude as their
end, toward which they (as natural powers, rather than by grace) are or-
dered. If this is so, however, it seems impossible to preserve the gratuity
of grace, since the dynamism toward the supernatural end would be built
into human nature, whose exigencies would be profoundly and unjustifi-
ably frustrated were grace not available. In The Mystery of the Supernatu-
ral, de Lubac seeks to answer this question at length. He argues that in the
task of theologizing, we have to begin from humans as humans actually
are; and this means starting from humans as constitutively called by God
to supernatural beatitude, rather than from possible worlds. As de Lubac
states, “My finality, which is expressed by this desire, is inscribed upon
my very being as it has been put into this universe by God.”27 Given the
kind of creatures that we actually are, is grace (or the supernatural) freely
given? De Lubac insists that this question must have to do not with hypo-
thetical humans who never have existed, but with “the being whose final-
ity is ‘already’, if one can say so, wholly supernatural—for such is the case
with us. . . . [T]here is only one end, and therefore I bear within me, con-
sciously or otherwise, a ‘natural desire’ for it.”28 At our existential core, we
do not wait for knowledge of divine revelation and only then experience a
desire for supernatural union with God. Rather, supernatural union with
God—the vision of God—is the only end for which God has made us,
and since God has made us for this end, we desire it and we would suf-
fer if we failed to attain it. De Lubac comments, “That is why, if I fail to
achieve this which is my end, it may be said that I have failed in every-
thing; if I lose it, I am ‘damned’; and to be aware of such a situation is for
me the ‘pain of damnation.’ ”29
On this basis, de Lubac arrives at the next step of his argument, namely
the task of showing “how, even for a being animated with such a desire,
there still is not and cannot be any question of such an end being ‘owed.’ ”30
Ruling out any appeal to a hypothetical “pure nature,” which has never ex-

27. De Lubac, The Mystery of the Supernatural, 70.

28. Ibid., 71–72.
29. Ibid., 73. 30. Ibid., 75–76.

142 G a ud i um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
isted, is there a way of answering this question regarding whether grace is
owed to the person who naturally desires the vision of God? De Lubac
proposes that we approach this question from the side of God: does God,
having from the outset given humans their ultimate end (beatific vision),
give this beatific vision freely, or is God compelled? Put another way, in
the present order of things, in which we desire to see God and this vision
is in fact our divinely ordained ultimate end, can grace still be a free gift?
Reflecting on this question, de Lubac rejects the supposition that “an end
cannot be given freely for a definite being, existing here and now, unless
there had first of all been a different end for him that was objectively, con-
cretely realizable.”31 He insists that God never willed any other end than
beatific vision for humans, that indeed humans were created solely for this
end and are not (without ceasing to be humans) abstractable from this
end, and that God nonetheless gives the end with utter freedom. Human
finality is deeply inscribed in what it means to be human; if humans had a
different finality, they would not remain the same qua human. We must
not conceive of finality in so extrinsic a manner.
How then to resolve the question of God’s freedom in giving the gift,
if the gift is naturally desired? According to de Lubac, we must recognize
that God’s gift of grace is utterly transcendent; it is not like our gifting,
but indeed the only gifting to which it can be compared is the gift of cre-
ation. Certainly grace must not be conflated with the gift of creation,
since grace is “wholly distinct” and “wholly super-eminent.”32 The dan-
ger comes, however, when we look to creation and see a twofold gift, of
natural being (creation) and of finality (grace): it seems that our being
precedes its finality, which leads both to a false extrinsicism and to an an-
thropomorphic notion of the power of the divine Giver. We should see
instead the radical contingency and freedom of both gifts. God gives no
“exterior” gifts to us; and therefore our being and our finality are given in
a twofold way and (paradoxically) given at once, with utter gratuitous-
ness.33 There are indeed two gifts, but the second gift cannot be rightly
conceived as a mere sequel of the first, as though they were on the same
ontological level. Grace radically transcends nature.

31. Ibid., 88. 32. Ibid., 98.

33. Ibid., 101.

Gau d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 143

 We should also appreciate that the longing or desire for the supernat-
ural present in the first gift (nature) expresses a lack, not a possession or a
natural power. Thus the natural desire for the supernatural “does not con-
stitute as yet even the slightest positive ‘ordering’ to the supernatural.”34
Only grace can order us to our ultimate end, and yet we can long for it
and be inclined to it, even if not in a proportionate or efficacious way. De
Lubac insists, “Man’s longing for God is in a category of its own; we can-
not apply univocally to it any of the patterns of thought which we gen-
erally use to try to define relationships between beings in this world.”35
Since our longing is expressive of a lack, not expressive of a positive power
or faculty (or even an “ordering”), and since this longing “is in a category
of its own,” de Lubac concludes that the natural desire for the supernatu-
ral does not mean that God owes us grace in order to do justice to what
he has created. Contrasting his position with the condemned viewpoint
of Michael Baius, de Lubac holds that created nature can recognize a lack
and express a longing for its supernatural ultimate end, but cannot rise
to the radically transcendent level of grace. Since grace utterly transcends
nature, it cannot be owed to nature. Again, human nature contains “no
slightest element of the supernatural in it,” but the supernatural nonethe-
less summons human nature through nature’s God-given supernatural
finality.36 God’s will is primary, and God’s will is perfectly free in giving
us this summons: “His sovereign liberty encloses, surpasses and causes all
the bonds of intelligibility that we discover between the creature and its
destiny.”37
De Lubac goes on to differentiate human nature from lower natures,
insofar as humans desire the infinite. Humans have a spiritual “nature,”
and so that term (“nature”) needs to be taken in an analogous sense. Our
nature is not stable, but reaches beyond itself, and also reaches lower than
itself. While retaining the notion of human nature, de Lubac seeks to
undermine the view that a spiritual nature must have an end that corre-
sponds to its powers. This is why human nature is a paradox, always reach-
ing above itself without thereby being divine in any way. De Lubac grants

34. Ibid., 111. 35. Ibid., 114.

36. Ibid., 124. 37. Ibid., 129.

144 G a u di um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
that “the idea of a gift coming gratuitously from above to raise up that
needy nature, at once satisfying its longings and transforming it—such an
idea remains wholly foreign to all whose minds have not been touched by
the light of revelation.”38 And yet, God has inscribed in human nature “a
certain innate openness . . . to that superabundance,” a hidden “call within
nature,” “with its roots lying deeper than any tendency or commitment
of man’s free will.”39 Ancient civilizations experienced this, but did not
know how to interpret it. This “call within nature,” since it is not a posi-
tive power, does not compel God in justice to satisfy it; but God placed it
within us because he does will to satisfy it, by raising human nature above
itself. In recognizing divine revelation, humans recognize our “capacity
for God and . . . the ‘natural’ desire corresponding to it.”40
Here de Lubac’s fundamental point has to do with the meaning of the
“obediential potency” for grace that Aquinas locates in humans. The key
question is whether grace is a new finality, opposed to an already present
natural finality in human nature. De Lubac’s argument is that “obediential
potency” is in fact expressive of a “call within nature,” a natural desire, even
though this “inscribed” finality cannot be a positive power in the human
spirit. As a spiritual nature reaching out to an end beyond its powers, hu-
man nature never tends simply to a proportionate end, despite Cajetan’s
effort “to see in the human spirit no more than the human spirit,” capable
of being truly fulfilled (theoretically at least) by a proportionate end.41 It
is a mistake to require of human nature, which is intrinsically paradoxical,
the proportionality (of powers and ends) that Aristotle imagines to hold
for all natures.
De Lubac concludes, “The desire to see him [God] is in us, it consti-
tutes us, and yet it comes to us as a completely free gift. Such paradoxes
should not surprise us, for they arise in every mystery; they are the hallmark
of a truth that is beyond our depth.”42 Our very nature, then, is a paradox.
Faced with two seemingly contradictory truths—the constitutive character
(for human nature) of the supernatural end and its status as free gift—theo-
logians have sought to reconcile the two; and they were right not to drop

38. Ibid., 168. 39. Ibid., 168, 170, 177.

40. Ibid., 179. 41. Ibid., 187.
42. Ibid., 217–18.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 145

the gratuitousness of grace. Yet in de Lubac’s view, choosing between the
two exhibited a failure of understanding, which a better reading of Aquinas
could have avoided. In affirming the gratuitousness of grace, one need not
reject the natural desire for the supernatural. Here de Lubac also discusses
the tendency to see “the call to the supernatural and the offer of grace in
a chronological series, as though the second is governed by the first.”43 If
this were the case, then all humans, given the interior dynamism to the su-
pernatural, would necessarily rise to beatitude. In fact, the offer of grace re-
mains completely gratuitous, and our will remains fully free to reject grace,
even though all humans possess the natural desire for the supernatural.
As a deep neediness rather than a positive possession, the natural desire
cannot be defined more closely except in the light of revelation, even when
evidence of the desire manifests itself (ambiguously) in non-Christian
philosophies or religions. This is so not least because the “desire,” far from
mandating a particular divine response, becomes clear only in the light of
God’s utterly free gift of self in love. As de Lubac remarks, therefore, “such
a ‘desire’, even before the transformation which it must undergo in order
to attain its goal, is different in kind from all the desires of our common
experience.”44 The revelation of Jesus Christ shows that God’s utter free-
dom in love is at the root of everything. Revelation also shows that the
utterly gratuitous “vision of God face to face is the only genuinely final end
for any created spirit, since it is the only end which can totally satisfy its
desires.”45 Yet God is bound by our natural desire, since, after all, it is God
who freely “awakens the desire”: reason alone cannot demonstrate that we
desire the beatific vision (although this desire, de Lubac specifies again, is
natural rather than “elicited”).46 De Lubac remarks that “[c]ertain depths
of our nature can be opened only by the shock of revelation. Then, with a
new clarity, deep calls upon deep.”47
My view is that we must not attribute modally supernatural elements
to human nature as such, and I think that de Lubac’s position cannot
avoid doing this. I advocate retrieving the concept of obediential potency

43. Ibid., 239. 44. Ibid., 301.

45. Ibid., 262. 46. Ibid., 272, 289.
47. Ibid., 282; cf. 294: “revelation cannot help at the same time transforming and completing
our idea of man and his desire, and ultimately, at least if we consent to it, of the desire itself.”

146 G a ud i um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
along lines that differ from de Lubac’s suggestion. But rather than set-
ting forth my own position, I will proceed to the text of Gaudium et Spes,
whose concerns are anticipated in important ways by de Lubac. Even if
the conundrums that de Lubac poses can be answered in ways that dif-
fer from his own solution, de Lubac nicely describes the existential con-
dition of fallen human nature embedded in a graced historical economy
of salvation. When thinking in concrete historical terms (as Gaudium
et Spes does), it is necessary to hold human nature and the grace of the
Holy Spirit together, under the rubric of what all parties agree is our
graced supernatural orientation toward fulfillment in Christ. The salu-
tary insistence that nature and grace ought never to be separated (even
though they can be distinguished) profoundly informs Gaudium et Spes’s
reflections on the relationship of the Church to the aspirations, advances,
and challenges of the modern world. Unlike The Mystery of the Super-
natural, of course, Gaudium et Spes is not seeking to resolve a clash of
philosophical-theological theories. But in accord with the main intention
of de Lubac’s work, Gaudium et Spes makes clear how, in the sphere of
human action (the world), we “live and move and have our being” (Acts
17:28) in the risen Christ, the supernatural source and goal of true human
fulfillment.

Gaudium et Spes
In its opening paragraph, Gaudium et Spes states that “[n]othing that is
genuinely human fails to find an echo” in the hearts of Christian believ-
ers, and so Christians—as befits those who bear a “message of salvation in-
tended for all men”—possess “a feeling of deep solidarity with the human
race and its history.”48 At the same time, Christians are “united in Christ
and guided by the Holy Spirit” (§1). Paragraph 2 observes that “the world
. . . has been created and is sustained by the love of its maker” and “has been
freed from the slavery of sin by Christ, who was crucified and rose again in
order to break the stranglehold of the evil one.” The world, therefore, must

48. Quotations of the preface, introduction and part 1 are from Gaudium et Spes, in Vatican
Council II, vol. 1: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, rev. ed., ed. Austin Flannery, OP
(Northport, N.Y.: Costello Publishing, 1996), 903–1001.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 147

“be fashioned anew” and “brought to its fulfillment” (§2). In paragraph 3,
Gaudium et Spes specifies that since “it is mankind that must be renewed”
and redeemed, the key to the discussion of the contemporary situation of
the world—and the Church’s role in it—is “man considered whole and en-
tire, with body and soul, heart and conscience, mind and will.” Paragraph
3 also notes that, in service to human brotherhood, the Church proclaims
the “noble destiny of man” and affirms “an element of the divine in him.”
When the human person is considered “whole and entire,” one finds in-
serted in the human person an element that cannot be reduced to matter
and that has a transcendent vocation to union with God.
Gaudium et Spes next speaks about “the aspirations, the yearnings,
and dramatic features” (§4) that characterize the world today even more
than in the past. It states dramatically: “Ours is a new age of history with
critical and swift upheavals spreading gradually to all corners of the earth”
(§4). Humans are becoming much more powerful, and yet questions of
how to use this power justly and of how to share resources equitably are
even more pressing. Technological advancement is ongoing but “without
a parallel spiritual advancement” (§4). In paragraph 5, Gaudium et Spes
notes the expansion of the power of the mind due to technological ad-
vancement. We now experience the world as a unity; regions are no longer
cut off from one another as they once were. As a result of these changes,
“nature” (including human nature) is seen as “dynamic” and “evolution-
ary” rather than as “static” (§5). Paragraph 6 addresses industrialization,
urbanization, and the growth of the mass media,49 and paragraph 7 points
out that many young people no longer accept traditional religion and mo-
rality. Paragraph 8 examines imbalances that have become commonplace:
between the practical/particular and the contemplative/whole; between
generations and between the sexes; and between wealthy and poor na-
tions; and between peace-making international organizations and aggres-
sor nations. At the same time, today the human person demands “a life
that is full, autonomous, and worthy of his nature as a human being” (§9).
Given this portrait of modern life, Gaudium et Spes argues that “[t]he
dichotomy affecting the modern world is, in fact, a symptom of the deeper

49. See Vatican II’s Inter Mirifica.

148 G a u d i u m e t Sp e s in C onte x t
dichotomy that is in man himself. He is the meeting point of many conflict-
ing forces” (§10). We are finite and limited creatures, but we have “unlim-
ited . . . desires” and feel ourselves “summoned to a higher life” (§10). Gaud-
ium et Spes calls modern humans to face the age-old existential questions
rather than imagining that humans can build a satisfying earthly paradise or
devise a satisfying meaning of life that excludes God. Among these age-old
questions are “What is man?” and “What happens after this earthly life is
ended?” (§10). To these questions and others like them, Gaudium et Spes ar-
gues that Jesus Christ shows the answer. The Church’s voice should be wel-
comed by the world, because Jesus offers satisfying answers to the world’s
questions. Thus, for Gaudium et Spes §10, it is only in light of Christ that we
can rightly apprehend and interpret “the mystery that is man.”
Gaudium et Spes §11 is the opening paragraph of part 1. The paragraph
expresses the Church’s desire, under the guidance of the Spirit “who fills
the whole world,” to assist the world in finding “solutions that are fully
human” (§11). These fully human solutions are knowable through faith,
which “throws a new light on all things and makes known the divine plan
for the integral vocation of man [divinum propositum de integra hominis
vocatione manifestat]” (§11).50 This “integral vocation of man” is a super-
natural one. From this soteriological perspective, the paragraph then sug-
gests that faith needs to be put into action, helping to purify the values
of modern societies—values that “stem from the natural talents given to
man by God” and that are therefore “exceedingly good,” but that must be
seen always in relation to God. The paragraph concludes that part 1 of
Gaudium et Spes will seek to demonstrate that “the people of God, and
the human race which is its setting, render service to each other; and the
mission of the Church will show itself to be supremely human by the very
fact of being religious.”
Paragraph 12 inaugurates chapter 1 of Gaudium et Spes, on “The Dig-
nity of the Human Person.” Sometimes humans conceive of themselves as
utterly exalted, sometimes as utterly debased. Fortunately, divine revela-
tion teaches “the true state of man” and explains his infirmities, “in such

50. I have modified the Flannery translation here, which reads “makes known the full ideal
which God has set for man.”

Gau d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 149

a way that at the same time his dignity and his vocation may be perceived
in their true light” (§12). Gaudium et Spes then presents the basic com-
ponents of this revealed teaching on the human person: humans are cre-
ated in the image of God, so as to worship God and share in God’s wise
and loving rule over creatures; humans are created male and female and
are made for communion with God and each other; sin alienates humans
from God and each other and thereby turns humans away from the ulti-
mate end of union with God. Sin mires humans in evil, which only God’s
grace can overcome.
Gaudium et Spes §14 explores human nature in more detail. Human na-
ture is a body-soul unity, and the body is good, though both body and soul
are rebellious through sin. Since humans are embodied creatures, through
us the entire material cosmos praises God. We have an immortal, spiritual
soul, which manifests itself through our power to know ourselves, to en-
counter God, and to determine our own destiny by free moral choices. Our
minds have the power to go beyond the limits of sense observation and to
obtain certitude about invisible realities, such as God. We can attain to a
life of contemplative wisdom. We experience within ourselves a law of right
and wrong, conscience, through which we encounter God. We enjoy free-
dom, the ability to choose the good; we can rise above passion and instinct.
Thus far our natural rational powers can go; but to know and obey God’s
plan, we need grace.
Paragraph 18 takes up the problem of death—is death natural to hu-
mans? Gaudium et Spes goes right to the heart of the matter, namely “the
dread of forever ceasing to be” (§18). Alongside this dread, as Gaudium
et Spes says, there is a counter-intuition: “a deep instinct leads him [man]
rightly to shrink from and to reject the utter ruin and total loss of his per-
sonality” (§18). Humans possess a spiritual soul, which Gaudium et Spes
calls “the seed of eternity” (§18). Building upon our soul’s spiritual nature,
we have a graced ultimate end: “God has created man in view of a blessed
destiny” that will not only restore our bodily integrity, but will also estab-
lish us “in the perpetual communion of the incorruptible divine life [in
perpetua incorruptibilis vitae divinae communione]” (§18).51 Paragraph 19

51. I have modified the Flannery translation here, which reads “a life that is divine and free
from all decay.”

150 G a ud i um e t Sp e s in C onte x t
rests human dignity primarily upon our supernatural ultimate end, which
defines all humans from the outset of their existence, even when grace has
been lost by original sin: “The dignity of man rests above all on the fact
that he is called to communion with God. The invitation to converse with
God is addressed to man as soon as he comes into being” (§19). The rea-
son for this invitation to divine communion is God’s love, and humans
can respond to this invitation because their created nature is rational.
Paragraph 19 specifies that to live “fully according to truth” requires that
humans know and love God.
The nuanced discussion of the reasons for atheism that follows in
paragraph 19 make clear that human reason itself—and not solely the re-
jection of grace—is implicated in atheism, insofar as some atheists “try
to drive God from their heart and to avoid all questions about religion,
not following the biddings of their conscience.” Yet, atheism also can arise
from a reaction to unfaithful teaching or practice on the part of believers.
A key point here is that atheism is not the natural condition of human
nature: it “is not present in the mind of man from the start” (§19), despite
the fallen human drive for autonomy and self-sufficiency that makes athe-
ism so prevalent today (as paragraph 20 describes). Gaudium et Spes §21
reiterates some points made earlier, including the point that human dig-
nity arises both from human intelligence and freedom (nature) and from
the call to share in God’s own happiness (grace). In response to Marxism,
it adds that the hope for eternal life does not take away from the signif-
icance of the present life. Paragraph 21 also affirms that “all men, those
who believe as well as those who do not, should help to establish right
order in this world where all live together.”
The final sentences of paragraph 21 emphasize that the gospel message
of grace does not impair human nature but instead bestows “light, life, and
freedom,” since “[a]part from this message nothing is able to satisfy the
heart of man.” Paragraph 21 ends by citing the famous line from Book I of
Augustine’s Confessions, “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our
heart is restless until it rest in thee.”
Building upon paragraph 21’s insistence that only the gospel can sat-
isfy the yearning of the human heart, paragraph 22 states that “it is only
in the mystery of the Word made flesh that the mystery of man truly be-

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 151

comes clear.” This claim echoes paragraph 10’s statement that “the key, the
center and the purpose of the whole of man’s history is to be found in its
Lord and Master,” as well as paragraph 10’s promise to “unfold,” on the ba-
sis of Jesus Christ, “the mystery of man.” It also echoes a well-known state-
ment made by de Lubac in Catholicism: “By revealing the Father and by
being revealed to him, Christ completes the revelation of man to himself.
By taking possession of man, by seizing hold of him and by penetrating
to the very depths of his being Christ makes man go deep down within
himself, there to discover in a flash regions hitherto unsuspected.”52 Af-
ter remarking in Pauline fashion that Adam, the first human, was a type
of Christ, paragraph 22 adds that Christ, “in the very revelation of the
mystery of the Father and his love, fully reveals man to himself and brings
to light his most high calling.” Here we should also recall paragraph 11’s
teaching that “faith throws a new light on things and makes known the
divine plan for the integral vocation of man.”
The remainder of paragraph 22 speaks of Jesus Christ. It observes that
he is the “perfect man” who thereby restores human nature in the fullness
of the image of God, and also, as the incarnate Son, elevates human na-
ture “to a dignity beyond compare.” By dying for our sins and rising from
the dead, Jesus opened up the path of eternal life. Even though we must
die, we have sure hope of the resurrection when we are configured to him
through faith and love. Paragraph 22 notes that Christ died for all and
that all have the same supernatural calling; therefore “we must hold that
the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partners, in a
way known to God, in the paschal mystery.” The unity of the human race
consists both in sharing human nature and in sharing the same ultimate
end (although we can rebel against it). Insisting upon the necessity of
Christ for understanding the meaning of suffering and death, which oth-
erwise would be overwhelming, paragraph 22 makes one final reference
to “the nature and the greatness of the mystery of man as enlightened for
the faithful by the Christian revelation.”
Paragraph 23 inaugurates chapter 2, on “The Community of Man-
kind.” The paragraph encourages all humans to undertake a “genuine fra-

52. Henri de Lubac, SJ, Catholicism: Christ and the Common Destiny of Man, trans. Lancelot C.
Sheppard and Elizabeth Englund (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988), 339.

152 G a udi um e t Sp e s in Conte x t

ternal dialogue” through personal friendships, which require “mutual re-
spect for the full spiritual dignity of men as persons” rather than dividing
humans into some who merit respect and others who do not. Paragraph 24
reiterates that all humans “are destined to the very same end, namely God
himself.” It adds that all have the same end because “they have been created
in the likeness of God” (§24). Paragraph 24 distinguishes nature and grace
when it comes to the Trinitarian and ecclesial communion: Jesus “has
opened up new horizons closed to human reason by implying that there is
a certain parallel between the union existing among the divine persons and
the union of the sons of God in truth and love.” Without revelation, rea-
son could not have known of this deepest sense of communion. Given this
truth about communion, paragraph 24 states that “man can fully discover
his true self only in a sincere giving of himself.” Human nature has to be
self-giving in order to find itself, since love must be ecstatic; and our “true
self ” is found in the supernatural order revealed by Christ.
Gaudium et Spes §§25–28 treat the human person in relationship to life
in society, the common good, respect for the life and well-being of all oth-
er humans, and love for enemies and for those who differ from us (includ-
ing in religious conviction). Paragraph 29 reiterates the unity of the human
race, both with regard to nature and with regard to destiny: “All men are
endowed with a rational soul and are created in God’s image; they have
the same nature and origin and, being redeemed by Christ, they enjoy the
same divine calling and destiny.” On the basis of the equality of all humans,
Gaudium et Spes defends human rights and rules out such things as rac-
ism, sexism, and religious discrimination. It critiques economic disparities
and, in paragraph 30, calls for obedience to social obligations such as pay-
ment of taxes and observance of speed limits. Paragraph 31 commends the
free and full involvement of citizenry in public life, and calls for broader
and better education. Capping chapter 2 of Gaudium et Spes, paragraph
32 explores the communal life of Jesus: Jesus observed the law, sanctified
the bond of family, and feasted with friends as part of “revealing the Fa-
ther’s love and man’s sublime calling.” Jesus sought to restore the unity of
the human race, and he “established, after his death and resurrection, a
new brotherly communion among all who received him in faith and love”
(§32). Just as human nature requires life in society, so does grace establish

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the society of the Church, rooted in supernatural self-giving love and soli-
darity.
Chapter 3, which includes paragraphs 33–39, examines “Man’s Activ-
ity in the Universe.” On the one hand, Gaudium et Spes wants to affirm
the value of human work and of science and technology insofar as they
lead to better living conditions. God created the human race with intel-
lectual ability, and it was God’s plan that we should exercise this ability.
Yet work and advances in science and technology are not ends in them-
selves, but are good only insofar as they serve human goals such as person-
al development, justice, brotherhood, and social progress. Thus, on the
other hand, Gaudium et Spes denies that work or science and technology
can be autonomous from God. This is consistent with Gaudium et Spes’s
understanding of human nature as always related to and dependent upon
God. Paragraph 36 adds that “once God is forgotten, the creature is lost
sight of as well.” The human tendency to seek autonomy from God is a
mark of the sinfulness that afflicts the world. In speaking to the world, the
Church proclaims that human activities “must be purified and perfected
by the cross and resurrection of Christ” (§37).
Indeed, Gaudium et Spes is well aware that there is no natural realm or
“world” that is not profoundly in need of the healing and elevating power
of grace. Paragraph 38 states that love is “the fundamental law of human
perfection, and consequently of the transformation of the world.” Jesus’
commandment of love and his exercise of the power of love by his Cross
are not simply for our spiritual transformation in the life to come. Here
and now, the glorified Jesus at the right hand of the Father is the source of
grace that makes the world a better place: “Christ is now at work in the
hearts of men by the power of his Spirit; not only does he arouse in them
a desire for the world to come but he quickens, purifies, and strengthens
the generous aspirations of mankind to make life more humane and con-
quer the earth for this purpose” (§38). Gaudium et Spes describes various
vocations inspired by the Holy Spirit, some of which are directed toward
focusing attention upon our heavenly goal, while others are directed to-
ward service on earth. In every case, grace inspires a willingness “to put
aside love of self and integrate earthly resources into human life, in order
to reach out to that future day when mankind itself will become an of-

154 G a udi um e t Sp e s in C onte x t

fering accepted by God” (§38). The grace of the Holy Spirit heals and el-
evates our nature so that we can love, and this love is transformative of the
world. Paragraph 38 speaks of this graced transformation as promised and
nourished by “the sacrament of faith, in which natural elements, the fruits
of man’s cultivation, are changed into His glorified Body and Blood, as a
supper of brotherly fellowship and a foretaste of the heavenly banquet.”
Paragraph 39 concludes this chapter of Gaudium et Spes by reflecting
upon how the activities that occupy us in this life are related to the full es-
tablishment by God of his kingdom at the end of time. Does the kingdom
of God undermine the meaningfulness of the works to which much of our
lives are devoted? By no means: grace transforms these works necessitated
by the needs of nature, so that “[w]hen we have spread on earth the fruits
of our nature and our enterprise—human dignity, brotherly communion,
and freedom—according to the command of the Lord and in his Spirit,
we will find them once again, cleansed this time from the stain of sin, il-
luminated and transfigured, when Christ presents to his Father an eternal
and universal kingdom” (§39). In other words, works done in charity will
remain in a transformed way in eternal life, since the works we do for the
building up of the human family will be supernaturally crowned in the fi-
nal consummation. Thus, far from there being a separation of our natu-
ral needs and the life of grace, it is already true that “[h]ere on earth the
kingdom is mysteriously present; when the Lord comes it will enter into its
perfection” (§39).
The last chapter of part 1 of Gaudium et Spes is chapter 4, on “The
Role of the Church in the Modern World.” Paragraph 40 begins with the
point that Christ founded the Church by the eschatological outpouring of
the Holy Spirit, and so the Church has “a saving and eschatological pur-
pose which can be fully attained only in the next life.” Until Christ comes
in glory, members are to be added to his family the Church; indeed the
spreading of this family of Christ, through the Holy Spirit, is the very pur-
pose of the Church (rather than any worldly or secular purpose). These
members, of course, live in the world and share in the movement of his-
tory, and they are called “to be a leaven and, as it were, the soul of human
society in its renewal by Christ and transformation into the family of
God” (§40). Grace does not liberate humans from their natural (created)

Gau d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 155

constitution, nor from their place in the world with its various needs. They
are called to take part in the world and to transform it by the grace of the
Spirit acting in and through them. Paragraph 40 states, “In pursuing its
own salvific purpose not only does the Church communicate divine life to
men but in a certain sense it casts the reflected light of that divine life over
all the earth, notably in the way it heals and elevates the dignity of the hu-
man person” and “in the way it consolidates society.”
To make this general claim more specific, paragraph 41 addresses the
benefits that revelation brings to individual humans by healing and elevat-
ing their natural constitution. In a manner reminiscent of paragraphs 10–
11 and 21–22, paragraph 41 notes that by revealing the triune God, who is
the supernatural finality of human life, revelation “opens up to him [man]
the meaning of his own existence, the innermost truth about himself.”
Much like paragraph 21, paragraph 41 states that “God alone, whom it [the
Church] serves, can satisfy the deepest cravings of the human heart, for
the world and what it has to offer can never fully content it.” Paragraph
41 continues by observing that “man is continually being aroused by the
Spirit of God” so as never to be “utterly indifferent to religion.” This point
stands in sharp contrast to the contention of Cold War Communist gov-
ernments. Paragraph 41 adds, “For man will ever be anxious to know, if
only in a vague way, what is the meaning of his life, his activity, and his
death. The very presence of the Church recalls these problems to his
mind.” Gaudium et Spes is willing to admit that in our fallen condition,
we do not think of God or consciously desire God as much as we should.
The Holy Spirit must stimulate our attention by giving us grace, not least
through the evangelizing presence of the Church.
Paragraph 41 underscores that our fallen nature needs to be humanized;
human nature profoundly needs grace. It promises that “[w]hoever follows
Christ the perfect man becomes himself more a man” (§41). Far from wish-
ing to override the proper “autonomy of the creature,” the Church contrib-
utes to the world by making the world more truly the world (§41). Con-
trary to what may have been supposed when the phrase “the rights of man”
was popularized, the gospel enables and requires the Church to proclaim
“the rights of man” (§41). Paragraph 41 supports the spread of “these rights
all over the world,” even while warning against “all traces of false autonomy”

156 G a udi um e t Sp e s in Conte x t

that would in fact undermine true human rights. Those who hold them-
selves above divine law inevitably trample upon the human dignity of oth-
ers. In this fallen world, therefore, it is the graced “spirit of the Gospel” that
ensures the natural “rights of man” (§41).
While paragraph 41 focuses upon the ways in which the Church ben-
efits individual humans in the world, paragraph 42 focuses upon the ways
in which the Church benefits societies in the world. The Church itself
does not have “a mission in the political, economic, or social order”; the-
ocracy, or the instantiation of any particular political or economic system,
is not the Church’s goal (§42). But this does not mean that the Church,
in proclaiming the gospel, has nothing to contribute in these areas. On
the contrary, the Church undertakes works of mercy and promotes so-
cial unity, not least by its example of unity (enabled by the Holy Spirit).
Gaudium et Spes is eager to emphasize that the Church does not seek to
influence modern societies by gaining an “external power exercised by
purely human means” (§42). Here Gaudium et Spes seeks to show appre-
ciation for the natural order as natural, even if fallen: “Whatever truth,
goodness, and justice is to be found in past or present human institutions
is held in high esteem by the Council” (§42). Paragraph 42 also proposes
that the Church can be a mediating bond between the various social enti-
ties, helping to reduce conflict and to “consolidate legitimate human or-
ganizations.” What the Church requires from societies is freedom to serve
the gospel, as well as a just recognition of “the basic rights of the person
and the family, and the needs of the common good.” This paragraph is
particularly careful to stake out space for natural human institutions, and
to show how the Church can benefit such institutions insofar as they are
committed to justice.
By contrast, the next paragraph (§43) warns against the state’s effort
to restrict religion to a private sphere of personal piety, an effort that is
mirrored in the lives of believers who separate their private piety from
their public lives. Although there are natural institutions, there can be no
natural realm that is separated or isolated from grace. Paragraph 43 warns,
“Let there, then, be no such pernicious opposition between professional
and social activity on the one hand and religious life on the other.” Every
this-worldly enterprise undertaken by a believer is necessarily suffused by

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 157

the power of grace; if not, then the person is not truly in a state of grace.
The laity thus must not imagine that their piety is for Sundays, and that
the rest of the week is a godless sphere. In cases where members of the
laity disagree with each other over prudential matters in the world, Gaud-
ium et Spes reminds such persons that “no one is permitted to identify
the authority of the Church exclusively with his own opinion” (§43). The
key point is that the (fallen) natural realm is precisely where the laity is
expected to manifest the power of the grace of the Gospel, although the
laity also bear witness within the Church to this grace.
Do bishops and priests also bear witness in the world, or is that solely
the province of the laity? Paragraph 43 answers that it is the task of bishops
and priests to prepare and nourish the laity, and it is also the task of bish-
ops and priests to show “[b]y their words and example” that the Church is
“an inexhaustible font of all those resources [virtutum] of which the mod-
ern world stands in such dire need.” Yet, as paragraph 43 goes on to indi-
cate, the Church cannot overrun the legitimate autonomy of the world,
despite the world’s fallenness. Bishops and priests must engage “in dia-
logue with the world” rather than trying to dictate terms on this-worldly
matters (§43). Above all, bishops and priests must foster true unity, in the
Church and in the world.
Is the Church, then, immune to the perils that afflict the fallen world?
Paragraph 43 observes that although “[b]y the power of the Holy Spirit
the Church is the faithful spouse of the Lord and will never fail to be
a sign of salvation in the world,” nonetheless its members include some
who have rebelled against the Holy Spirit. Further, paragraph 43 notes
that the doctrine of the Church’s relationship to the world has developed
over the centuries. In these ways, Gaudium et Spes recognizes the faulty
witness of some members of the Church and of the Church itself in par-
ticular prudential situations over the centuries. The grace of the gospel
is communicated without fail by the Church, and yet the fallenness of
human nature inevitably affects the Church, which therefore is always in
need of renewal.
In addition, as paragraph 44 says, the Church and world should mutu-
ally acknowledge not only each other’s failings but each other’s gifts: “Just as
it is in the world’s interest to acknowledge the Church as a social reality and

158 G a u di um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
a driving force in history, so too the Church is not unaware how much it
has profited from the history and development of mankind.” As an example
of the latter, paragraph 44 mentions the use of Greco-Roman philosophy
in the communication of the gospel. Paragraph 44 acknowledges that evan-
gelization today must likewise involve inculturation, not simply so that our
contemporaries can understand the gospel, but indeed so that the meaning
of the gospel itself can be “more deeply penetrated.”53 The Church not only
employs cultural resources, but also is changed by them in positive ways.
For instance, the development of the Church’s visible form—not a rupture
with the constitution given the Church by Christ, but a deepening of the
Church’s understanding of this constitution and a fitting adaptation of
this constitution to our times—benefits from “the evolution of social life”
(§44). Developments in the realm of reason (nature), including political
philosophy, enrich the community of grace, just as the community of grace
enriches the realm of reason. Paragraph 44 adds that God ensures that even
the opposition of the Church’s enemies enriches the Church.
Is the purpose of the Church, then, to assist the world, and to receive
benefits from the world in turn? No, because the Church truly is an escha-
tological community, awaiting Christ’s coming in glory and the new cre-
ation. The Church’s purpose, which only God can bring about, is the salva-
tion of the world. Any lesser purpose would deform the Church. This does
not mean that the Church does not benefit the world, but it does mean
that all benefits that flow from the Church are rooted in the gospel of the
kingdom. These benefits are not alien to the world, however, because the
world was created by and for Jesus Christ. Gaudium et Spes §45 describes
the incarnate Word as “a perfect man” and states, in accord with para-
graph 41 (and 10–11, 21–22): “The Lord is the goal of human history, the
focal point of the desires of history and civilization, the center of mankind,
the joy of all hearts, and the fulfilment of all aspirations” (§45). The con-
cluding sentences of paragraph 45, which bring to a close part 1 of Gaud-
ium et Spes, emphasize that Christ (with the Father and the Holy Spirit)
is the creative source and ultimate end of all things, “ ‘the Alpha and the
Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end’ [Rev 22:13].”

53. See also Vatican II’s Ad Gentes.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 159

 Part 2 treats various urgent problems of the present day. Chapter 1 iden-
tifies the first urgent problem as that of the status and stability of marriage
and the family—both a natural and a supernatural reality. For Gaudium
et Spes, “The wellbeing of the person and of human and christian society
is intimately connected with the healthy state of the community of the
family” (§47).54 What then are the problems that beset this crucial com-
munity? Gaudium et Spes names polygamy, divorce, free love, “selfishness,
pleasure-seeking and wrongful practices against having children” (§47).
Economic and social conditions, including “problems arising from increas-
ing population,” are also placing stress upon the family (§47).
In response to these problems, Gaudium et Spes devotes five lengthy
paragraphs to setting forth a theology of marriage as rooted in both nature
and grace. Paragraph 48 explains that “[t]he covenant, or irrevocable per-
sonal consent, of marriage sets up an intimate sharing of married life and
love as instituted by the creator and regulated by God’s laws.” The bond
of marriage is not a mere human invention. Rather, the Creator God is its
author, and it is directed first and foremost to the begetting and raising of
children. The sacrament of marriage enables marriage—which otherwise
would be solely a natural bond pertaining to the order of creation—to
be in the order of grace a sign of Christ’s union with his Church. By the
grace of the sacrament, the married couple is strengthened to live out the
responsibilities of marriage and to serve each other and their children in
the path of sanctification.
In making decisions about whether to have more children, the mar-
ried couple should exercise careful prudence while also being “aware that
they cannot just do as they please, but ought always to be ruled by a con-
science in conformity with the divine law, and be docile to the magiste-
rium of the church which authentically interprets the divine law under
the light of the gospel [dociles erga ecclesiae magisterium, quod illam sub
luce evangelii authentice interpretatur]” (§50).55 Gaudium et Spes notes

54. Quotations of part 2 and the conclusion are from Gaudium et Spes, in Decrees of the Ecu-
menical Councils, vol. 2, Trent to Vatican II, ed. Norman P. Tanner, SJ (Washington, D.C.: George-
town University Press, 1990), 1069–1135.
55. I have modified the Tanner translation here, which reads “be attentive to the church’s
teaching authority which officially interprets that law in light of the gospel.”

160 G a udi um e t Sp e s in Conte x t

that the Church’s laws for the transmission of life serve the good of true
married love, despite the sacrifices that couples often face; and Gaudium
et Spes adds that, with regard to the transmission of life, “the moral char-
acter of the behaviour does not depend simply on good intention and
evaluation of motives, but ought to be determined by objective criteria,
derived from the nature of the person and its acts, which take account
of the whole meaning of mutual giving and human procreation in the
context of true love” (§51). Abortion receives condemnation as a grave
crime, and with regard to contraception Gaudium et Spes states simply:
“It is not permitted to daughters and sons of the church who rely on these
principles to take steps for regulating procreation which are rejected by
the teaching authority [magisterium] in its explanation of the divine law”
(§51). Having a large family is commendable, but Gaudium et Spes makes
clear that in cases where the couple are unable to have children, “marriage
remains as a sharing and communion for the whole of life and retains its
goodness [valorem] and indissolubility” (§50).
Gaudium et Spes calls for the state to “consider it its sacred duty to rec-
ognise, protect and advance the true nature of marriage and the family, to
safeguard public morality and to promote family prosperity” (§52). Mar-
ried couples should collaborate in raising their children, and Gaudium
et Spes suggests that it remains preferable for mothers to care for young
children at home, without thereby denying women their proper advance-
ment in society. Gaudium et Spes encourages scientists who are studying
“the various conditions which favour the virtuous control of procreation”
(§52). The section on marriage concludes by urging that married couples
“be united in equal regard, similarity of mind and mutual holiness so
that, following Christ the beginning [principium] of life in the joys and
sacrifices of their vocation, they may become through their faithful love
witnesses to that mystery of devoted love which the Lord in his death and
resurrection revealed to the world” (§52).
Chapter 2 discusses “The proper development of culture,” that is to
say, the proper task of the cultivation, development, and perfecting of “the
goods of nature and values” (§53). The development of natural and social
science, technology, and the modes of communication has produced “a
new age of human history,” and “a more widespread form of human cul-

Gau d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 161

ture” is emerging (§54). Indeed, paragraph 55 holds that the growing sense
of personal responsibility for “building a better world in terms of truth
and justice” means that “a new humanism is being born in which the hu-
man is defined above all in terms of our responsibility to our sisters and
brothers and to history.” How does the Church contribute to this “new
humanism”? Gaudium et Spes notes that a key problem facing the devel-
opment of culture consists in how to unite scientific and technological
growth with the “capacities for contemplation and wonder which lead to
wisdom” (§56), in other words, how to ensure that nature remains open to
the supernatural call (grace).
Gaudium et Spes appreciates culture’s ability to serve the human mis-
sion of “subduing the earth and completing creation” and of “raising the
human family to higher planes of truth, goodness and beauty, and to judg-
ments of universal value, thus further enlightening it with the wonder-
ful wisdom which was with God at the beginning” (§57). But Gaudium
et Spes warns that modern science and technology, by focusing solely on
the empirical, can lead to a reductive agnosticism or to a view of humans
as self-sufficient without God. Even so, Gaudium et Spes notes that such
negative consequences are not inevitable, and it focuses on the positive
dimensions of modern culture, “including scientific study and scrupulous
respect for truth in scientific enquiry, the need to work in collaboration
with others, a feeling of international solidarity, a daily increasing aware-
ness of the responsibility of experts to help and also protect others, and a
wish to improve the living conditions of all” (§57).
In paragraph 58, Gaudium et Spes observes that just as God revealed
himself to Israel—and preeminently in Christ—from within a variety of
cultural contexts, so also the Church has made use of the gifts of numer-
ous cultures in performing its graced task of spreading the gospel. The
Church does not commit itself to any particular culture, ancient or re-
cent, but instead gladly enters “into a communion with different forms
of culture” over the centuries, to the benefit of both the Church and
the cultures (§58). Gaudium et Spes remarks that the gospel “attacks and
dispels the errors and evils which flow from the ever-threatening seduc-
tion of sin” and “ceaselessly purifies and enhances the ways of peoples” by
grace (§58). The Church insists that culture should be directed toward the

162 G a u d i um e t Sp e s in C onte x t
good of human persons and communities, and thus should truly cultivate
the mind and heart by fostering contemplative wonder and “a religious,
moral and social sense” (§59). Approving of the “legitimate autonomy of
human culture and especially of the sciences,” Gaudium et Spes proclaims
that “while observing the moral order and the common benefit, people
should be able to seek truth freely, to express and publicise their views, to
cultivate every art” (§59).
Gaudium et Spes goes on to urge that action be taken “to recognise
and implement throughout the world the right of all to human and civil
culture appropriate to the dignity of the person” (§60). In this context,
Gaudium et Spes mentions the full part that women should be able to
play in every sphere of life, the need for education and for appreciation of
“the collective cultural expressions and activities of our day” (§61),56 the
need for theologians to continually seek better ways “of communicating
doctrine to the people of their time” (§62) in accord with the distinction
between the truths of faith and the manner in which the truths are ex-
pressed, the value of psychology and sociology for pastoral care, and the
need for the Church to appreciate new forms of art and to “receive them
into the sanctuary when their idiom is suitable and in conformity with
the needs of the liturgy” (§62). Gaudium et Spes urges members of the
Church, filled with grace, not to shy away from the world: “The faithful
should live in the closest contact with others of their time, and should
work for a perfect understanding of their modes of thought and feel-
ing as expressed in their culture” (§62). Theologians should collaborate
with scholars in other fields, even while pursuing “a deep knowledge of
revealed truth” (§62). Lay people are encouraged to study theology and
to become theologians, and theologians are granted “a just freedom of
enquiry, of thought and of humble and courageous expression in those
matters in which they enjoy competence” (§62).
Chapter 3 treats economics. Paragraph 63 warns against disparities of
wealth and against the reduction of humanity to economic factors, and it
opposes both unfettered capitalism and socialism. Paragraph 64 encour-
ages the ongoing agricultural and industrial (technological) growth and

56. See Vatican II’s Gravissimum Educationis.

Gau d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 163

creativity needed to provide for an increasing human population. The
pursuit of economic productivity, however, must not lose sight of the fact
that its goal cannot be mere profit but instead must be “the service of hu-
manity and of the whole human person,” integrating nature and grace by
fully “taking into account material needs and the requirements of intel-
lectual, moral, spiritual and religious life” (§64).
The paragraphs that follow make this point concrete. Paragraph 65
urges that all citizens and nations should be included in guiding and con-
tributing to economic progress. Paragraph 66 denounces economic in-
equality, addresses the situation of migrant or immigrant laborers, calls for
professional training for those put out of work by technological advanc-
es, and commends programs for people who cannot work because of old
age or illness. Paragraph 67 demands that workers not be “made slaves of
their work,” but should instead have time for family and leisure, and para-
graph 68 approves labor unions because they give workers an active par-
ticipation in the shared enterprise. Paragraph 69 affirms private property,
but notes that property is ultimately for the common good and so a person
“in extreme need has the right to procure from the riches of others what is
necessary for personal sustenance.” Paragraph 69 also approves of new so-
cial welfare programs with the proviso that such programs not be allowed
to make citizens passively dependent upon society. Nor should citizens
suppose that their own good works are no longer necessary now that so-
ciety is taking on a greater role. Paragraphs 70 and 71 depict investment
and private poverty in a positive light, so long as the common good is kept
in view by those who have resources. Paragraph 72 concludes Gaudium et
Spes’s discussion of economics by stating that “Christians taking an active
part in modern socioeconomic progress, and campaigning for justice and
charity, should be convinced that they have much to offer to the prosperity
of humanity and and to the peace of the world.”
Turning to politics, chapter 4 suggests that the world today has “a
clearer awareness of human dignity” (§73), in accord with the exigen-
cies of both nature and grace. It finds that “there is growing concern to
protect the rights of minorities in any country without prejudice to their
duties to the political community; there is increasing respect for people
professing a different opinion or a different religion; and greater coopera-

164 G a ud i um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
tion is being established so that all the citizens . . . can in fact enjoy their
personal rights” (§73). Political structures that “obstruct civil or religious
liberty” or serve only a particular faction receive condemnation (§73).57
In paragraph 74, Gaudium et Spes observes that the political community
arises in order to serve the common good of individuals, families, and as-
sociations. The political community has its “foundation in human nature”
and thus in “the order established by God,” though the particular form of
government varies according to the will of the people (§74).
Gaudium et Spes discusses the rights and duties of citizens, and states
that “[c]itizens individually and together should take care not to concede
too much power to the public authority, nor to make inappropriate claims
on it for excessive benefits and services, in such a way as to weaken the
responsibilities of individuals, families, and social groupings” (§75). It fa-
vors welfare programs but warns that the state should not become too big
or dominant over the rights of the citizens. It urges that citizens should
combine loyalty to their own country with concern for all nations, that
political parties should serve the common good rather than merely their
own interests, that politicians should not seek their own gain, and that
dictatorship or the permanent rule of one political party should be avoid-
ed. While paragraph 76 notes that the Church transcends the state and
any political system, it also encourages cooperation between the Church
and state, as the Church ministers to the graced calling of human beings.
Although the Church grants the state’s independence, the Church insists
upon its own freedom to proclaim the gospel and to minister to people,
and the Church also insists upon its ability “to pass moral judgment even
on matters belonging to the political order when this is demanded by the
fundamental rights of the person or the salvation of souls” (§76). In its
graced mission of evangelization, the Church encourages all elements of
truth, goodness, and beauty and fosters peace.
Chapter 5 addresses peace, understood “not merely [as] the absence of
war” but as a just order (§78). As followers of Christ, Christians should
“work with all people in order to consolidate peace in mutual justice and
love and to prepare instruments of peace” (§77). Paragraph 78 notes that,

57. See Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 165

in the face of the power of sin, peace does not simply arise from natural
justice and lawful authority, important though these are, but also requires
that people trust one another and respect one another’s human dignity,
which means that peace (as a fruit of grace) “emerges as the fruit of love
which goes beyond what justice is able to provide” and “is an expres-
sion and result of the peace of Christ which flows from God our Father.”
Paragraph 78 adds that even in situations of self-defense where violence
is permissible, persons should strive to avoid violence, so long as this re-
nunciation of violence “can be done without harm to the rights and ob-
ligations of others or of the community.” Paragraph 79 stresses “the per-
manent force of the natural international law and its binding principles,”
and it condemns genocide, with the Nazis in view. It accepts that “once
all means of peaceful negotiations are exhausted, the right of legitimate
defence cannot be denied to governments” (§79).
Detailing the requirements of natural justice among nations, Gaudium
et Spes condemns acts of “total war,” which aim to obliterate whole cities
(§80), and equally condemns the “arms race” of stockpiling nuclear weap-
ons (§81). It calls for the world’s security to be safeguarded by “the establish-
ment of a universal public authority” (§82) vested with power sufficient to
accomplish its aims, and it encourages international cooperation with the
goal of removing “the causes of discord among people on which war feeds”
(§83). With regard to the establishment of a just world order, it approves
of the effort by international institutions to assist poorer countries in de-
velopment and to relieve the “distress of refugees” and migrants (§84). It
advocates the emergence “of a true universal economic order,” which will
require grace to accomplish “the abolition of excessive profit-motive, na-
tional ambitions, the will to political domination, military considerations,
and schemes to spread and impose ideologies” (§85). It argues that the de-
veloped countries should assist “developing nations” especially by helping
them to cultivate their citizens’ economic abilities and by ensuring that in-
ternational trade is set up in favor of developing nations, while at the same
time no development program should be tied to anything that harms the
“spiritual nature and development” of the citizens (§86). It accepts that
governments have the right to address population problems, though not
in ways contrary to God’s law. With regard to methods for regulating the

166 G a ud i um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
number of children, it appreciates “scientific advances that are well proven
and are found to be in accordance with the moral order” (§87). It praises
“those Christians, especially the young, who freely volunteer to bring aid to
others and to whole peoples” (§88). It insists that the Church, as an instru-
ment of God’s grace, “ought to be present in the community of nations in
order to encourage and stimulate universal cooperation” (§89), and it es-
tablishes “an organisation of the universal church” whose purpose will be
“to stimulate the catholic community to the promotion of progress in poor
areas and of social justice among nations” (§90).
Finally, given modern people’s ambition to achieve “a universal fellow-
ship with deeper foundations” (§91) and in view of the Church’s “mission
to spread the light of the gospel’s message over the entire globe” (§92),
Gaudium et Spes urges that human unity be sought not least through the
promotion of “genuine dialogue” (§92). Such dialogue should character-
ize the life of the Church, through “mutual esteem, respect and harmony,
with the recognition of all legitimate diversity, in the Church itself, in
order to establish ever more fruitful exchanges among all who make up
the one people of God, both pastors and the rest of the faithful” (§92).
Here Gaudium et Spes affirms the principle that in the Church “there
should be unity in essentials, freedom in doubtful matters, and charity in
everything” (§92). The unity of Catholics with non-Catholic Christians
must be fostered as much as possible, so as to show the unity and peace
of Christians.58 Likewise, Gaudium et Spes encourages dialogue with “all
who recognise God and whose traditions contain precious religious and
human elements,” and also dialogue with those who do not believe in
God and who may even be persecuting the Church (§92).59 Gaudium et
Spes concludes by emphasizing the need for grace-filled love as the mark
of the Church’s engagement with the world: “The Father wishes us to rec-
ognise and extend active love in word and deed to Christ our brother in
people everywhere, thus witnessing to the truth, and to share with others
the mystery of our heavenly Father’s love” (§93).

58. See also Vatican II’s Unitatis Redintegratio.

59. See also Vatican II’s Nostra Aetate.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o nt ext 167

Conclusion: Gaudium et Spes as an Ongoing
Theological Event
In light of Gaudium et Spes §§10, 22, and 45, Antonio López remarks:
“To the council’s mind, Christ illumines the mystery of man, his truth, by
accompanying him.”60 Although there are different emphases in various
parts of Gaudium et Spes, it should be clear that Gaudium et Spes insists
upon both the created goodness of the fallen world and its urgent need
for the grace of the Holy Spirit through Jesus Christ. The conflicts and
existential threats present even at the height of the world’s scientific and
technological progress show the world’s need for grace. Although there
are “natural” spheres of life that are not governed by the Church, there
is no sphere of strict autonomy from God, since human nature seeks and
desires God as its proper fulfillment and since the true dignity of human
nature can be known only through Jesus Christ.
Like Gaudium et Spes, de Lubac insists over and over again upon the
centrality of Christ for the Church and the world. In his seminal 1938 vol-
ume Catholicism: Christ and the Common Destiny of Man, de Lubac re-
sponds forcefully to contemporary thinkers who argue that Christianity
lacks concern about the earthly conditions of human life and has an indi-
vidualistic piety in which each person is concerned solely with his or her
eternal destiny. He repeatedly emphasizes “the unity of the human race”;
humans are “one spiritual family intended to form the one city of God.”61
It follows that there can be no strict separation between the Church and
the world, or even the Church and non-Christians, because “[n]o one is a
Christian for himself alone.”62
In Catholicism, de Lubac responds at length to those who consider
that the Christian claim to be the perfect religion, the one Church into
which God is uniting everyone, is dismissive of other religions. He em-
phasizes that God’s pedagogical plan, in preparation for Christ’s com-
ing (and second coming), always had in view the salvation of the nations

60. Antonio López, FSCB, “Vatican II’s Catholicity: A Christological Perspective on Truth,
History, and the Human Person,” Communio 39 (2012): 82–116, at 106.
61. De Lubac, Catholicism, 25, 29.
62. Ibid., 245.

168 G a u d i um e t Sp e s in C onte x t
and not solely the salvation of those visibly united to the Church. As he
observes, “Peace upon the world, unity of all peoples in the service and
praise of Yahweh! That is no dream, it is the word of God. No afflictions
and disappointments can ever make us doubt it.”63 Catholicism does not
mean compelling everyone to be Catholic. On the contrary, the Catholic
vision of human unity, toward which the Church works constantly, is an
eschatological one in service of all the nations: only God will bring about
the final unity. Thus de Lubac affirms the need to respect non-Christian
religions, even while also insisting upon the truth that only Christ fulfills
the desires of the human race.
In his The Drama of Atheist Humanism (1944), de Lubac observes that
“the peoples of the West are denying their Christian past and turning away
from God,” and he also perceives—well before many others did—that the
atheism of the 1940s had moved beyond its strictly negative Enlighten-
ment posture and become “increasingly positive, organic, constructive.”64
Its constructive power flows from an anti-Christian posture: it aims to
develop a way of life that has no need for anything belonging specifically
to Christianity. The atheistic movements that have developed around
the ideas of Auguste Comte, Ludwig Feuerbach, Karl Marx, and Fried-
rich Nietzsche seek to remove humans from contact with the Christian
God. De Lubac notes that although man can “organize the world with-
out God,” nonetheless “without God, he can ultimately only organize it
against man. Exclusive humanism is inhuman humanism.”65 This point is
at the center of Gaudium et Spes as well. De Lubac also strives to show
that Christianity is not the path of sleepy and parochial retreat nor athe-
ism the path of bold advance. Rather, Christianity itself contains the bold
element, the God who goes all the way to the Cross out of love for us, the
God who demands holiness of us and who offers us a share in his own life.
Compared to this, atheism is self-contented and self-enclosed; it cannot
truly meet our spirits’ desire for going beyond ourselves, for transcendence
and true life. Thus de Lubac, like Gaudium et Spes, is constantly examin-

63. Ibid., 247.

64. Henri de Lubac, SJ, The Drama of Atheist Humanism, trans. Edith M. Riley, Anne Eng-
lund Nash, and Marc Sebanc (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1995), 11.
65. Ibid., 14.

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 169

ing the world’s concerns and showing the intersections with Christianity.
William Portier has shown that for de Lubac, the Council’s “chris-
tological focus illuminates the question, at the center of much contem-
porary strife in the Church, about how, or in what senses, the world is
graced. . . . The first four chapters of Gaudium et spes make clear that the
world is graced in and through the Divine Word become incarnate in Je-
sus Christ.”66 Portier recalls that in a 1969 lecture at Saint Louis Univer-
sity, de Lubac raised the concern that postconciliar Catholics are again
separating faith from life in the world, this time rejecting not life in the
world (as in the papal response to the modernist crisis) but rather faith
itself. Portier comments that in 1969 “de Lubac saw the christological an-
thropology of Part 1 of Gaudium et spes being separated from the con-
cerns of Part 2 about urgent problems of the world. The ‘world’ of Part 2
swallowed up in a new secularization Part 1’s Christ-centered interior life
in the Church.”67
Arguably, then, de Lubac’s postconciliar writings shed important light
upon the ongoing theological event of Gaudium et Spes. For example, in
his strikingly titled “The Council and the Para-Council,” de Lubac ob-
serves: “Just as the Second Vatican Council received from a number of
theologians instructions about various points of the task it should assume,
under pain of ‘disappointing the world’, so too the ‘post-conciliar’ Church
was immediately and from all sides assailed with summons to get in step,
not with what the Council had actually said, but with what it should have
said.”68 De Lubac particularly has in mind theologians who have misread
Gaudium et Spes, either by reading only certain portions of it or by read-
ing it in isolation from the other Constitutions. According to de Lubac,
such theologians argue that in order to attain credibility with the modern
world and to bring Vatican II to culmination, the Church “must no longer
pretend to interpret the world to us in terms of the Christian faith; she

66. William L. Portier, “What Kind of a World of Grace? Henri Cardinal de Lubac and the
Council’s Christological Center,” Communio 39 (2012): 136–51, at 137.
67. Ibid., 142.
68. Henri de Lubac, SJ, “The Council and the Para-Council,” appendix to A Brief Catechesis
on Nature and Grace, trans. Richard Arnandez, FSC (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1984), 235–60,
at 235.

170 G a u di um e t Sp e s in Conte x t
must cease considering herself ‘as the depositary of the truth’ ” and “must
give herself a ‘democratic structure.’ ”69 Here nature and the world have
subsumed grace and the Church, despite Gaudium et Spes’s intentions.
Along the same lines, in his “The ‘Sacrament of the World,’ ” de Lu-
bac responds to Edward Schillebeeckx’s 1967 claim that, according to the
Council, the Church is the “sacrament of the world.” De Lubac’s con-
cern here is that for Schillebeeckx, “the role of this Church of Christ is
only to ‘manifest’ a ‘progressive sanctification of the world (as a profane
reality)’, a sanctification which seems to take place without her.”70 Schil-
lebeeckx attributes the phrase “sacrament of the world” to Lumen Gen-
tium and Gaudium et Spes, but in fact it is found in neither document.
The key issue, as de Lubac shows, is that for Schillebeeckx the eschato-
logical kingdom appears (in de Lubac’s words) “as the culmination of our
‘earthly expectations’, as their supreme fulfillment and consummation.”71
On this view, Jesus Christ and the Church serve the purpose of reveal-
ing and ratifying what belongs immanently and always to the world in its
history. For Schillebeeckx, according to de Lubac, the nature-grace dis-
tinction is eliminated in a manner that does away with the Christological
integration found in Gaudium et Spes, since for Schillebeeckx nature itself
is already intrinsically graced and Christ simply manifests the inherent
kingdom-dynamism of the world (of which the Church is the sacrament).72

69. Ibid., 257.

70. Henri de Lubac, SJ, “The ‘Sacrament of the World’?,” appendix to A Brief Catechesis on
Nature and Grace, 191–234, at 194. See also Jared Wicks, SJ, “Vatican II in 1964: Major Doctri-
nal Advances, but Also Fissures on Addressing the Modern World,” Josephinum Journal of Theol-
ogy 20 (2013): 4–19, at 17–19. See also the issues raised in Joseph A. Komonchak, “Le valutazioni
sulla Gaudium et Spes: Chenu, Dossetti, Ratzinger,” in Volti di fine concilio. Studi di storia e teologia
sulla conclusion del Vaticano II, ed. Joseph Dore and Alberto Melloni (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2000),
115–63.
71. De Lubac, “The ‘Sacrament of the World’?,” 225. See also the emphasis on the distinction
between nature and grace found, in the same postconciliar context, in de Lubac’s “The ‘Supernatu-
ral’ at Vatican II,” appendix to A Brief Catechesis on Nature and Grace, 177–90. For the nuances of
Schillebeeckx’s anthropological method and account of salvation, see for example Schillebeeckx,
“Questions on Christian Salvation of and for Man,” in Toward Vatican III: The Work That Needs
to Be Done, ed. David Tracy, Hans Küng, and Johann B. Metz (New York: Seabury Press, 1978),
27–44.
72. See also Richard R. Gaillardetz, An Unfinished Council: Vatican II, Pope Francis, and the
Renewal of Catholicism (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2015), 117; cf. 51. Of course salvation
history takes place in the midst of and in dialogue with sociocultural histories. No one disputes

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 171

 In a brief 1968 commentary on Gaudium et Spes, titled “The Total
Meaning of Man and the World,” de Lubac emphasizes the importance
of emboldening the Church to evangelize the world with the gospel of
Christ, since it is in fact the gospel of Christ that fulfills human nature
and the world.73 In Christ, and in cultures transformed by faith in Christ,
true human progress will be found. Rather than imagining Gaudium et
Spes to be a mere embrace of the world, de Lubac argues that Gaudium et
Spes aims to show that “the faith in fact contains the only hope for a truly
spiritual integration of man and his world.”74 Faith in Christ transforms
humanity and the world rather than merely ratifying or expressing an
experiential datum found in the world; the gospel of the Cross requires
repentance and conversion. De Lubac remarks that Christian hope “pre-
supposes a transfiguration that passes through the Cross, and it reminds
us how the Church is the matrix in which this cosmic rebirth begins to
take place.”75
De Lubac is correct that for Gaudium et Spes, commitment to the
Church’s role in history and to the Church’s dialogue with the world is
built upon the distinction (not separation) of nature and grace, Church
and world. Neither de Lubac nor Gaudium et Spes can be classified as dark-
ly “neo-Augustinian” or optimistically “neo-Thomist,” since this would
be to overlook the Christological standard by which both de Lubac and
Gaudium et Spes value and judge the world in its history and culture.76 To-

that point. But the priority of divine revelation (God’s Word) to merely human words, and divine
revelation’s ability to address us authoritatively with judgments of truth that hold across diverse
sociohistorical contexts, is crucial. Otherwise, we simply accommodate the “gospel” (whatever the
“gospel” is, since if its truth does not transcend its sociohistorical context, then it is merely a wax
nose) to whatever socio-historical context we find ourselves in, rather than both appreciating and
critically judging our sociohistorical context on the basis of the enduring truth of the gospel (God’s
Word addressing us). The Barmen Declaration penned by Karl Barth against the Nazis is a central
example of the importance of this point.
73. See Henri de Lubac, SJ, “The Total Meaning of Man and the World,” trans. D. C. Schindler,
Communio 35 (2008): 613–41.
74. Ibid., 641.
75. Ibid.
76. See Thomas Gertler, Jesus Christus—Die Antwort der Kirche auf die Frage nach dem Men-
schsein (Leipzig: St. Benno-Verlag, 1986). For the opposition between “neo-Augustinian” and
“neo-Thomist,” see Michael G. Lawler, Todd A. Salzman, and Eileen Burke-Sullivan, The Church in
the Modern World: Gaudium et Spes Then and Now (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2014), 14.

172 G a udi um e t Sp e s in Conte x t

day, our task is to retrieve the ways in which Gaudium et Spes offers a vision
of the whole world created by and for Christ, a world that, in both its won-
derfully positive gifts and its deep neediness, calls out for the fulfillment
and truth given only by the grace of the gospel. In the ongoing theologi-
cal event of Gaudium et Spes, in which the debate remains as intense as it
was in the early 1970s, the Church must proclaim anew, for the sake of the
world, the Creator who is the Redeemer: “The true light that enlightens
every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world
was made through him, yet the world knew him not. . . . But to all who re-
ceived him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children
of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the
will of man, but of God” ( Jn 1:9–13).

The authors use these terms to replace another deficient polarity, “conservative” and “liberal.” The
misleading character of the authors’ use of their terms is evident not least in their claim regarding the
struggle at the outset of the Council: “The sides were those that had already emerged during the pre-
paratory phase, the Roman classicist neo-Augustinian theologians who had prepared the schemas
for discussion, and the historically conscious neo-Thomist bishops and their theologians who were
critical of the prepared schemata” (Lawler, Salzman, and Burke-Sullivan, The Church in the Modern
World, 19).

Ga u d ium e t Spe s i n C o n t ext 173

T h e Way Forwa rd
T h e Way Forwa rd

C h a p t e r 5

}
VATICAN II
AS AN ONGOING
THEOLOGICAL
EVENT
The Way Forward

This final chapter contrasts two representative approaches to Vatican II as

an ongoing theological event, namely the approaches of Robert Imbelli
and Massimo Faggioli. In light of the preceding chapters, I argue that
Imbelli’s focus on Jesus Christ is the proper way to receive Vatican II as
an ongoing theological event, in accord with Pope John XXIII’s insistent
pastoral emphasis that “the Church should bring Christ to the world.”1

1. Pope John XXIII, Radio Message of His Holiness John XXIII a Month before the Open-
ing of the Second Vatican Council, September 11, 1962, at www.vatican.va (my translation from
the Spanish text). See Jared Wicks, SJ, “Vatican II Taking Hold of Its (and Pope John’s) Council

174
By focusing on Christ as faithfully known and mediated by the Church,
and on the world’s need for Christ as well as the Church’s need to be cen-
tered anew upon Christ, Imbelli avoids the danger—present, I argue, in
Faggioli’s approach—of a historicist reception of the Council, a reception
that undermines the possibility of enduring dogmatic truth and thereby
inevitably makes power relations the central theme of the Council. Im-
belli’s approach illumines the Council’s path to a “renewed discovery of
[the Church’s] vital bond of union with Christ,” as Pope Paul VI described
the Council’s work in his 1964 encyclical Ecclesiam Suam.2 Focusing on

Goals, September 1962–May 1963,” Josephinum Journal of Theology 19 (2012): 172–86. See also Pope
John XXIII’s “Gaudet Mater Ecclesia,” English translation at https://jakomonchak.files.wordpress
.com/2012/10/john-xxiii-opening-speech.pdf. In this important speech on October 11, 1962, at
the solemn opening of the Second Vatican Council, Pope John affirms, “The very serious matters
and questions which need to be solved by the human race have not changed after almost twenty
centuries. For Christ Jesus still stands at the center of history and life: people either embrace him
and his Church and so enjoy the benefits of light, goodness, order, and peace or they live without
him or act against him and deliberately remain outside the Church, so that confusion arises among
them, their relationships are embittered, and the danger of bloody wars impends” (§4). At the same
time, he warns strongly against the false nostalgia that some people have for the past and their cor-
respondingly overly negative view of the present: “These people see only ruin and calamity in the
present conditions of human society. They keep repeating that our times, if compared to past cen-
turies, have been getting worse. And they act as if they have nothing to learn from history, which
is the teacher of life, and as if at the time of past Councils everything went favorably and correctly
with respect to Christian doctrine, morality, and the Church’s proper freedom” (§8). He goes on to
describe the central goal of the Council: “The greatest concern of the Ecumenical Council is this,
that the sacred deposit of Christian doctrine should be more effectively defended and presented”
(§11), for the enrichment of both the Church and the whole world. With an eye to both ressource-
ment and aggiornamento, he adds: “But for this teaching to reach the many fields of human activity
which affect individuals, families, and social life, it is first of all necessary that the Church never
turn her eyes from the sacred heritage of truth which she has received from those who went before;
and at the same time she must also look at the present times which have introduced new conditions
and new forms of life, and have opened new avenues for the Catholic apostolate” (§12).
2. Pope Paul VI, Ecclesiam Suam, Encyclical Letter, August 6, 1964, §35, at www.vatican.va. In
accord with Imbelli’s approach, Gerald O’Collins, SJ (who, like Imbelli, was a seminarian during
the Council, though in Australia and Germany rather than in Rome) describes his “greatest debt
to Vatican II” as the prompting that he received from the Council “to center my theological work
on Jesus in an unqualified way” (O’Collins, Living Vatican II: The 21st Council for the 21st Century
[New York: Paulist Press, 2006], 17). O’Collins speaks beautifully about the Christocentricity of
Gaudium et Spes: “What I treasured in Gaudium et Spes was its capacity to hold together various
themes about Jesus: his role as both creator and redeemer (no. 45), his life, death, and resurrection
(no. 22), his inseparable relationship with the Father and the Holy Spirit (nos. 22, 92–93), and his
vital link with every human being (no. 22)” (O’Collins, Living Vatican II, 17). Indeed, with regard
to the purpose of his Living Vatican II, O’Collins states: “If by this present work, I help readers
to ‘know Jesus more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow him more nearly’ (from a prayer of

T he Way Fo rward  175

Christ as the measure of true reform also enables Imbelli to avoid privi-
leging the contemporary sociohistorical context of the secular West, as
though it embodied the graced future toward which the Church must
now catch up. At the same time, Imbelli does not ignore or dismiss that
context.
I should note at the outset that the alternative I wish to expose is
not between “Christ-centered” on the one hand and “historical” on the
other (since Christ obviously cannot be known outside of history!), but
between a Christological interpretation of both history and the Council
and a historicist interpretation of both history and the Council. The latter
turns the meaning of Vatican II into a mere struggle for power, whether
between neo-scholastics and the nouvelle théologie, clergy and laity, tradi-
tionalists and progressives, conservatives and liberals, and so on. The for-
mer places the focus upon Jesus Christ crucified and risen and upon how
Christ wishes us to share in his life today in the modern world and for
the salvation of the world. Imbelli, who has constantly sought dialogue
and healing among contesting groups in the Church throughout his long
career, makes clear that his Christological interpretation is not a power
play. Rather, Imbelli simply wishes for Jesus Christ, the “bridegroom” and
divine Son incarnate in history, to “increase” ( Jn 3:29–30) in the Church
of the Second Vatican Council.
A Christological interpretation of Vatican II will not put an end to
theological controversies or power struggles, but it will mean that these
controversies proceed on the basis of shared Christ-centered frameworks:
divine revelation through Christ, liturgical participation in Christ, eccle-
sial mediation of Christ, and evangelizing mission for the world’s ful-
fillment in Christ. This is the path that the Constitutions of Vatican II
encourage, and it is the path that the Council Fathers themselves took
in arriving at their teachings. Guided by the conciliar Constitutions, we

St. Richard of Chichester), I will be more than satisfied. I passionately believe that the teaching of
Vatican II can help bring about that happy result” (O’Collins, Living Vatican II, 18). O’Collins dif-
fers from Imbelli (and from me) in his sharply negative view of the encyclical Humanae Vitae and
the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s Dominus Iesus: for the latter, see Imbelli’s “The
Reaffirmation of the Christic Center,” in Sic et Non: Encountering Dominus Iesus, ed. Stephen J.
Pope and Charles Hefling (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2002), 96–106.

176 T h e Way Forwa rd 

should follow this Christological path today for the sake of the renewal—
symphonic rather than monotone—that Vatican II continues to inspire.

Robert Imbelli: Christ the Center

Many leading commentators on the Council have emphasized the signifi-
cance of Dei Verbum. Giuseppe Alberigo, for example, finds it “significant
that Dei Verbum was one of its [the Council’s] major and most telling doc-
uments, and the only one the composition of which lasted through the en-
tire duration of the assembly, from 1962 to 1965.”3 Gerald O’Collins notes
that the four Constitutions provide a “hermeneutical key” to the Council,
and he then asks: “does one of them, as a kind of ‘primus inter pares,’ enjoy
a certain ‘primacy’ over the other three when we set ourselves to interpret
Vatican II and its teaching?”4 He answers his question in the affirmative:
“Many scholars and others have assigned this primacy to Lumen Gentium,
but, given the priority of divine revelation over the doctrine of the Church
(which is derived from revelation), it might be preferable to name Dei Ver-
bum in first place.”5 In support of this view, O’Collins cites Jared Wicks
and Christoph Theobald, both of whom are known for their expertise in
the study of the Council. From a similar perspective, Godfried Cardinal
Danneels has recently remarked: “The Constitution on Divine Revelation
is perhaps the most important doctrinal document of the Council. . . . Ver-
bum Dei, which consumed so much time and discussion, is unfortunately
barely read today. This Constitution is however a pillar for conciliar work
and, from a doctrinal point of view, is the crown of Vatican II.”6
In his Rekindling the Christic Imagination, Robert Imbelli likewise ob-
serves that “not all the documents of the council are of equal weight,” even

3. Giuseppe Alberigo, “Vatican II and Tradition,” in History of Vatican II, ed. Giuseppe Al-
berigo, vol. 5, The Council and the Transition: The Fourth Period and the End of the Council, Septem-
ber 1965–December 1965, trans. Matthew J. O’Connell, English version ed. Joseph A. Komonchak
(Leuven: Peeters, 2006), 592–95, at 594.
4. Gerald O’Collins, SJ, The Second Vatican Council: Message and Meaning (Collegeville,
Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2014), 141.
5. Ibid.
6. Gottfried Cardinal Danneels, “The Ongoing Agenda: A Council Unlike Any Other,” in
The Second Vatican Council: Celebrating Its Achievements and the Future, ed. Gavin D’Costa and
Emma Jane Harris (London: Bloomsbury, 2013), 19–34, at 26.

T he Way Fo rward  177

though we must “appropriate the texts of the council in a comprehensive
way that does justice to all of the documents it [the Council] bequeathed
the church.”7 Holding up the four Constitutions as “the interpretive keys to
the council’s intentions,”8 Imbelli considers that these Constitutions should
be read together, in an intertextual fashion, so as to expose their shared prin-
ciples and thereby to perceive how to interpret the Council’s teachings as a
whole. He finds Dei Verbum to be “first among equals” with respect to the
conciliar Constitutions.9 As he remarks, Dei Verbum has priority because
without divine revelation, the Council could have no real warrant. If God
had not revealed himself, and if the cognitive content of divine revelation
could not be or had not been faithfully transmitted by the Spirit-guided
Church in Scripture and Tradition, then Vatican II’s teachings about the
liturgy or about the Church would be no more than human constructions,
unanchored by any real connection to the living God or the risen Christ.
Imbelli nicely articulates what is at stake: “Unless God has revealed himself
fully through Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit, then the church is without
foundation and the liturgy a merely human construct. Dei Verbum makes
this foundational claim: ‘By this revelation the deepest truth, both about
God and about human salvation, shines forth for us in Christ, who is him-
self both the mediator and the fullness of all revelation’ (2).”10
Imbelli identifies the Council’s two fundamental intentions—united
in a “creative tension”—as ressourcement (the “effort to rediscover, with
fresh eyes, the wellsprings of the faith, in particular the Scriptures them-
selves and the reception of and reflection upon the Scriptures by the early
bishops and theologians of the church”) and aggiornamento (the “in-
tention to bring the Good News of Jesus Christ proclaimed by the tra-
dition into the world of today, addressing the aspirations and concerns
of contemporary men and women in language that speaks to them in a
way both intelligible and pastorally inviting”).11 Both of these intentions,

7. Robert P. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination: Theological Meditations for the New
Evangelization (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2014), xiv.
8. Ibid., xv.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid. See also Eric de Moulins-Beaufort, “Henri de Lubac, Reader of Dei Verbum,” Com-
munio 28 (2001): 669–94.
11. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, xiii–xv. In 1961, addressing a group of the

178 T h e Way Forwa rd 

clearly, depend upon divine revelation, in which the Triune God reveals
himself and his plan of salvation in and through Jesus Christ and the
Holy Spirit. The rediscovery of Scripture and of Scripture’s dogmatic and
pastoral reception in the early Church would be of mere historical import
if Scripture and dogma did not authoritatively teach saving truth about
divine mysteries. Likewise, the communication of the gospel to our con-
temporaries in fresh and inviting ways, with appreciation for the modern
world’s advances and challenges, would be of little use if the gospel did
not teach us truly about the nature of God, Christ, and humanity.
Imbelli then asks whether the Council’s intentions regarding res-
sourcement and aggiornamento have been adequately received, in light
of the ongoing conflicts within the Church today. He grants that “[p]ar-
tial and partisan readings of the council and its documents account for
some of the fragmentation and polarization we have experienced” since
the Council.12 But he emphasizes that if we keep our eyes focused on the
surface-level debates between so-called liberals and conservatives, we will
miss the deeper problem that has surfaced in the reception of the Council.
Put succinctly, a crisis of faith in Jesus Christ, and not mere battles over
liberal and conservative emphases, is what ails the Church today. This
is so especially in Europe and North America, but elsewhere as well. As
Imbelli states, the liberal-conservative partisan battles “are symptoms of a
more severe crisis: an eclipse of the enlivening and unifying center of the
faith. That center is Jesus Christ himself, crucified under Pontius Pilate,
risen and present as Lord and head of his body, the church.”13 The Church

Blessed Sacrament fathers, Pope John XXIII expressed the hope that the coming Council would
accomplish the updating or aggiornamento (an Italian term) of the Church. In his 1964 encyclical
Ecclesiam Suam, Pope Paul VI strongly affirms John XXIII’s hope that the Council would accom-
plish aggiornamento (see especially §50), and he frames aggiornamento within the context of a res-
sourcement that leads the Church deeper into the sources of faith, requiring the Church to embrace
a deeper charity (see §56). Ecclesiam Suam devotes much of its space to distinguishing between
true and false reform and to describing the rationale and conditions of true dialogue.
12. Ibid., xv.
13. Ibid., xv–xvi. In his essay on “Vatican II as an ‘Event’,” in Vatican II: Did Anything Happen?,
ed. David G. Schultenover (New York: Continuum, 2007), 24–51, Joseph Komonchak portrays
the postconciliar situation this way: “Within five years, articles and books began to be written,
some of which enthusiastically spoke of the ‘new Church,’ ‘the Church of the future,’ ‘a new Chris-
tendom,’ while others noted with displeasure what they variously called decomposition, crisis, di-
saster, apostasy, etc.” (Komonchak, “Vatican II as an ‘Event’,” 29). This way of phrasing it can make

T he Way Fo rward  179

is built not by us, but by Jesus Christ, who pours out the Spirit and unites
disciples to his saving work.
The Constitutions of Vatican II are rooted in this vision of the living
Christ, the Messiah of Israel, at the head of his Church and at the center
of all history. Imbelli notes, however, that “in some theological circles, an
odd aversion to affirmations of the uniqueness and universality of Jesus
Christ has taken hold,” and he suggests that this aversion to “the revelatory
primacy of Jesus Christ” is the root cause of the “relative neglect” of Dei
Verbum since the Council.14 In support of his view that faith in Christ is
the real issue in the reception of the Council today, he cites Joseph Ratz-
inger (Pope Benedict XVI), Luke Timothy Johnson, and Avery Dulles.15
Like Ratzinger/Benedict and Johnson, he points to the challenge that
historical-critical biblical scholarship poses to believers’ ability to know
Jesus Christ and to assent to the truth of the gospel—although Imbelli cer-
tainly values historical-critical scholarship. Like Dulles, he notes that some
influential theologians “hold that each religion has its own way of salva-
tion. Jesus may be the savior for Christians, but this confession need not
preclude the acknowledgement of other savior figures.”16 This position, as
Imbelli observes, is fatal for the Council’s “Christic center of faith” and for
the Council’s emphasis on the Church’s evangelizing mission—the procla-
mation of the gospel of Christ as good news for the whole world.17
With beautiful simplicity, getting right to the heart of things, Imbelli

it sound as though those who responded with “displeasure” were made grumpy by the speed of
change in the Church, that is to say by the “event-character of the council” as “a watershed” (ibid.).
Komonchak might add that one cause of concern, for Congar, de Lubac, Ratzinger, and other lead-
ing figures of the Council, was the massive exodus of laity and clergy from the Church, especially
in Europe and Canada.
14. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, xvi; see also Imbelli, “The Reaffirmation of
the Christic Center.” Already in 1972 Yves Congar spoke of a troubling silence about and forget-
fulness of Dei Verbum: see Congar, “Le chrétien, son présent, son avenir et son passé,” Lumière et
vie 21/108 (1972): 72–82, at 80. In 1985, the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops, meeting in order to
discuss the Council, likewise underscored in its Final Report “the importance of the Dogmatic
Constitution, Dei Verbum, which has been too neglected” (The Synod of Bishops, “ ‘Final Report,’
December 7, 1985,” in The Extraordinary Synod—1985: Message to the People of God [Boston, Mass:
St. Paul Editions, 1986], 37–68, at 49).
15. See also Robert P. Imbelli, “The Christocentric Mystagogy of Joseph Ratzinger,” Commu-
nio 42 (2015): 119–43.
16. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, xvii.
17. Ibid.

180 T h e Way Forwa rd 

offers a plan for contemporary reception of the Council: we need to recog-
nize “in Jesus, crucified and risen, the Word of God in person”;18 we need
to confess anew with Dei Verbum that “Jesus completes the work of revela-
tion . . . above all by his death and his glorious resurrection from the dead,
and his sending of the Spirit of Truth” (Dei Verbum §4); and we need to
recall that “revelation,” far from being something narrow, partisan, or mar-
ginalizing, is nothing less than “the joyful realization that in Christ ‘God
is with us, to free us from the darkness of sin and death, and to raise us up
to eternal life’ (4).”19 Jesus Christ, fulfilling in the history of Israel God’s
covenantal promises to make his people holy and to bring blessing to all
nations, mercifully heals, restores, and enlightens us so that we might, in
the Holy Spirit, follow his path of self-giving love and be joined everlast-
ingly to the Trinity in the new creation, whose pattern is love. Imbelli
makes clear that the “Christocentric approach” he advocates is not “Chris-
tomonism,” because “one cannot do justice to Jesus short of seeing him
within a fully trinitarian frame of reference,” and furthermore because the
recognition that Christ is the center entails the equal recognition that “the
eschatological goal is the ‘recapitulation of all in Christ’ (Eph 1:10) in the
Church as the “totus Christus . . . enlivened by the Holy Spirit.”20
Although Imbelli prioritizes Dei Verbum on the grounds that “from
God’s revelation the identity [Lumen Gentium], mission [Gaudium et
Spes], and worship [Sacrosanctum Concilium] of the church proceed,” he
devotes much of his book to Lumen Gentium and Gaudium et Spes.21 His
central argument throughout is that “the deepest ressourcement the coun-

18. Ibid.
19. Ibid. See also Imbelli’s remark elsewhere that “[a] truly Eucharistic grounding of priestly iden-
tity is founded upon the real presence of the risen and ascended Jesus Christ in Church and world.
Therefore, it does not support retrenchment, but engagement, not withdrawal, but missionary ad-
vance. The love of Christ, experienced above all in the Eucharist, impels Christian and priestly exis-
tence” (Imbelli, “The Identity and Ministry of the Priest in the Light of Vatican II: The Promise and
Challenge of Presbyterorum Ordinis,” forthcoming in the Josephinum Journal of Theology). Although
he is speaking here of ordained priests, his words equally apply to the priesthood of all believers. Ger-
ald O’Collins offers four helpful questions or “tests” for receiving the Council faithfully: “(1) a deeper
experience of salvation that comes through real sensitivity to the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit;
(2) a richer experience of life-giving worship in the community; (3) fidelity to biblical witness; and
(4) a generous service of those who suffer” (O’Collins, Living Vatican II, 60), though I would add to
these experiential “tests” Newman’s seven “notes” of true doctrinal development.
20. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, xviii.
21. Ibid., 76.

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cil engaged in was a re-Sourcement: a return to the unique Source who is
Jesus Christ.”22 Beginning with Dei Verbum’s insistence that divine revela-
tion is ultimately centered in a Person (Christ), Imbelli insightfully draws
the connection to the ecclesiology of Lumen Gentium and to the evan-
gelizing mission of Gaudium et Spes: “the church is not a self-contained
institution, but witnesses to what God has done and is doing in Jesus
Christ.”23
It is significant for Imbelli, and rightly so, that Lumen Gentium—
indebted to Henri de Lubac’s Méditation sur l’Église—emphasizes the
Church’s character as mystery and sacrament of Jesus Christ. In this light,
the Church’s “institutional” (and hierarchical) character can be seen for
what it is: an instrument, rooted in cruciform service, by which the Holy
Spirit builds up the Church. When the Church is built up, its purpose
is not power but praise: its goal (and its source) is “relation with Christ”
in Eucharistic worship and mission (Sacrosanctum Concilium).24 True
reform of the Church, then, is a matter of the holiness of all the mem-
bers of the Church (laity, religious, clergy), their configuration to Christ’s
self-sacrificial love in true worship. As Imbelli states, “Entering into the
mystery of the church at a contemplative, mystical depth and thirsting for
the transformative holiness to which Christ summons the whole people
of God—lay women and men, religious, priests, bishops (the universal
call to holiness!)—is the royal road to the reform of the church.”25 Im-
belli makes clear, as I have also sought to do in the preceding chapters,
that a necessary part of reading and receiving Vatican II is to thirst for
transformation and conversion of heart, so that we no longer use and
22. Ibid., 79.
23. Ibid., 78.
24. Ibid., 79. See Christopher Ruddy, “ ‘In my end is my beginning’: Lumen Gentium and the
Priority of Doxology,” Irish Theological Quarterly 79 (2014): 144–64.
25. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, 80. The emphasis on “mystical, contemplative
depth” is a trademark of Imbelli’s work. For background to Imbelli’s perspective, see Frans Jozef van
Beeck, SJ’s remark: “The mystic leads the Church to trust the deeper source of unity: One Father,
one Lord, one Holy Spirit—Triune Source of the varieties of energies, services, and gifts. . . . Only
the mystic knows God, that is to say, he or she desires to be known by God, and so he or she loves”
(van Beeck, Catholic Identity after Vatican II: Three Types of Faith in the One Church [Chicago:
Loyola University Press, 1985], 66–67). Van Beeck concludes that “the Catholic faith and identity
experience after Vatican II stands to gain decisively from liturgical spirituality” (Van Beeck , Catho-
lic Identity, 67).

182 T h e Way Forwa rd 

abuse our neighbors or ourselves, and so that our hearts and minds are
filled in Christ with the grace of the Holy Spirit. According to Lumen
Gentium, as Imbelli points out, the model of such holiness is Mary, pre-
cisely because of her intimate relationship with her Son and her unique
participation in his work: “Of all the members of the church, Mary has
lived most intimately and fully the mystery of the church, the sacrament
of the paschal mystery of her Son.”26 Thus Imbelli identifies “Christifica-
tion,” the participation of Christians in the very life of Christ, as the cen-
tral theme—including the central ecclesiological theme—of Vatican II.27
Given Imbelli’s salutary insistence upon the centrality of Christ, he
resists separating the “pastoral” from the “dogmatic,” without thereby
denying the distinction. As he shows, Gaudium et Spes contains many
dogmatic elements, and Lumen Gentium many pastoral ones (not least
the universal call to holiness).28 The justice, peace, and dialogue that the
Church in the world seeks are, on Imbelli’s reading, inseparable from
the light of the salvation won by the crucified and risen Christ, as can be
seen not least in Gaudium et Spes §22’s teaching that Christ reveals the
source, nature, and fulfillment of humankind. God’s grace is available
to all persons, yet “all grace is paschal, and, therefore, Christic.”29 When
Christ is excluded from the world, the world suffers, because even in our
most mundane activities we need the healing from sin and the elevation
to eternal life that Christ brings. Imbelli summarizes: “The church’s only
goal, the council claims, is that the reign of God may come and that the
salvation of humankind may be realized.”30 The Church works to serve
this goal, but only Christ can bring it about, since indeed the goal is none
other than everlasting union with Christ that fulfills every human desire

26. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, 82.

27. Ibid., 83.
28. For the link between “pastoral” and “doctrinal” (and the distinction of both from “dog-
matic”), see Yves Congar, OP, “A Last Look at the Council,” in Vatican II Revisited by Those Who
Were There, ed. Alberic Stacpoole, OSB (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1986), 337–58, at 345–48.
For the French version of this essay, see Congar’s Le Concile de Vatican II. Son église: Peuple de Dieu
et corps du Christ (Paris: Beauchesne, 1984), 49–72. See also the Synod of Bishops, “Final Report,”
in The Extraordinary Synod—1985, 41: “It is not licit to separate the pastoral character from the
doctrinal vigor of the documents.”
29. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, 86.
30. Ibid., 87.

T he Way Fo rward  183

for wisdom, love, and joy. After quoting Pope Benedict XVI and Pope
Francis (and noting the debt of both to de Lubac), Imbelli concludes,
“Unless united intimately to Jesus on the one Way he has shown, the Way
who he himself is, the church inevitably goes astray.”31 That this fact is at
the heart of Vatican II’s Constitutions has also been the theme of my own
book.

Massimo Faggioli: Historical Consciousness

and Ecclesiastical Decentralization
In his recent essay “Vatican II: The History and the Narratives,” the Vati-
can II scholar Massimo Faggioli notes that “after Vatican II, the Catholic
Church took unambiguous steps to help Catholics remember the coun-
cil,” such as Pope Paul VI’s decision “to collect and publish the proceed-
ings of the plenary congregations celebrated in the Basilica of St. Peter,
the different schemas in the redaction history of each final conciliar docu-
ment, and the minutes of the conciliar and preconciliar commissions.”32

31. Ibid., 88. Already in 1964, de Lubac wrote: “Reform, aggiornamento, openness to the
world, ecumenism, religious freedom, and so on: that is all to be understood within the faith, as a
present requirement of the purified and deepened Christian spirit. Now all that, distorted, is nearly
equivalent in the mind of many to carelessness, indifference, amorphous liberalism, concessions to
the ‘spirit of the world’ and almost an abandonment of faith and of morals. I well know that this
is in part the effect of propaganda coming from opposition that is bent on presenting things that
way. But doesn’t the language of many of the partisans of aggiornamento also contribute to it? They
speak, for example, of ‘conservatives’ and ‘progressives’; greater emphasis on a return to traditional
positions (on the Church, on Revelation, and so forth) is presented as the victory of new ideas; few
serious efforts are made to explain in the press the principal subjects treated or to justify the ori-
entations adopted: even all the Catholic journalists whom I had occasion to read declared, on the
day the discussion of de Revelatione was opened, that the Council was entering into ‘ultra-technical
questions’, thereby discouraging readers from taking an interest in it, even though this subject is the
source and center of our faith. On the contrary, what would have been simpler, or more necessary,
than to remind everyone of the proclamation of the Good News through the revelation of God in
Jesus Christ, the essential subject of this schema” (de Lubac, At the Service of the Church: Henri de
Lubac Reflects on the Circumstances That Occasioned His Writings, trans. Anne Elizabeth Englund
[San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993], 340–41). See also Matthew L. Lamb, “Vatican II after Fifty
Years: The Virtual Council versus the Real Council,” in The Second Vatican Council: Celebrating Its
Achievements and the Future, 7–17.
32. Massimo Faggioli, “Vatican II: The History and the Narratives,” in 50 Years On: Probing the
Riches of Vatican II, ed. David G. Schultenover (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2015), 61–81,
at 62. This essay appeared earlier in Theological Studies. Note that, of the minutes of Commissions’
meetings, only those of the Central Preparatory Commission have appeared in print, but the Vati-

184 T h e Way Forwa rd 

Faggioli appreciates the Church’s original and indeed “continuing trust in
the community of scholars of Vatican II.”33 By this community of schol-
ars, Faggioli means professional Church historians with specific expertise
in the Second Vatican Council. Although Imbelli was in Rome during the
four conciliar years as a seminarian, and although Imbelli has an extensive
knowledge of the Council’s texts, he would not claim that he is a histo-
rian, nor does he analyze the Constitutions of Vatican II from the per-
spective of the historical formation of the texts. Since Imbelli freely reads
the Council’s texts through the lens of later papal teaching (for example,
Pope Benedict and Pope Francis), it may seem that Imbelli’s Christocen-
tric interpretation of the Constitutions has been ahistorically shaped by
“a particular ‘institutional interpretation’ of the council,” given (in Fag-
gioli’s words) “the organizational dominance of one center of power [the
Vatican] that announces the event, manages it, and after its ending deter-
mines the process of the event’s evaluation and concretization of its reso-
lutions.”34
In fact, Faggioli warns in sharp terms against the rise, since the 1980s,
of unapologetically (even proudly!) ahistorical readings of the Council’s
documents. He remarks, “What we have seen emerge in the last few de-
cades is a new prominence for narratives about Vatican II and the shape of
contemporary Catholicism that take no account of the historical research
on the council produced during this same period. We are left with narra-
tives innocent of historical studies and even inimical to them.”35 Faggioli
points out that at the very same time (1985) that the Extraordinary Synod
issued its authoritative interpretative lens for the Council—emphasizing
the “ecclesiology of communion”36—Giuseppe Alberigo began his mas-
sive five-volume project of surveying the history of Vatican II. The 1985
Extraordinary Synod taught that a “deeper reception of the Council” is
needed, and the Synod proposed that this “deeper reception,” one that
gets to the real heart of the Council as both a historical and an ongo-

can Archives’ vast holdings of all the rest is, by Paul VI’s decision, open to scholars and not limited
by the normal time limits of the Archive.
33. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 62. 34. Ibid., 63.
35. Ibid., 64.
36. The Synod of Bishops, “Final Report,” in The Extraordinary Synod—1985, 54.

T he Way Fo rward  185

ing event, should be undertaken by giving hermeneutical primacy to the
four Constitutions and by refusing to disjoin either the doctrinal from
the pastoral, or the spirit from the letter.37 As we saw, Imbelli reiterates
and confirms the urgency of precisely this approach, which I follow in
this book.38 But in Faggioli’s view, it is the particular historical approach
exemplified by Alberigo that will in fact lead to a deeper reception of the
Council. Faggioli bemoans “the gap between Catholic church historians
on one side (and historians of the councils in particular) and theologians,
magisterium, and ‘secular historians’ on the other side.”39
This gap, Faggioli contends, has led to the flourishing of misleading
macronarratives and subnarratives about the Council. He first describes
the traditionalist narrative, which he finds to have become increasingly
influential under the pontificate of Benedict XVI. He then summarizes
the liberal narrative, represented by Hans Küng. Thirdly, he treats the
neoconservative narrative that in his view combines aspects of “the ultra-
traditionalist and the ultraliberal” and is found in the writings of George
Weigel, Richard John Neuhaus, and Michael Novak. After his critique
of these metanarratives, Faggioli puts forward one that he favors, which
builds upon the distinction (in my view a deeply ahistorical one) that
some scholars have made between the “Thomistic” Karol Wojtyła and the
37. Ibid., 41. For a largely appreciative response to the 1985 Extraordinary Synod’s Final Re-
port, see Avery Dulles, SJ, “The Reception of Vatican II at the Extraordinary Synod of 1985,” in
The Reception of Vatican II, ed. Giuseppe Alberigo, Jean-Pierre Jossua, and Joseph A. Komonchak
(Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1987), 349–63. See also the essays in
Synod 1985: An Evaluation, ed. Giuseppe Alberigo and James Provost (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark,
1986), especially Jean-Marie Tillard, OP’s generally positive “Final Report of the Last Synod,” 64–
77 and Avery Dulles, SJ’s “Catholic Ecclesiology since Vatican II,” 3–13.
38. Yves Congar, too, emphasizes the centrality of “communion” for the Council: see his
“Moving Towards a Pilgrim Church,” in Vatican II Revisited by Those Who Were There, 129–52, at
136–37. With regard to the mystery of the Church, Congar states that “the most suitable concept
is undoubtedly that of ‘communion’ and Paul VI loved it. I well remember the way in which he
spoke to me about it, quoting from J. Hamer’s book, The Church is a communion (1962)! It is true,
of course, that the Council did not go as far as it might have gone in working out this idea. As
Antonio Acerbi has pointed out, it retained some elements of a juridical ecclesiology” (ibid., 136).
Congar adds, “ ‘Communion’ is a key concept in the ecumenism of Vatican II and Paul VI contin-
ued to use it again and again after the Council” (ibid., 137). Congar goes on to note approvingly
that the concept of a hierarchical, unequal society “was not rejected by Paul VI, the Council or the
post-conciliar Church. On the contrary, they reaffirmed it. They did not, however, regard it as of
first importance or as the door by which one had to enter ecclesiology” (ibid., 141).
39. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 65.

186 T h e Way Forwa r d 

“Augustinian” Joseph Ratzinger. Faggioli argues that the Church’s official
reception of the Council since 1978 has been “characterized by two par-
tially conflicting visions: John Paul II’s fundamentally positive view of the
council and Ratzinger’s decidedly pessimistic reading of the post–Vati-
can II period. This ‘dialogue’ of interpretations—at the beginning under
some control of the pope [ John Paul II]—gradually ceded place to Ratz-
inger’s views.”40
It quickly becomes clear that in Faggioli’s view, Ratzinger/Benedict’s
vision, beloved of Imbelli, is in fact at the service of the American neo-
conservative distortion of the Council, which Faggioli warns has roots
in “recent converts to Catholicism” who use Catholicism for their own
political ends.41 In response, Faggioli promotes the “historicization” of
Vatican II achieved by Alberigo, a historicization that works at two levels:
to ward off apologetic or reactionary metanarratives, and to contribute
to the historicizing of the Church’s doctrinal, moral, and scriptural tradi-
tion. Admittedly, Alberigo’s five principles of interpretation do not them-
selves explicitly advocate “historicization.” Faggioli lists the five principles
as the “event” character of the Council, Pope John XXIII’s intention for
the Council, the pastoral goal of the Council, aggiornamento as the “key
goal” of the Council, and the conciliar compromises among theological
schools.
Faggioli is more explicit in his Pope Francis: Tradition in Transition.
After rejecting “the simplistic myth of the ‘anticonciliar’ Joseph Ratzing-
er,” he goes on to attack Benedict XVI’s “fundamentally pessimistic Au-
gustinian anthropology, a world view that sees the world and the Church
as two forces in opposition,” by sharp contrast to Gaudium et Spes.42
Faggioli warns against thinking of the Council in terms of “continuity”
with Tradition, an approach associated with Ratzinger/Benedict as well

40. Ibid., 71.

41. Ibid. The implicit questioning of the sincerity of the faith of such persons as Richard John
Neuhaus strikes me as unfortunate and wrong. If one removes the ad hominem attack, moreover,
the Catholic “neoconservatives” in America seem more closely aligned to Pope John Paul II than to
Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI, as shown by Caritatis in Veritate’s (2009) differences from
Centesimus Annus (1991), for example.
42. Massimo Faggioli, Pope Francis: Tradition in Transition, trans. Sean O’Neill (New York:
Paulist Press, 2015), 23.

T he Way Fo rward  187

as with figures such as Yves Congar and Avery Dulles.43 Faggioli suggests
that both before and after Vatican II, the Church has always been in con-
stant change, and so the very notion of “continuity” requires an ideal or
ahistorical history that has never existed, by contrast to the historicist his-
tory that actually exists.44
In his “Vatican II: The History and the Narratives,” Faggioli grants
that more than historical studies are needed for understanding a Council.

43. See, for example, Congar, “A Last Look at the Council,” 351; Congar, “Moving Towards a
Pilgrim Church,” 129; Avery Dulles, SJ, “The Reception of Vatican II at the Extraordinary Synod
of 1985,” appendix to The Reception of Vatican II, ed. Giuseppe Alberigo, Jean-Pierre Jossua, and
Joseph A. Komonchak, trans. Matthew J. O’Connell (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University
of America Press, 1987), 349–63, at 350; Dulles, “Nature, Mission, and Structure of the Church,”
in Vatican II: Renewal within Tradition, ed. Matthew L. Lamb and Matthew Levering (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2008), 25–36; Pope Benedict XVI, “A Proper Hermeneutic for the Sec-
ond Vatican Council,” in Vatican II: Renewal within Tradition, ix–xv, at xi; excerpted from Pope
Benedict XVI’s December 22, 2005 address to the Roman Curia, “Ad Roman Curiam ob omnia
natalicia,” Acta Apostolicae Sedis 98 (6 January 2006): 40–53. Dulles concludes, “The teaching of
Vatican II on the nature, mission, and structures of the Church should by rights have brought
about a peaceful consensus within the Church and launched a new era of confident evangelization.
In point of fact the council was followed by several decades of contestation, polarization, and con-
fusion. Often enough, dissenters tried to justify their stance by appealing to Vatican II, as though it
had broken sharply with the past and ushered in a new era of critical thinking and innovation. Such
appeals to the council were hollow and unwarranted. With a sounder hermeneutic, it may still be
possible to retrieve the council’s actual teaching. If so, the Church may appear more radiantly as the
sacrament of Christ, who remains forever the light of the nations” (Dulles, “Nature, Mission, and
Structure of the Church,” 34–35). See also Peter Walter’s study, “Kontinuität oder Diskontinuität?
Das II. Vaticanum im Kontext der Theologiegeschichte,” in Das II. Vatikanische Konzil und die
Wissenschaft der Theologie, ed. Ansgar Kreutzer and Günther Wassilowsky (Frankfurt: Peter Lang,
2014), 11–31.
44. For Congar, change does not negate continuity: “Vatican II was intentionally in continu-
ity with the previous councils of the Church and with Tradition. Paul VI himself insisted on its
continuity with Vatican I. As every historian knows, everything is always changing and at the same
time there is in many ways a deep continuity” (Congar, “Moving Towards a Pilgrim Church,” 129).
Although the Church often breaks with aspects of its past, the issue is whether such breaks involve
a false teaching that was previously taught authoritatively, as part of the deposit of faith, by the
Magisterium. For the latter view, which I find unpersuasive, see for example Francis Oakley, “His-
tory and the Return of the Repressed in Catholic Modernity: The Dilemma Posed by Constance,”
in The Crisis of Authority in Catholic Modernity, ed. Michael J. Lacey and Francis Oakley (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2011), 29–56, especially 46–49. See also along the same lines Terrence W.
Tilley’s Inventing Catholic Tradition (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2000) and Edward Schille-
beeckx, OP’s Church: The Human Story of God, trans. John Bowden (New York: Crossroad, 1993),
as well as Daniel Speed Thompson, The Language of Dissent: Edward Schillebeeckx on the Crisis of
Authority in the Catholic Church, with a Foreword by Edward Schillebeeckx, OP (Notre Dame,
Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2003). See also, on the relationship of change and continu-
ity, Paul VI’s important 1976 letter to Archbishop Lefebvre.

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He argues, however, that the problem is that the metanarratives—such as
Ratzinger/Benedict’s—have wrongly become “detached from the kind of
historical studies dedicated to the councils and cultivated by the church
that celebrated them.”45 Here he specifically has in mind Alberigo’s histori-
ography. Making negative reference to Agostino Marchetto, he warns that
“[a]lready in 1997 members of the entourage of the Roman Curia, feeling
more secure in the decline of John Paul II’s pontificate, began expressing
more vocally their prior criticism of the volumes of History of Vatican II
edited by Giuseppe Alberigo, because History of Vatican II challenged their
favorite narrative.”46 After the papal election of Joseph Ratzinger, this vo-
cal criticism grew even stronger. Faggioli explains that the “initially quiet
reaction against the international, multiauthored, and respected historio-
graphical work on Vatican II (polemically labelled ‘the Bologna School’)
became gradually more visible over time and especially after 2005.”47 For-
tunately, says Faggioli, no serious historians criticized Alberigo’s work, and
so the criticism “never acquired a real scholarly standing as an alternative
to the international research on Vatican II.”48 Even so, during the pontifi-
cate of Pope Benedict, “Catholic ultratraditionalist intellectuals, ideologi-

45. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 77.

46. Ibid. See Agostino Marchetto, The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council: A Counterpoint for
the History of the Council, trans. Kenneth D. Whitehead (Scranton, Penn.: University of Scranton
Press, 2010). Marchetto’s book amply demonstrates the theological perspectives present in the his-
toriography of the Council, including in Alberigo’s volumes. Indeed, we should expect that works
of Church history will be colored by particular theological perspectives, and whenever the pres-
ence of such perspectives is denied, we should worry. Here I agree with Joseph Komonchak that
“the question of how the Church ought to be at once faithful to Christ and an effective sign and
instrument of him in the world or worlds of today continues. It is only natural that disagreements
about these matters will affect one’s initial interest in the council, the questions one asks, the ele-
ments one assembles in order to answer them, the story one decides to tell, and, above all, one’s
evaluation of the conciliar event. I do not believe that there is any way in which these larger issues
can be wiped from a historian’s mind, nor do I think that anything but a purely mythical ideal of
‘presuppositionless history’ should require one to try to do so. But I do think that it might help
if we were to acknowledge that the last thing to which I referred above—the evaluation of the
council—represents a different level of the historian’s existential involvement in his project and
that gross differences on this level will not be resolved by the same criteria by which the historian
attempts to say ‘what really happened at Vatican II.’ It is too much to expect that mere history will
suffice to overcome those differences, which have other causes and require other solutions” (Ko-
monchak, “Vatican II as an ‘Event’,” 44–45).
47. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 77–78.
48. Ibid., 78.

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cally much closer to the Lefebvrites than to the Roman ‘official’ interpreta-
tion of Vatican II as an event of ‘continuity and reform,’ have been given
honors and venues by prelates of the Roman Curia.”49
While complaining that the historians by whom he was trained have
not been appreciated for their even-handed historiography, Faggioli at the
same time does not hesitate to show his own theological positions, in a
manner that is in tension with his ideal of a normatively objective histo-
riography. He criticizes the centralizing tendencies of the pontificates of
John Paul II and Benedict XVI (who had not yet resigned at the time Fag-
gioli first published his “Vatican II” essay). He states, “So many expecta-
tions regarding the power of Vatican II to reform the church have been
disappointed, such that it has become easy for the ones who never believed
in Vatican II as a real reform council to blame it for what happened after
Vatican II.”50 On this view, “what happened after Vatican II” is considered
blameworthy by those who, Faggioli thinks, actually “never believed in
Vatican II as a real reform council”—while at the same time Vatican II’s
real reforms were never implemented or barely implemented (thus pro-
ducing the disappointment “regarding the power of Vatican II to reform
the church”). Here Faggioli does not pause to define what “reform” would
mean in terms of Vatican II’s own teachings; instead he seems to take it for
granted that the Council’s “real reform” must be political in nature.
Faggioli’s position raises two concerns. First, the way that he speaks
about Vatican II’s goal of reform does not touch upon the cruciform char-
ity that Imbelli identifies as the center of Vatican II’s call for “Christifica-
tion.” Certainly, as Imbelli recognizes, Vatican II promoted reforms in the
Church’s institutional power relations. But to describe the “reform” advo-
cated by Vatican II fundamentally in terms of power rather than funda-
mentally in terms of cruciform love suggests that one has not adequately
apprehended the centrality of Christ for Vatican II. Second, Faggioli’s es-
say warns about “the escalating risk of leaving church history, and espe-
cially Vatican II, in the hands of ‘theological pundits’ (journalists in the
best of cases; bloggers in the worst) whose agenda is far more influenced

49. Ibid. He does not name these intellectuals, but he points the reader to Giovanni Miccoli’s
La chiesa dell’anticoncilio: I tradizionalisti alla riconquista di Roma (Rome: Laterza, 2011), 234–334.
50. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 79.

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by nontheological factors.”51 Opposed to this nontheological or ideologi-
cally theological punditry, Faggioli sets the work of Alberigo and also his
own work. He puts Alberigo’s work, and the work of those whose ap-
proaches accord with Alberigo’s, beyond the ability of non-historians to
criticize. For Faggioli, the real experts on Vatican II must not be criticized
by theologians who lack historical expertise in the field of Vatican II his-
toriography, because “[a]ll the experts know that there is no trustworthy
alternative, at least so far, to the history of Vatican II written in the last 20
years and represented by Alberigo, Komonchak, and O’Malley.”52
Of course, the most prominent theologian criticizing the basic ap-
proach that Faggioli adopts has been Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI.53
This is no mere journalist or blogger, ignorant of the real history of the
Council, let alone a mere “pundit.” As we have seen, however, Faggioli
identifies Ratzinger with the promotion of the American neoconservative
metanarrative, and Faggioli responds sharply (though implicitly) to Pope
Benedict XVI’s 2005 suggestion that the historiography of Vatican II
has been taken over by theorists of doctrinal rupture. Faggioli states that
“church historians have been accused of ‘discontinuism,’ of being unin-
terested in the tradition, that is, in Catholicism’s past. But it is clear now,
at 50 years from the opening of Vatican II, that those not interested in
recovering the past—as well as tradition in its entirety—are actually the

51. Ibid., 80.

52. Ibid.
53. In his “Benedict XVI and the Interpretation of Vatican II,” in The Crisis of Authority in Cath-
olic Modernity, 93–110, Joseph A. Komonchak suggests (probably rightly) that Pope Benedict XVI’s
December 22, 2005, speech to the Roman Curia on the proper interpretation of Vatican II did not
have Alberigo’s approach in view, but instead aimed to persuade the small band of Lefebvrist tradi-
tionalists. Thus, Komonchak observes regarding the five-volume history of the Council edited by
Alberigo, “There are reasons to think that this work is not the chief target [of Benedict XVI’s speech]
and certainly not the only one. Neither the editors nor the authors of individual chapters in the five
volumes entertain the exaggerated hermeneutics of discontinuity that the pope criticizes. None of
them denies the church’s continuity in the faith. They do point to rupture or discontinuity in two
areas. First, the council represented a departure from the tight system of thought and discipline that
in the decades before the council had cast suspicion on most of the movements of ressourcement and
aggiornamento, of renewal and reform, that made the council possible. Second, these authors found
discontinuity precisely where the pope has placed it: in the council’s effort at a more successful en-
gagement with the modern world than had been achieved by the antimodern attitudes and strategies
adopted by the papacy since the French Revolution” (ibid., 104). Certainly, if this is all that is meant
by “rupture or discontinuity,” then it was present at the Council (and is present in the Council’s
documents).

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ideologues of the ‘narratives’ on Vatican II.”54 The assumptions here are
manifold: not only that the expert Church historians have risen above the
theological and ideological blinders that have led great theologians such
as Benedict XVI (despite his historical role in the drafting of the Coun-
cil’s documents) into the punditry of false metanarratives, but also that
historicist retrieval of “the past” is sufficient for understanding continuity
within Tradition—precisely the point that Maurice Blondel, a key source
for many of the leading contributors to the Council’s documents, took
great pains to deny.55 In short, Faggioli both sets forth an understanding
of “reform” according to Vatican II that revolves around the distribution
of power rather than Christic love, and offers a vision of experts whose
historical knowledge of Vatican II makes them theologically unassailable
even by theologians whose knowledge of the Council is rooted in actual
high-level participation in the Council.
According to Faggioli, “church historians try, with their own scientific
method, to remind the church ‘how much purposeful forgetting—repres-
sion or amnesia—is required to make a case for continuity.’”56 Faggioli

54. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 80.

55. See Maurice Blondel, History and Dogma, trans. Alexander Dru, in Blondel, The Letter on
Apologetics and History and Dogma (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1994), 221–87.
56. Faggioli, “Vatican II,” 81, citing Stephen Schloesser, “Against Forgetting: Memory, History,
Vatican II,” Theological Studies 67 (2006): 275–319, at 277. Arguing in favor of “radical historicity”
of human reality and of Vatican II as a “revolution” in the Church’s understanding of divine rev-
elation, John W. O’Malley, SJ, grants that “there is a strong continuity in history, whether we are
speaking of history as past human reality itself or as historians’ understanding of the past reality”
(O’Malley, “Reform, Historical Consciousness, and Vatican II’s Aggiornamento,” in Tradition and
Transition: Historical Perspectives on Vatican II [Wilmington, Del.: Michael Glazier, 1989], 44–81,
at 77, 79). The problem comes in O’Malley’s understanding of the handing on of the gospel: “At
the core of Christianity lies the belief in a message—‘the Gospel’, ‘the Good News’. That belief pos-
tulates that the message has a validity that transcends the ages and transcends the limitations of any
culture in which it finds itself, even the culture in which it first took expression. . . . The charge of
the Church was to ‘hand on’ that message, not adulterate or change it. But the very transcendence
of the message implies that it perforce will be variously articulated and that every articulation will
but imperfectly realize it” (O’Malley, “Tradition and Traditions,” in Tradition and Transition, 32–
43, at 33). I note that the “message” is a Person, Jesus Christ, and even if “every articulation” of the
mysteries revealed in Christ is imperfect in the sense of not exhausting the mystery, nonetheless
the articulations are either true or false. The Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed confesses that the
divine Son is “consubstantial with the Father,” and this is either true about God or not. The ques-
tion, therefore, is not whether there are changes and discontinuities (since, of course, development
of doctrine would be impossible without changes and discontinuities), but whether the handing on
of divine revelation is subject to revolutions that contradict a truth that the Church has definitively

192 T h e Way Forwa rd 

considers that the scientific method of historians has made clear that claims
to doctrinal “continuity” (such as Benedict XVI’s or, for that matter, Con-
gar’s) are built upon a highly negative “purposeful forgetting” that, since it
is purposeful, must in fact be “repression” rather than “amnesia.” Faggioli’s
contention, then, is that those who criticize the conclusions of Alberigo
and Faggioli not only are non-experts who have no right to criticize the
reputable results of historical scholarship—despite their own historical in-
volvement during the Council at the highest levels—but also are persons
engaged in an intellectual act of “repression” which is the only way, as his-
torians know, that the theological claim of doctrinal “continuity” across the
vicissitudes of history can be advanced.
In his 2012 book True Reform: Liturgy and Ecclesiology in Sacrosanc-
tum Concilium, Faggioli argues in favor of reading Vatican II largely in
terms of historical consciousness (historicism) and ecclesiastical decen-
tralization: “Among the elements of the ‘transition age’ of Vatican II,
there is definitely a change in the categories of thinking, which implies—
to take just two examples—a modern critical approach to exegetical in-
terpretation of the Scriptures and a relationship between pope, bishops,
and laity characterized . . . by freedom and responsibility.”57 Certainly,
the Council affirms both historical-critical exegesis and “freedom and re-
sponsibility,” but these need to be distinguished from a philosophically
naïve historicism and from a muting of the authority of the gospel over
our lives.58 Imbelli’s concern needs to be highlighted here: without Dei
Verbum’s full account of divine revelation, we will find that “the church

taught about the content of the gospel, that is, about faith and morals. (Note that such definitive
teaching does not require dogmatic definition: many truths of faith and morals, such as the Resur-
rection of Jesus Christ, have not been dogmatically defined but have been definitively taught by the
Church through the “ordinary” Magisterium.) Thus, O’Malley’s distinction between a transcen-
dent “message” and its imperfect articulations does not get to the heart of the matter, which has
to do with whether God can reveal enduring truths about himself in history and in human words.
57. Massimo Faggioli, True Reform: Liturgy and Ecclesiology in Sacrosanctum Concilium
(Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2012), 156.
58. See Joseph Ratzinger, “Biblical Interpretation in Conflict: On the Foundations and the
Itinerary of Exegesis Today,” trans. Adrian Walker, in Opening Up the Scriptures: Joseph Ratzing-
er and the Foundations of Biblical Interpretation, ed. José Granados, Carlos Granados, and Luis
Sánchez-Navarro (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2008), 1–29; Joseph Ratzinger, “Foreword,” in
Ratzinger, Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration, trans. Adrian J.
Walker (New York: Doubleday, 2007), xi–xxiv.

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is without foundation and the liturgy a merely human construct.”59 Af-
ter all, given a historicized understanding of Scripture and Tradition, the
terms “freedom and responsibility” can possess only the meaning that
they have in this-worldly institutions, not the meanings that they would
have within the Christologically grounded ecclesiology and theology of
mission one finds in Lumen Gentium and Gaudium et Spes.60
Theologically, Faggioli’s True Reform proposes that the liturgical re-
form found in Sacrosanctum Concilium embodies and undergirds the de-
centralized, lay-empowering, world-affirming, change-embracing ecclesi-
ology that, in his view, is found in the other documents of the Council.
As a theologian, Faggioli advocates political decentralization in ecclesiol-
ogy, dissent from magisterial teaching (especially from moral teachings),
and the need to re-interpret the Church’s authority and structure in a
historicist manner. Faggioli is therefore particularly concerned about the
way that Ratzinger/Benedict and others, when discussing Vatican II, im-
ply “the catholicity of continuity and the ‘un-catholicity’ of discontinuity
and change in the Church.”61 He finds this “simplistic distinction” to be

59. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, xv

60. Consider, for example, the similar claim made by Michael G. Lawler, Todd A. Salzman, and
Eileen Burke-Sullivan that “[i]t is never enough simply to read the text to find out what it says about
morality. Its original sociohistorical context must first be clarified and then the text can be trans-
lated, interpreted, and applied in a contemporary context” (Lawler, Salzman, and Burke-Sullivan,
The Church in the Modern World: Gaudium et Spes Then and Now [Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical
Press, 2014], 99). This position supposes that the “original sociohistorical context,” determined by
modern historical-critical research, has a foundational priority over all other interpretative tools or
contexts (for example, providentially ordered canonical context and context within the ecclesial Tra-
dition guided by the Holy Spirit). Although Lawler, Salzman, and Burke-Sullivan consider them-
selves to be interpreting Dei Verbum §12 here (specifically its second and third sentences), the actual
text of Dei Verbum §12 paints a more complex portrait. Thus Dei Verbum §12 goes on to say that
“holy scripture requires to be read and interpreted in the light of the same Spirit through whom it
was written. Consequently a right understanding of the sacred texts demands attention, no less than
that mentioned above, to the content and coherence of scripture as a whole, taking into account the
whole church’s living tradition and the sense of analogy of faith” (Dei Verbum, in Decrees of the Ecu-
menical Councils, vol. 2: Trent to Vatican II, ed. Norman P. Tanner (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown
University Press, 1990), 971–81, at 976; translation slightly modified). In discussing marriage in light
of Gaudium et Spes, Lawler, Salzman, and Burke-Sullivan argue for the separation of the unitive and
procreative ends of sexual intercourse, so that the goodness of a particular act of sexual expression
depends entirely on what it may contribute to a relationship—a position that is quite different from
that which is found in Scripture and Tradition (and in Gaudium et Spes itself !).
61. Massimo Faggioli, A Council for the Global Church: Receiving Vatican II in History (Min-
neapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2015), 276.

194 T h e Way Forwa rd 

“one of the most disturbing elements of today’s scenario,” since he thinks
that it ahistorically rules out the possibility of change and grants to to-
day’s magisterial teaching an inviolable authority.62
Faggioli goes on to argue: “One implication of the paradigmatic shift at
Vatican II from a metaphysics theology to a more historical understanding
of the truths of Christian faith is that the conciliar teaching is not abstract,
but something that must be understood in the world of today.”63 On this
basis, he reads the texts looking for “the ways the Church of Vatican II has
(or has not) been able to reform itself in order to be a credible witness of
the changes announced by the council.”64 It is these changes, both particular
ones (such as the liturgy, ecumenism, interreligious dialogue, and decen-
tralization of authority) and general ones (most importantly the embrace of
the Church’s radical historicity and of the Church’s embeddedness within
the modern world), that for Faggioli make up the heart of the Council.
From this perspective, he considers that in receiving the Council, Catholics
must receive not merely fifty-year-old propositional teachings that may or
may not retain their value today, but rather a heart for further change in
response to discernment of the needs of our time. As he puts it with refer-
ence to the shift of tone under Pope Francis: “Vatican II was an act, and the
reception of Vatican II is an act. Looking for it only in written documents
reveals a scant understanding of the profound nature of that moment—and
of the Church in general.”65 The spirit of this “act,” which flows from but is
not limited to the actual conciliar texts, is found for Faggioli in “[e]cumen-
ism, interreligious dialogue, an ecclesiology of the Church ‘that goes forth,’
a Church of mercy and for the poor.”66
All of these elements—ecumenism, interreligious dialogue, a missio-
logical ecclesiology, mercy, and the preferential option for the poor—are
good and, indeed, necessary. For Faggioli, “the council is a solemn mo-
ment of rejection of the temptations to make of the Catholic Church

62. Ibid. He cites in this regard the book I co-edited with Matthew L. Lamb, Vatican II: Re-
newal within Tradition.
63. Faggioli, A Council for the Global Church, 330.
64. Ibid.
65. Ibid., 334. By contrast, see Andrew Meszaros’s “Vatican II as Theological Event and Text
according to Yves Congar,” forthcoming in the Josephinum Journal of Theology.
66. Faggioli, A Council for the Global Church, 334.

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an inward-oriented community,”67 and certainly Imbelli would agree, so
long as one emphasizes (by contrast to an inward-looking focus on de-
centralization, dissent, and discontinuity) that the Church must be an
outward-looking community whose eyes are focused on Jesus Christ. In-
deed, what I find largely missing in Faggioli’s work on Vatican II is atten-
tion to Jesus Christ, who according to Vatican II is the measure, source,
and center of all things. I do not find Faggioli giving an account of Christ
or setting forth his salvific significance and the mode of the mediation
of the transformative truths of his gospel. Faggioli’s concerns, instead, are
primarily political, in the sense that it is the distribution of power in the
Church, illumined by historicist modes of critical thought (as distinct
from Ratzinger/Benedict’s Blondelian historical engagement), that most
attracts Faggioli’s attention and that, crucially, bears the burden of defin-
ing what “true reform” means.
Consider his way of unfolding his contention that “[t]he vision of
Vatican II is crucial . . . for the viability of theology in modernity.”68 He ex-
plains this viability in two ways. First, he notes (quite rightly) that “clearly
long overdue were the shifts about biblical hermeneutics, theology and
modern science, interreligious and the ecumenical dialogue.”69 Second, he
sums up the “other theological issues” by stating that “Vatican II opened a
path toward the future of the Church: a more communional and less ju-
ridical ecclesiology, a new understanding of the relationship between laity
and ministry, and Church reform.”70 In other words, his view of Vatican II’s
theological contributions ultimately reduces to the Council’s approval of
modern modes of critical thought (certainly a good thing, but—I would
emphasize—in need of Christological reference) and the Council’s redis-
tribution and reconceptualization of ecclesiastical power in the light of
religious pluralism. Faggioli seems to think that these two dimensions—
modern hermeneutics and democratized power (both of which can be
recognized as beneficial in their proper context, but which must be mea-
sured by and centered in Christ)—largely suffice for describing the way in
which the Council “is about recentering theology in the very roots of the

67. Ibid., 331. 68. Ibid., 285.

69. Ibid. 70. Ibid., 285–86.

196 T h e Way Forwa rd 

Christian revelation without losing sight of the signs of our times.”71 The
problem here is that “the very roots of the Christian revelation” are in fact
discussed extensively and deeply by the Council, not least in the four Con-
stitutions, in christologically specific ways that Faggioli almost completely
ignores. With respect to the “signs of our times,” the crucified and risen
Christ so strongly proclaimed by Vatican II is, as Imbelli makes clear, too
often no longer at the center of Catholic consciousness.
Faggioli concludes, “The interpretation of Vatican II as an exercise of
textual exegesis made in a historical vacuum is not only a reduction of its
meaning, it is also the subtlest form of rejection of the council.”72 Surely no
one, let alone Ratzinger/Benedict, wishes to read Vatican II “in a historical
vacuum” as though the historical contextualization of ecclesial texts did not
matter. But a comparison of the theology of Vatican II uncovered by Im-
belli with the theology of Vatican II uncovered by Faggioli makes evident
that it is Faggioli who has produced “a reduction of its meaning” and who
has not taken up the most central Christological and Trinitarian themes
of the actual historical Council into his vision of Vatican II as the ongoing
theological event of the decentralization and historicization of the Church.
In sum, Imbelli rightly perceives that the real ongoing theological
event of the Council is the renewed biblical, liturgical, ecclesial, and mis-
sional ways by which—with ecumenical and interreligious outreach and
with appreciation for the advances and challenges of the modern world—
“the Church should bring Christ to the world” (as Pope John XXIII put
it a month before the Council’s opening).73 The ongoing theological
event of Vatican II is centered upon Christ.

Joseph Ratzinger and the Council:

Brief Further Reflections
Faggioli, like Imbelli, is well aware of the significance of the figures of the
nouvelle théologie for the composition of Vatican II. He presents the cen-
tral debate in terms of a contrast between the perspectives of Henri de Lu-

71. Ibid., 287. 72. Ibid., 345.

73. Pope John XXIII, Radio Message, 11 September 1962 (my translation from the Spanish text).

T he Way Fo rward  197

bac and Joseph Ratzinger, on the one side, and Congar (joined by Chenu
and Rahner) on the other. Faggioli considers de Lubac and Ratzinger to
be theological pessimists who misdiagnosed the Council’s aftermath as a
return of immanentism or modernism, and who therefore consistently
fought the true reforms called for by the Council. In his engagement with
these figures, Faggioli highlights Gaudium et Spes rather than, as he does
elsewhere, Sacrosanctum Concilium; but in both cases Ratzinger’s opposi-
tional perspective takes center stage. Faggioli states, “Gaudium et Spes was
and still is at the very heart of the two major streams of interpretation of
the council. Henri de Lubac and Joseph Ratzinger were the champions
of a more Augustinian view of the modern world and therefore were not
enthusiastic about Gaudium et Spes.”74

74. Faggioli, A Council for the Global Church, 124. In his “A Council for All Peoples,”
Marie-Dominique Chenu, OP, criticizes “a particular, explicit or implicit, conception of Christian
doctrine as focused on God as God, rather than on the Man-God Christ, upon God as involved
in the history of humanity” (Chenu, “A Council for All Peoples,” in Vatican II Revisited by Those
Who Were There, 19–23, at 20). In Chenu’s view, Gaudium et Spes rectifies this situation by focusing
“upon God as involved in the history of humanity.” Arguing that “[i]f the humanization of God
is the constant axis of the theology of Vatican II, it is natural that man should be the common
denominator of its analyses and decisions,” he praises the fact that Gaudium et Spes “is headed by
a long psychological and sociological analysis of the situation of mankind in the modern world.
This is the first time in history that a Council has ‘introduced’ (the text is called an ‘Introductory
Statement’) its doctrinal and institutional position by referring to the actual situation of the world.
This is because this Constitution is built not on recourse to the eternal verities come down from
heaven, but on constant reference to the dynamic of a ‘new age’ that calls the statements of faith
into question. For the first time, the Church defines its own mystery through and in the movement
of the world, in which it finds the setting for its existence and its self-understanding” (Chenu, “A
Council for All Peoples,” 20). Chenu links this Christian humanism to that found in Pope John
Paul II’s 1979 encyclical Redemptor Hominis, but if Chenu’s emphasis on the Church defining “its
own mystery through and in the movement of the world” were pressed further than he presses it
here, it would be difficult to avoid a historicist account of the dogmatic teaching of the Church.
Chenu is also somewhat too confident with respect to the ease of determining, prior to theological
analysis, what “man” and “the world” are. For a movement along Chenu’s lines, according to which
one can speak of “concrete self-realizations of the Church” at particular historical times and places
but not of “the Church” per se (thus leaving dogmatic theology deeply vulnerable to historicism),
see Joseph A. Komonchak, Foundations in Ecclesiology (Chestnut Hill, Mass.: Boston College,
1995), although Komonchak does not go as far as does Roger Haight, SJ’s Christian Community in
History, 2 vols. (New York: Continuum, 2004–2005). For insight into the issues involved, criticiz-
ing the historicism that he identifies in Walter Kasper’s 1967 book The Methods of Dogmatic Theol-
ogy, trans. John Drury (Glen Rock, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1969), see Reinhard Hütter, “ ‘A Forgotten
Truth?’—Theological Faith, Source and Guarantee of Theology’s Inner Unity,” in his Dust Bound
for Heaven: Explorations in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans,
2012), 313–48. As Hütter shows, for Kasper in 1967—and for numerous others following the same

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 A careful consideration of Ratzinger’s statements shows the weak-
ness of Faggioli’s one-sided engagement with Ratzinger’s perspective. For
instance, commenting on Gaudium et Spes’s discussion of war and peace
(and the anthropology therein), Ratzinger observes in his 1966 Theologi-
cal Highlights of Vatican II: “If we meditate on the Council’s statement,
we become immediately aware how suited it really is to lead us from what
seems to be an almost secular consideration into the very heart of Christi-
anity.”75 What is this “very heart of Christianity”? Ratzinger answers that
it is the inability of humans to redeem ourselves, to be holy by our own
power. This perspective is not simply “Augustinian” but deeply Pauline,
and it leads Ratzinger to emphasize that Gaudium et Spes draws us to
the center of Vatican II: Jesus Christ. He remarks that Gaudium et Spes’s
teachings on war and peace force us “to admit that our righteousness is
nothing but a temporary expedient in the midst of unrighteousness.
We find ourselves crying for mercy to him who makes just the unjust.”76
Gaudium et Spes’s proposals show us, as the document itself emphasized
in earlier passages, that only Christ can satisfy the human heart and bring
ultimate fulfillment and peace to the human race. Thus Ratzinger goes on
to say, with a strong interreligious impulse that is deeply Christological:
“The sincerity of the man who acknowledges reality with no excuses is
itself a hidden appeal to the mercy of the mystery which has appeared to
the faithful in Jesus Christ. The foremost intention of the Council was to
reveal this need for Christ in the depth of the human heart so as to make
man able to hear Christ’s call.”77 Here, indeed, is the Ratzinger and the
Vatican II about which Imbelli writes so beautifully.

path—“dogma is always relative to its particular time. All propositions are functions of the promise
of a future that is not yet at hand, hence historically conditioned by this future and therefore to be
interpreted in light of it. Because there is no perennial supernatural given of the faith, there can
be no contemplation of the faith that rises above the flux of history toward God,” with the result
that “the theological enterprise cannot be correlated to the deliveries of the faith that essentially
transcend the vagaries of historically conditioned understanding” (ibid., 329). See also Joseph A.
Komonchak, “Le valutazioni sulla Gaudium et Spes: Chenu, Dossetti, Ratzinger,” in Volti di fine
concilio. Studi di storia e teologia sulla conclusion del Vaticano II, ed. Joseph Dore and Alberto Mel-
loni (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2000), 115–63.
75. Joseph Ratzinger, Theological Highlights of Vatican II, trans. Werner Barzel, Gerald C.
Thormann, and Henry Traub, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 2009), 243.
76. Ibid.
77. Ibid., 243–44.

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 There are many other passages in Ratzinger’s writings that praise Gaud-
ium et Spes, such as one in his 1968 commentary on the document in which
he states, with respect to paragraph 22, “We are probably justified in saying
that here, for the first time in a document of the magisterium, a new type
of completely Christocentric theology appears. On the basis of Christ this
dares to present theology as anthropology and only becomes radically theo-
logical by including man in discourse about God by way of Christ.”78 This
Christocentrism, and not a merely negative “Augustinianism” that seeks to
do anything to counter the threats of modernity, is what drives Ratzinger’s
interpretation of the Council. The Council’s texts correspond deeply, as
Imbelli shows, to this Christ-centered vision. When Ratzinger criticizes
certain statements in Gaudium et Spes, as he does in his 1968 commentary
with respect to paragraph 12, it is because he fears that the paragraph retains
traces of “a schematic representation of nature and the supernatural viewed

78. Joseph Ratzinger, “Part I, Chapter I,” in Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, ed.
Herbert Vorgrimler, vol. 5, Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, trans. W. J.
O’Hara (New York: Herder and Herder, 1969), 115–63, at 159; cited in Imbelli, Rekindling the
Christic Imagination, 87. See also Ratzinger’s 1975 essay “On the Status of Church and Theology
Today,” in Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology, trans. Mary
Frances McCarthy, SND (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987), 367–93. Ratzinger praises Gaudium
et Spes as “a revision of the Syllabus of Pius IX, a kind of countersyllabus” (Ratzinger, “On the
Status of Church and Theology Today,” 381). As he notes, Gaudium et Spes does not represent a sud-
den or unprepared shift in this regard: “The new ecclesiastical policy of Pius XI produced a certain
openness toward a liberal understanding of the state. In a quiet but persistent struggle, exegesis and
Church history adopted more and more the postulates of liberal science, and liberalism, too, was
obliged to undergo many significant changes in the great political upheavals of the twentieth centu-
ry. As a result, the one-sidedness of the position adopted by the Church under Pius IX and Pius X in
response to the situation created by the French Revolution was, to a large extent, corrected via facti,
especially in Central Europe, but there was still no basic statement of the relationship that should
exist between the Church and the world that had come into existence after 1789” (Ratzinger, “On
the Status of Church and Theology Today,” 381–82). In the final section of this essay, Ratzinger
examines the reception of Gaudium et Spes, both the embrace of the modern world (represented
by the reception of the document in the Netherlands) and the radical critique of the modern world
(represented by the reception of the document in Latin America). Although Ratzinger finds Gaud-
ium et Spes to be in certain respects too hopeful (as shown by the events of the years 1966–1975)
about the reconciliation of Church and world, he argues that “[w]hat devastated the Church in
the decade after the Council was not the Council but the refusal to accept it. This becomes clear
precisely in the history of the influence of Gaudium et spes. What was identified with the Council
was, for the most part, the expression of an attitude that did not coincide with the statements to be
found in the text itself, although it is recognizable as a tendency in its development and in some of
its individual formulations. The task is not, therefore, to suppress the Council but to discover the
real Council and to deepen its true intention in the light of present experience” (Ratzinger, “On
the Status of Church and Theology Today,” 390–91).

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far too much as merely juxtaposed,” not because of any goal of “imposing
[upon the text] a pessimistic view of man or of constructing an exaggerated
theology of sin.”79 Ratzinger adds that in fact the final form of paragraph
12 is greatly improved from earlier drafts, as a result of the introduction of
a strongly Pascalian or phenomenological understanding of human nature’s
existential situation at the outset of the paragraph.
Ratzinger was aware that the Council’s changes, whose purpose was to
draw people closer to Jesus Christ, were not necessarily having the desired
impact of reinvigorating the Church and its mission.80 In his Milestones:

79. Ratzinger, “Part I, Chapter I,” 120.

80. With regard to the impact that Vatican II has had, two recent articles in First Things draw
different conclusions. In his “Reckoning with Modernity,” First Things, no. 258 (December 2015):
23–30, Bruce D. Marshall argues that “the council channeled the torrent of modernity in a way
that made the Church’s ancient teaching on her relationship with the world especially clear” (Mar-
shall, “Reckoning with Modernity,” 30)—a relationship that includes Jesus’ promise that “[i]f the
world hates you, know that it hated me before you” ( Jn 15:18), a hatred that arises from the love
of creaturely goods above the love of God. Marshall finds that the Council came just at the right
moment and accomplished evident good: “In 1960, it was increasingly evident, not least to people
like Congar, that this anti-modernist discipline had become ineffective at coping with the flood of
social, cultural, and intellectual forces that confronted the Church. Had this regime continued,
while modernity—the bad along with the good—continued to take root among Catholics, un-
guided by the actions and decisions of an ecumenical council, the flood might simply have bro-
ken in on the Church willy-nilly, sweeping away the precious treasure Congar loved along with
the anti-modernist regime he detested” (Marshall, “Reckoning with Modernity,” 29). I agree with
Marshall that “Vatican II did not, as some theologians still suppose, accommodate modernity by
digging an ugly ditch between the Catholic Church and her past. It channeled the modern flood
in a way that was beneficial to the Church just because it was faithful to her traditions” (Marshall,
“Reckoning with Modernity,” 29). In his “A Crisis of Conservative Catholicism,” First Things,
no. 259 ( January 2016): 21–28, Ross Douthat observes (among other things) that “a major part of
Vatican II’s mission was to equip the Church to evangelize the modern world, and . . . five decades
is long enough to say that in this ambition the council mostly failed. Since the close of the council,
we’ve seen fifty years of Catholic civil war and institutional collapse in the world’s most modern
(and once, most Catholic) societies, fifty years in which only Africa looks like a successful mis-
sion territory, while in Asia and Latin American the Church has been lapped and lapped again
by Protestants” (Douthat, “A Crisis of Conservative Catholicism,” 27). As Douthat notes with
regard to the United States, “Ex-Catholics are one of the country’s largest religious groups, and
without Hispanic immigration, trends in Catholic affiliation and practice would resemble Main-
line Protestantism more than many would be eager to admit” (Douthat, “A Crisis of Conservative
Catholicism,” 22). Lest he be misunderstood, Douthat adds: “This doesn’t mean the council was a
failure in its entirety, or that arch-traditionalists are right to condemn it as heretical, or (as more
moderate traditionalists would argue) that the council itself was primarily to blame for everything
that followed. The experience of every other Christian confession suggests that some version of the
same civil war and institutional crisis would have arrived with or without the council” (Douthat, “A
Crisis of Conservative Catholicism,” 27). Douthat concludes that “for all its future-oriented rhet-
oric, Vatican II’s clearest achievements were mostly backward-looking. It dealt impressively with

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Memoirs 1927–1977, Ratzinger recalls that by 1964 he encountered theo-
logical confusion in Germany, especially among faculties and students of
theology: “Now and then, on returning from Rome, I found the mood
in the Church and among theologians to be quite agitated. The impres-
sion grew steadily that nothing was now stable in the Church, that every-
thing was open to revision. More and more the Council appeared to be
like a great Church parliament that could change everything and reshape
everything according to its own desires.”81 Rather than leading people to
a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ, the danger was that the Council
could undermine believers’ sense of divine revelation.82 Ratzinger suggests
that already during the Council itself, the Council was being interpreted
in a primarily hermeneutical and political way, as though the Church
were simply coming to terms with its own hermeneutical backwardness

problems that came to the fore during the crises and debates of the nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries (the Church’s relationship to democracy, to religious liberty, to anti-Semitism). But its
deliberations simply took place too soon to address the problems that broke across Catholicism
and Christianity with the sexual revolution and that still preoccupy us now” (Douthat, “A Crisis of
Conservative Catholicism,” 27). I agree with Douthat so far as he goes, but I think that Marshall is
more insightful on the crucial theological work done by the four Constitutions.
81. Joseph Ratzinger, Milestones: Memoirs 1927–1977, trans. Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis (San
Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1998), 132. John O’Malley observes, “The impact of the media and the
very content of the documents explain, therefore, why Catholics feel such a stake in the Council,
and they further indicate why the interpretation of the Council has become so problematic. Chris-
tianity is by self-definition traditional. Its obligation is to ‘tell the next generation’ the message it
has received. Any too sudden or too obvious change in practice or attitude is bound to be scru-
tinized for possible adulteration of that fundamental commission” (O’Malley, “Vatican II: His-
torical Perspectives on Its Uniqueness and Interpretation,” in Vatican II: The Unfinished Agenda.
A Look to the Future, ed. Lucien Richard, OMI, Daniel Harrington, SJ, and John W. O’Malley, SJ
[Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1987], 22–32, at 23). Writing in 1987, O’Malley speaks of “the present
crisis” (O’Malley, “Vatican II: Historical Perspectives,” 23), and he also speaks of “[t]he turmoil
into which the Church was thrown in the aftermath of the Council” (O’Malley, “Vatican II: His-
torical Perspectives,” 31).
82. In 1966, Karl Barth famously asked: “Are the adherents of the ‘progressive’ majority of
the Council . . . aware of the danger that this might result in an undesired repetition of the errors
committed in modern Protestantism?” (Barth, Ad Limina Apostolorum: An Appraisal of Vatican II,
trans. Keith R. Crim [Edinburgh: The Saint Andrew Press, 1969], 20). Barth had in view specifi-
cally the errors of Protestant liberalism, which, for those who embraced it, dissolved the sense of an
authoritative divine revelation that we must hear and obey, and also dissolved the sense of real sin
and real salvation by Christ. Ratzinger, like de Lubac and other members of the “progressive” ma-
jority, clearly seems to have been aware of this danger, but the threat that Barth identified emerged
powerfully in the immediate postconciliar period and remains today, fifty years after the Council,
the key struggle within the Catholic Church.

202 T h e Way Forwa rd 

and its oppressively feudal structure. The Christological center of Vati-
can II’s Constitutions was thereby being missed. Ratzinger recollects that
in Germany during the later stages of the Council, “The disputes at the
Council were more and more portrayed according to the party model of
modern parliamentarianism.”83
As a result, it began to seem in the popular imagination as though
hermeneutics and power, rather than Jesus Christ, were the real issues of
the Council. This result made faith in Christ seem like a human construct,
changeable by whoever has the power. As Ratzinger puts it, “The faith
no longer seemed exempt from human decision making but rather was
now apparently determined by it.”84 This situation was the very opposite
of the nouvelle théologie’s desire to draw people closer to Christ. Rather
than finding Christ at the very center of everything, people found the hu-
man hermeneutical will to power at the center: a self-constituting Church
with no real need for or access to Christ. Ratzinger adds that alongside a
“tendency to dominance by specialists,” so that “even the Creed no lon-
ger appeared untouchable but seemed rather subject to the control of
scholars,” there was emerging “the idea of an ecclesial sovereignty of the
people in which the people itself determines what it wants to understand
by Church.”85

Conclusion
In his “Vatican II: For the Life of the World,” James Hanvey articulates a
common criticism of Ratzinger/Benedict XVI’s approach, one that many
other Catholic theologians find persuasive. He remarks that Benedict XVI’s
“hermeneutic of ‘continuity’,” while correct so far as it goes, “cannot and
should not be used to normalize the Council and minimize its achieve-
ments, its vision or the tasks which it sets for the Church and the creative
challenges which it still continues to propose.”86 This remark deserves atten-

83. Ratzinger, Milestones, 132–33.

84. Ibid., 133.
85. Ibid., 134. As Bruce Marshall remarks, the key question became “what it really means for
the Church to be ‘updated’ and open to the world” (Marshall, “Reckoning with Modernity,” 26).
86. James Hanvey, SJ, “Vatican II: For the Life of the World,” in The Second Vatican Council:
Celebrating Its Achievements and the Future, 45–68, at 47.

T he Way Fo rward  203

tion, because many theologians today, as we have seen, fear that appeal to
“continuity” is tantamount to neutralizing or even neutering the Council.87
The key question is what it would mean to “normalize the Council
and minimize its achievements, its vision or the tasks which it sets.” What
kinds of things would we need to understand in order for the Council’s
achievements, vision, and tasks not to be minimized? For Hanvey, as for
so many other theologians today, the answer is simply that we must recog-
nize that the Council “commits us to the journey of history” and that the
Council commits the Church to understanding “its own need to change
in order to be faithful to Christ and the mission entrusted to it.”88
In response, I observe that no one denies that the Church is on “the
journey of history” or that the Church changes in significant ways. There
are also some things in the Church that do not change: for instance, the
Church has believed in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior from the outset.
This belief has been enriched by doctrinal development, but it is important
to insist upon unchanging elements in the Church’s faith, without which
the communication of the apostolic deposit of faith would not make sense.
Hanvey argues that “the Council must be read as the beginning of a
new phase in the Church’s self-understanding and development for which
the theology is still being worked out.”89 The danger here is that by maxi-
mizing this “new phase . . . for which the theology is still being worked
out,” one could end up radically minimizing the new phase by separat-
ing it too sharply from the vast riches of preconciliar theology—includ-
ing the theological teachings of Scripture and the luminous theological
writings produced in the twenty centuries during which Christians have
reflected upon the biblical testimony to Jesus Christ. For example, Han-
vey observes that “[b]efore Vatican II, the Church was predominantly
thought of as a perfecta societas” and as a “Mystical Body” in a manner

87. In his December 22, 2005, address to the Roman Curia, of course, Benedict XVI contrasted
the “hermeneutic of discontinuity and rupture” not with the “hermeneutic of continuity” but with
the “hermeneutic of reform”: see Benedict XVI, “A Proper Hermeneutic for the Second Vatican
Council,” in Vatican II: Renewal within Tradition, ed. Matthew L. Lamb and Matthew Levering, ix–
xv, at x–xi; excerpted from Benedict XVI’s “Ad Roman Curiam ob omnia natalicia,” Acta Apostolicae
Sedis 98 (6 January 2006): 40–53. On the “hermeneutic of reform,” see also Kurt Koch, Das zweite Va-
tikanische Konzil: Eine Bilanz. Die Hermeneutik der Reform (Augsburg: Sankt Ulrich Verlag, 2012).
88. Hanvey, “Vatican II,” 47.
89. Ibid., 49.

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that “emphasized its hierarchical constitution, governed by the Pope, and
sanctified through the proper administration of the sacraments.”90 But
by citing only Robert Bellarmine and Pius XII’s encyclical Mystici Cor-
poris, Hanvey inadvertently presents a truncated view of the resources of
pre-1962 theology, a truncated view against which the nouvelle théologie
fought strenuously and which Vatican II sought to correct. The resources
of the entire ecclesiological tradition, rooted in the wide array of biblical
images and certainly not downplaying the role of the Petrine office and
the sacraments (“the Eucharist builds the Church”), provide Vatican II
with its ecclesiological vision.
Despite the weakness of some of his formulations, Hanvey’s insistence
upon “the journey of history” strikes me as in a certain way quite appropri-
ate for the interpretation of Vatican II. The four themes that I highlighted
in the preceding chapters—personal encounter with the self-revealing
Lord, active participation in Christ’s sacrificial self-offering, true reform so
as to deepen communion with Christ, and the fulfillment of all created
things in Christ—all emphasize the historical context and historical dy-
namic by which faith in Jesus Christ arises and grows. In the contrasting
visions of Imbelli and Faggioli, however, we find two alternative ways of
construing “the journey of history” and two alternative ways of conceiv-
ing of how historical and theological scholarship should join together in
the interpretation of Vatican II’s texts. For Imbelli, the center of history is
Jesus Christ, and the Church must meet him—and draw the whole world
to him—in a historical journey fueled by encounter with divine Mystery,
by Eucharistic participation, by reform rooted in the Church’s response to
Christ’s universal call to cruciform holiness, and by an evangelizing mis-
sion. In this history, it is not ecclesiastical power—whether during Vati-
can II or after it—that takes center stage. Imbelli does not deny the im-
portance of ecclesiastical power, and he gladly supports Vatican II’s call for
the greater participation of laity and of diocesan bishops in the governance
and mission of the Church, even while he rejects efforts to undermine the
authority that Vatican II accords to the pope or to undermine the obedi-
ence of faith. But power structures do not stand at the core of Imbelli’s

90. Ibid., 50.

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vision of Vatican II. While the history of the power struggles and complex
drafting of documents during the Council interests him, he points firmly
to the historical and trans-historical Mystery made present afresh by the
documents and preeminently by the Constitutions, the same Mystery to
which Scripture testifies: Jesus Christ crucified and risen.
By comparison, Faggioli’s work presents “the journey of history” with a
much different focus. In the journey of history, according to Faggioli, Vati-
can II finally has enabled the Church itself to recognize how profoundly
historically conditioned (in a historicist sense) its teachings and structures
are. The Church no longer supposes that the answers to contemporary
theological problems are readily available from Scripture or Tradition.
Given how radically historically conditioned the teachings of Church and
Scripture are, we cannot really know what the Church should teach in the
future, since it is the act of change rather than the content of texts that
now is determinative. As a result, intra-ecclesiastical power politics takes
center stage. This is especially so with regard to the need to weaken hier-
archical power to command obedience about matters of faith and mor-
als. For Faggioli, each of us, along with our local, regional, and worldwide
communities, strives toward a truth that will be knowable only at the end
of history. The center of Vatican II, on this view, is the journeying com-
munity and its awakening to its real freedom. From this perspective, the
center of the study of Vatican II should not be the salvific realities taught
anew by the Council, but rather the struggles and behind-the-scenes influ-
ences that portend further decentralization and historicization.
I hold that Imbelli’s approach to Vatican II is correct. Christ cruci-
fied and risen, faithfully mediated to us through Church and Scripture
and participated in through faith and sacramental worship, is the very
center of the Second Vatican Council. The ongoing event of Vatican II
consists primarily in learning from the Council how better to encounter
and know the love of Christ, how to participate actively in the liturgy in
Christ’s supreme act of love, how to understand what is reformable and
what is unchanging in the Church’s witness to Christ, and how to lead the
whole world “to live for the praise of his glory” (Eph 1:12) and to be “filled
with the fruits of righteousness which come through Jesus Christ, to the
glory and praise of God” (Phil 1:11).

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C on c l u s i o n
C on c l u s i o n

}
CONCLUSION

On December 1, 1965, as the Second Vatican Council approached its end,

Henri de Lubac wrote in a letter to his Jesuit Superiors in France: “In the
coming months and years, it will be necessary to study seriously the over-
all work of the Council. One must know how to take the dogmatic con-
stitutions as the center of perspective, for they are in fact at the center of
everything.”1 The present book has tried to implement this advice, from
a perspective of profound appreciation for the teachings of the Council.
The great themes of the Council are dogmatic and pastoral at the same
time: personal encounter with the mystery of Jesus Christ through Scrip-
ture and Tradition; active participation in Christ’s Paschal mystery; the
Church as comprising divine constitutive elements (dogma, sacraments,
offices) and human elements that are in constant need of reform; and the
connection of nature and grace so as to show that Jesus Christ is the very
center of history. These great themes make clear why de Lubac, in his let-
ter to his Jesuit Superiors, strongly opposes “placing too much emphasis
on a distinction between ‘doctrine’ and ‘pastoral’.”2 Doctrine has as its
source and goal the living Christ, and therefore it is not cut off from the

1. Henri de Lubac, SJ, At the Service of the Church: Henri de Lubac Reflects on the Circum-
stances That Occasioned His Writings, trans. Anne Elizabeth Englund (San Francisco: Ignatius Press,
1993), 345.
2. Ibid., 342.

207
pastoral dimensions of Christ as the Good Shepherd and of the Church
as God’s sheepfold.
De Lubac was an advocate of reform, but reform of a particular kind,
namely reform that unites us more tightly with the Person of Christ and
thus with divine revelation as faithfully handed on in Scripture and Tra-
dition. He would have resonated with Lawrence Cunningham’s observa-
tion fifteen years after the Council, “If by fiat the Vatican assented to all
the demands of every reform group of every persuasion (hardly a pos-
sibility because reform groups are headed by Archbishop Lefebvres and
well as Hans Küngs), the fundamental issue would still remain: How is
the Gospel to be lived and why should it be followed?”3 It should be fol-
lowed because it is true and fulfills our deepest yearnings, and it should
be lived in repentance and love of Christ. When we look at the conciliar
reforms of the ways that the Church communicates the truths of faith,
we find personal encounter with Christ emphasized in Inter Mirifica,
Gravissimum Educationis, and Optatam Totius. Likewise, the reforms of
the Church’s hierarchical order emphasize the need for all believers to
actively participate in Christ, as can be seen in Christus Dominus, Pres-
byterorum Ordinis, and Apostolicam Actuositatem. In the reform of the
relationship of Latin Catholics to Eastern Catholics, the reform of con-
secrated religious life, and the reform of the relationship of the Catholic
Church to non-Catholic Christians—found respectively in Orientalium
Ecclesiarum, Perfectae Caritatis, and Unitatis Redintegratio—we observe
the effort to retain the divine elements of the Church while removing cer-
tain human elements that weaken the power of the divine elements given
by Christ. Finally, in the reform of the Church’s missionary activity (Ad
Gentes), the reform of the Church’s relationship with the Jewish people
and with other religions (Nostra Aetate), and the reform of the Church’s
relationship with the state (Dignitatis Humanae), we find Christ at the
center but not in a punitive or condemnatory way.
At the outset of the Council, the great figures of the nouvelle théolo-
gie were united by a shared experience of misunderstanding, and in some
cases real persecution, by neo-scholastic authorities in Rome (both Cu-

3. Lawrence S. Cunningham, The Meaning of Saints (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1980), 171.

208 C on c lu s ion
rial authorities and the leaders of the religious orders). Joseph Ratzinger
describes an oppressive atmosphere of “anti-ism.”4 Many exemplary theo-
logians, including de Lubac, were removed in the 1950s from teaching po-
sitions or forbidden to write on particular topics. This situation rapidly
changed under Pope John XXIII, and by 1963 the Council was clearly
being shaped theologically by representatives of the nouvelle théologie.
Though the great figures of the nouvelle théologie each had disagreements
with certain passages in particular conciliar documents, as a whole the
documents of Vatican II embody what they had hoped to accomplish.
Thus, at the conclusion of the Council, Yves Congar reported in
his journal, “A great many bishops congratulated me, thanked me. To a
good extent, it was my work, they said.”5 Ratzinger, too, expresses plea-
sure in 1966 about the outcome of the Council: “the overall result can
be summed up in line with what Oscar Cullmann, the Protestant exegete
from Basel, said to the German Council conference on December 2, 1965.
After a careful analysis he said that, looking at the Council in retrospect,
‘on the whole our expectations . . . were fulfilled and in some respects sur-
passed.’ ”6 In a letter written on July 26, 1966, de Lubac underscores his
appreciation for “the authentic sense of the Council and of true aggiorna-
mento.”7 Describing the admiration that Pope Paul VI had for de Lubac,
Karl Neufeld reports that following the ecumenical celebration of the end
of the Council, Paul VI “added one further personal gesture of special es-
teem by inviting Henri de Lubac, along with Oscar Cullmann and Jean
Guitton, to dine with him the following Sunday.”8
By the end of the Council, however, tensions were emerging among
4. Joseph Ratzinger, Theological Highlights of Vatican II, trans. the Missionary Society of St.
Paul the Apostle (New York: Paulist Press, 1966), 43.
5. Yves Congar, OP, My Journal of the Council, trans. Mary John Ronayne, OP, and Mary Cec-
ily Boulding, OP, ed. Denis Minns, OP (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2012), 870.
6. Joseph Ratzinger, Theological Highlights of Vatican II, trans. Werner Barzel, Gerald C. Thor-
mann, and Henry Traub, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 2009), 260.
7. De Lubac, At the Service of the Church, 345.
8. Karl Heinz Neufeld, SJ, “In the Service of the Council: Bishops and Theologians at the
Second Vatican Council (for Cardinal Henri de Lubac on His Ninetieth Birthday),” trans. Ron-
ald Sway, in Vatican II: Assessment and Perspectives: Twenty-Five Years After (1962–1987), vol. 1, ed.
René Latourelle, SJ (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1988), 74–105, at 98. On the Council as an ecu-
menical moment, see Wolfgang Thönissen, Ein Konzil für ein ökumenisches Zeitalter: Schlüsselthe-
men des Zweiten Vatikanums (Paderborn: Bonifatius, 2012).

C o nclu s i o n 209
the theologians who at the beginning of the Council had formed a gener-
ally united front. In his journal entry of November 30, 1965, for example,
Congar complains that “Küng is always very radical. He says some true
things, but in which the critical research into what is true is not sufficient-
ly tempered by concern for concrete situations.”9 More strongly, in his let-
ter of December 1, 1965, de Lubac warns that “it will be necessary to break
away from the propaganda and tendentious attempts that are already aris-
ing and that will soon be in danger of aborting the undertaking of reform
and of compromising the very foundations of the faith.”10 Indeed, de Lu-
bac notes that in the previous month he had resigned from “the govern-
ing committee of the Concilium journal” on the grounds that he had “ob-
served that the orientation of the Review did not correspond to what its
title had led me to expect.”11 Congar remained on the editorial board of
Concilium, but Ratzinger also broke with Concilium relatively soon after
the Council’s conclusion. In 1967, de Lubac states bluntly that “the pres-
ent doctrinal crisis” has two foundations: “a total aversion to admitting a
divine revelation,” and “an inability on principle to think of a transcen-
dent order of truth.”12 Ratzinger worries already in 1966 that “renewal is
mistakenly taken to mean dilution and cheapening of religion,” and he
notes that “here and there people seem to demand not so much truth as
modernity, and they take this as the sufficient standard for behavior.”13
Similarly, in July 1968 Congar observes that “[e]verything is being
called into question at the same time,” and, without losing his fundamen-
tal optimism, he adds: “The discovery of the contemporary world and of
humanity’s role in the world have become so dominant as to seem some-
times exclusive. The danger of horizontalism is not a fantasy!”14 In his in-

9. Congar, My Journal of the Council, 861. See Christopher Ruddy, “Yves Congar and Hans
Küng at Vatican II: Differing Paths of Church Reform,” Ecclesiology 10 (2014): 159–85.
10. De Lubac, At the Service of the Church, 345. See also de Lubac’s Carnets du Concile, ed.
Loïc Figoureux, vol. 2 (Paris: Cerf, 2007). For background, see Loïc Figoureux, “Henri de Lubac et
le concile Vatican II, espoirs et inquiétudes d’un théologien,” Cristianesimo nella Storia 34 (2013):
249–271.
11. De Lubac, At the Service of the Church, 345.
12. Ibid., 348.
13. Ratzinger, Theological Highlights of Vatican II, 260–61.
14. Yves Congar, OP, True and False Reform in the Church, trans. Paul Philibert, OP (Colleg-
eville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2011), 341.

210 C on c l u s ion
structive 1979 essay “A Last Look at the Council,” Congar warns against
the “practice of applying the pattern ‘before’ and ‘after’ to the Council, as
though it marked an absolute new beginning, the point of departure for a
completely new Church.”15 He insists upon the continuity of the Council
with previous Church teaching: “I was at the time [of Vatican II] and still
am anxious to stress the continuity of Tradition. Vatican II was one mo-
ment and neither the first nor the last moment in that Tradition, just as
Trent, Pius V and Pius X were neither the first nor the last.”16
By 1967, Edward Schillebeeckx and others in what Jürgen Mettepen-
ningen calls the third wave of the nouvelle théologie were moving strong-
ly in the theological direction that de Lubac and Ratzinger had already
sensed during the Council and about which they now expressed a grow-
ing alarm.17 In his 1968 God the Future of Man, Schillebeeckx cemented
his postconciliar shift by undertaking to do theology in a hermeneutical

15. Yves Congar, OP, “A Last Look at the Council,” in Vatican II Revisited by Those Who Were
There, ed. Alberic Stacpoole, OSB (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1986), 337–58, at 351. See also, in
the same volume, Congar’s “Moving Towards a Pilgrim Church,” 129–52, at 129: “Something hap-
pened at the Council and the dominant values in our way of looking at the Church were changed
by the Council. That will become clear in the course of my analysis; but I am bound to stress that
such a plan is simplistic. Vatican II was intentionally in continuity with the previous councils of the
Church and with Tradition.”
16. Congar, “A Last Look at the Council,” 351. Congar goes on to say that “the current crisis [of
faith] is clearly due in quite an important degree to causes that have revealed their strength since
the Council. Indeed it warned against them, warding them off rather than bringing them about.
Vatican II has been followed by socio-cultural change more extensive, radical and rapid and more
cosmic in its proportions than any change at any other period in man’s history. The Council was
conscious of this great change—this is evident from the introduction to Gaudium et Spes—but
not of all its aspects or of its violence. Many questions have arisen in the past ten or twelve years of
which the Council was not aware or which it might at the most just have suspected. These include,
in the sphere of thought, the collapse of metaphysics as an acceptable philosophy, the feverish pur-
suit of hermeneutics, the triumphant emergence of critical methods and the all-pervasive influence
of the human sciences. . . . In the Church, we have since 1968 been passing through a crisis of the
magisterium and a loss of interest on the part of many Christians, including the clergy, in what
the Church is. We are increasingly absorbed by the things of this world, by politics and by Marxist
categories” (ibid.). This absorption of Catholic consciousness by politics has had ill effects in the
field of Vatican II studies.
17. See Jürgen Mettepenningen, Nouvelle Théologie—New Theology: Inheritor of Modernism,
Precursor of Vatican II (London: T. & T. Clark International, 2010). To describe the nouvelle théol-
ogie as the “inheritor of modernism” is a mistake insofar as it implies that the nouvelle théologie
was fundamentally modernist. The nouvelle théologie, like Leonine neo-scholasticism, “inherited”
modernism in the sense of seeking to respond critically to it by attending to its philosophical and
historical challenges to Catholic faith.

C o n clu s i o n 211
and critical key focused upon the need to reconceive doctrine in light of
its eschatological consistency with the liberative praxis of Jesus. Books
arguing for the need to revise dogmatic formulae proliferated, as did
far-reaching calls for changes in the Church’s moral teachings (including,
but certainly not limited to, birth control). On the American scene, Rich-
ard McBrien separated the institutional Church from the eschatological
kingdom in his 1969 Do We Need the Church?, and Avery Dulles’s 1971
The Survival of Dogma sounds a strikingly different note from René La-
tourelle’s cutting-edge work of less than a decade before. As Dulles com-
ments in The Survival of Dogma: “Since Vatican II the question of the
irreformability of dogma has become acute throughout the Church. . . .
[M]any of the ancient doctrines of the Church seem to demand transla-
tion into new terms and concepts if they are to retain their intelligibil-
ity in new frameworks. In the present turmoil the guarded statements of
Bouillard, which aroused such controversy twenty years ago, seem pru-
dent and moderate.”18
John O’Malley has emphasized the shortcomings that the “majority”
allegedly felt with respect to the Council’s ecclesiastical power changes:
“Even before the council ended in 1965, there was a discrepancy between
what the bishops hoped they had accomplished and what had happened.
The majority was consistently frustrated in its efforts to make its will felt
through the establishment of real structural changes.”19 By contrast, in a
private letter sent to various Council participants on October 14, 1964,
de Lubac observes that “the Council has long been held fast, as though
hypnotized, by the question of the agreement between the primacy of the
pope and episcopal collegiality. This has led to a discussion in juridical
terms, claims of authority, outside the spirit that was at first affirmed in
numerous interventions.”20 What de Lubac describes as a juridical hypno-
sis (and what O’Malley considers to have remained the central concern of
“the majority,” to which de Lubac belonged) fortunately did not prevent
the Council from moving forward in a manner focused upon the divine

18. Avery Dulles, SJ, The Survival of Dogma (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1971), 190.
19. John W. O’Malley, SJ, What Happened at Vatican II (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer-
sity Press, 2008), 312.
20. De Lubac, At the Service of the Church, 341.

212 C on c l u s ion
revelation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. No fair reader could accuse Vati-
can II’s Constitutions of what Congar calls “horizontalism.”21
Attention to the opening sentences of each Constitution should make
clear their Christological focus, so well exhibited by Robert Imbelli in Re-
kindling the Christic Imagination.22 Dei Verbum commits the Church to
“reverent attention and confident proclamation” of the word of God and
expresses the goal of setting “forth authentic teaching on God’s revelation
and how it is communicated, desiring that the whole world may hear the
message of salvation, and thus grow from hearing to faith, from faith to
hope, and from hope to love” (§1).23 Sacrosanctum Concilium introduces
its reflections by observing that “the liturgy, through which, especially in
the divine sacrifice of the Eucharist, ‘the act of our redemption is being
carried out,’ ” is “the chief means through which believers are expressing
21. In “A Last Look at the Council,” Congar grants that “Vatican II was to some extent respon-
sible” for the postconciliar crisis, but he notes that the actual content of the Council is not to blame
even though the reforms did allow for misinterpretations to arise: “The mere fact that there was a
Council and open discussion has contributed to it [the crisis]. Then there were repercussions, brought
about and amplified by the modern means of communication. . . . The Council was open to contribu-
tions that had for so long been overlooked, excluded or condemned. It was also healthily self-critical
in the light of the demands made by the Gospel and the Church’s essential mission. These factors
meant that the unconditional nature of the system inherited from the Counter-Reformation and the
anti-revolutionary restoration of the nineteenth century was completely overcome at Vatican II. The
result of the collapse of that system was that ideas and attitudes that had for too long been held at a
safe distance entered the Church through the open doors and windows of the Council. And the crisis
also entered that way” (Congar, “A Last Look at the Council,” 351–52). Congar remains optimistic,
however, that the Council has brought about a renewed ecclesiology that is rooted in believers (clergy
and laity) embracing the faith with a new “personal choice motivated by deep conviction” (ibid., 353).
22. See Robert P. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination: Theological Meditations for the
New Evangelization (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2014).
23. Dei Verbum §1, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2: Trent to Vatican II, ed. Norman
P. Tanner, SJ (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1990), 971–72. As Dei Verbum
says, our response to the word of God must be “ ‘the obedience of faith’ (see Rm 16, 26; compare
Rm 1, 5; 2 Cor 10, 5–6),” and Dei Verbum defines faith as “a total and free self-commitment to God,
offering ‘the full submission of intellect and will to God as he reveals’, and willingly assenting to the
revelation he gives” (§5; in ibid., 973). For further discussion see Jared Wicks, SJ, “The Levels of
Teaching by the Catholic Magisterium,” in Wicks, Doing Theology (New York: Paulist Press, 2009),
237–39; see also in Doing Theology his analysis of “The Theologian and Magisterial Teaching,” 110–
15, especially in his account of how doctrine, in the act of faith, enables believers to share in “the
death and resurrection of Christ to new life, a life he still lives for us and for our salvation” (Wicks,
Doing Theology, 114). Wicks is concerned that an emphasis on the need to assent to Church doc-
trine not cause us to neglect the fact that doctrine directs us to an eschatological consummation
in which we will see God face-to-face. Here I would underscore the mediating role of doctrine in
faith’s (liturgical) assent to God.

C o nclu s i o n 213
in their lives and demonstrating to others the mystery which is Christ,
and the sort of entity the true Church really is” (§2).24 Likewise, the open-
ing sentence of Lumen Gentium proclaims: “Since Christ is the light of
the nations, this holy synod, called together in the Holy Spirit, strongly
desires to enlighten all people with his brightness, which gleams over the
face of the Church, by preaching the gospel to every creature” so that the
human race may “attain full unity in Christ” (§1).25 Lastly, Gaudium et
Spes begins with the observation that the community of believers “is com-
posed of people united in Christ who are directed by the Holy Spirit in
their pilgrimage towards the Father’s kingdom and who have received the
message of salvation to be communicated to everyone” (§1).26
Massimo Faggioli misses the mark, therefore, when he interprets the
entirety of the Council as being about reforming “the institutions of the
Church” so as to prepare “a ground for a world Church, able to take the tra-
dition from its European past but unwilling to be a prisoner of its histo-
ry.”27 Lacking from this perspective is an account of the Church’s handing
on of divine revelation (as distinct from the tradition’s “European past”).
It is the handing on of the true gospel of Jesus Christ that makes the
Church inexhaustibly “catholic” or universal, which differs significantly
from the geopolitical status suggested by the phrase “world Church.” De-
spite the fact that Vatican II was so urgently concerned with the gospel
of Christ, Faggioli’s discussions of Vatican II rarely address the gospel ex-
plicitly.
The problem is that when intra-ecclesiastical power becomes the focus
of historiography, Vatican II inevitably appears to be centered on commu-
nity rather than on Christ, whereas in fact in the conciliar Constitutions
the opposite is the case (thereby enabling the Constitutions to apprehend
rightly the mystery of the Church). Maureen Sullivan concludes her The
Road to Vatican II: Key Changes in Theology by quoting Karl Rahner’s
statement that “the Council was the beginning of the beginning.”28 But if

24. Sacrosanctum Concilium, §2, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2, 820.
25. Lumen Gentium, §1, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2, 849.
26. Gaudium et Spes, §1, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, 1069.
27. Massimo Faggioli, True Reform: Liturgy and Ecclesiology in Sacrosanctum Concilium
(Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2012), 144.
28. Maureen Sullivan, OP, The Road to Vatican II: Key Changes in Theology (New York: Paulist

214 C on c l u s ion
the Council was truly the beginning of the beginning, then Jesus has been
displaced. Paul Lakeland observes, “In an age when absolute monarchies
are a thing of the past and most if not all of us live in at least some kind
of democracy, our Church is the one anachronistic holdout, insisting on
maintaining a structure that is directly responsible for many if not most
of our ills.”29 Lakeland knows that this view cannot be squared with the
Constitutions’ repeated teaching that Jesus himself established the hier-
archical Church, but he blames “the incompleteness of Lumen Gentium’s
ecclesiological tradition.”30 He grants that “[w]e are immediately made
aware by the Council fathers that it is Christ, not the Church, that should
always be the center of our attention.”31 But in his view this means essen-
tially that the Church has exaggerated and misunderstood its own status
from the beginning. As he says, “To borrow some phrases from the work
of Juan Luis Segundo, the realm of grace is ‘the community of redemp-
tion,’ which is the entire world, not only ‘the community of revelation,’
which is the Church.”32
This sharp distinction between the world/redemption and the Church/
revelation cuts against the grain of the Constitutions of Vatican II, because
divine revelation—as the gospel of Jesus Christ—is never (least of all by
Jesus) separated from redemption in this way. When Christ is the center,
then his Body and People, the Church, will also be at the center, since he
enables us to participate in him. From the perspective of Vatican II, it is not
adequate to say, as Lakeland does, that “[t]he Church’s mission is not to give
grace, as if it were pouring water on a parched land, but to meet grace with
grace in an embrace that pours grace on a fertile land, while at the same time
the Church drinks from the wells that it encounters there.”33 Rather, Vati-
can II insists that the world needs Christ and his Spirit because the world

Press, 2007), 122, quoting Karl Rahner, SJ, “The Council: A New Beginning,” in The Church after
the Council (New York: Herder and Herder, 1966), 9–33, at 19.
29. Paul Lakeland, A Council That Will Never End: Lumen Gentium and the Church Today
(Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2013), 138.
30. Ibid., 148.
31. Ibid., 152.
32. Ibid., 153, citing Segundo’s Theology for Artisans of a New Humanity: The Community
Called Church, vol. 1 (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1973).
33. Lakeland, A Council That Will Never End, 154.

C o nclu s i o n 215
(of which Christians are a part) is often “a parched land.” The Church’s mis-
sion—in the Eucharistic liturgy, in baptism and the other sacraments, in
preaching, in the works of mercy—is to make Christ present in the world
and thereby to renew the “parched land” that we are.
To avoid misunderstandings of the Council, it is therefore helpful to
identify the main concerns that motivated the drafters of the Council’s
documents. I have tried to show that these concerns included most no-
tably personal encounter with Christ as mediated to us in Scripture and
Tradition, active liturgical participation in Christ’s Paschal mystery, true
reform of the Church so as to purify the human elements and illuminate
the divine elements, and the God-given orientation of the world toward
fulfillment in Christ. Within these parameters, the Council allows for
plenty of leeway. A personalist view of revelation is essential, as Dei Ver-
bum emphasizes, but neglect of the cognitive or propositional dimen-
sion of revelation would obscure the self-revealing God and would leave
us with agnosticism rather than mystery. Active participation in the lit-
urgy is essential, as Sacrosanctum Concilium insists, but the view that ac-
tive participation requires facing east together remains possible. Reform
of the Church is essential, as Lumen Gentium shows, but if such reform
leads one to suppose that the Church has no divinely given constitution
and that everything is changeable and depends upon who has the the
power, then one has fallen afresh into a juridical ecclesiology that can
produce only false reform. The profound connection of nature and grace
(and world and Church) is essential, but a specific view of the natural de-
sire for the supernatural is not required by Gaudium et Spes.
In his An Unfinished Council: Vatican II, Pope Francis, and the Renew-
al of Catholicism, Richard Gaillardetz helpfully affirms that the “necessary
transformation of ecclesiastical structures” must not be an “accommodation
to the values of the secular world” but must instead be “the necessary re-
form of a church that wishes to be more deeply rooted in the radical values
of the Christian Gospel.”34 In the opening chapter of his book, Gaillardetz
critiques five “hierocratic” pillars of the preconciliar Church: “(1) a propo-

34. Richard R. Gaillardetz, An Unfinished Council: Vatican II, Pope Francis, and the Renewal of
Catholicism (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2015), 155–56.

216 C on c lu s ion
sitional theology of divine revelation, (2) a papo-centric church leadership
structure, (3) a sacral priesthood, (4) a mechanistic theology of grace and
the sacraments, and (5) a confrontational attitude toward the world.”35 Vati-
can II clearly eschews propositionalist understandings of revelation (op-
posed by Dei Verbum), papo-centrism and a hierarchical priesthood rooted
only in the sanctifying office rather than also in the prophetic and royal
offices (opposed by Lumen Gentium), mechanistic understandings of the
liturgy (opposed by Sacrosanctum Concilium), and a condemnatory view of
the world as though grace were present only in the confines of the visible
Church (opposed by Gaudium et Spes).
Gaillardetz would do well to add, however, that Vatican II also teach-
es that divine revelation is propositionally intelligible (Dei Verbum), that
the pope authoritatively interprets the gospel for the Church and can
do so in propria persona (Lumen Gentium), that the hierarchical priest-
hood’s sanctifying office and celebration of the Eucharistic sacrifice are
central (Lumen Gentium and Sacrosanctum Concilium), that the sacra-
ments cause the transformative influx of the grace of the Holy Spirit in
believers (Sacrosanctum Concilium), and that the world is fallen and fre-
quently stands in opposition to the gospel (Gaudium et Spes). One will
not be able to perceive or embrace the authoritative true reform if one
does not equally perceive and embrace the authoritative continuity in
teaching. Similarly, Gaillardetz’s concerns about the alleged resurgence
of “neoclericalism” and “preconciliar triumphalism” and “confrontational
rhetoric” in the pontificates of John Paul II and Benedict XVI need to
be balanced by careful attention to the doctrinal and moral content that
the two popes were teaching and to the close relationship of this content
to the actual teachings of the four Constitutions.36 Otherwise, misunder-
standings and strawmen will take the place of real discussion, as in Gail-
lardetz’s odd refutation of “any arrogant claim that church doctrine pro-
vides a comprehensive grasp of divine revelation in favor of a stance of
receptivity toward the revealing God”—since no one actually affirms that

35. Ibid., 4.
36. Ibid., 69–70. See also the richly nuanced essay of Gilles Pelland, SJ, “A Few Words on
Triumphalism,” trans. Leslie Wearne, in Vatican II: Assessment and Perspectives, vol. 1, ed. René La-
tourelle, SJ, 106–22.

C o n clu s i o n 217
the Church’s “grasp of divine revelation” is now exhaustively “compre-
hensive” or that the Church’s “grasp of divine revelation” could be rooted
otherwise than in “a stance of receptivity toward the revealing God.”37
Gaillardetz goes on to argue that “[t]he church can claim genuine in-
sight, drawn from revelation, without pretending it is a divinely sanctioned
‘answer box’ for all the world’s problems,” and he adds that the Church is
plagued by doctrinal and moral “positions that are no longer compelling
and fairly beg honest questions.”38 While of course Christ’s Church must
not be reduced to an “answer box,” my concern here is twofold. First, believ-
ers need to be able to know what the “genuine insights” of divine revelation
actually are, so that we can obey and worship the God who reveals his sav-

37. Gaillardetz, An Unfinished Council, 84–85.

38. Ibid., 86–87. In a recent essay, Gaillardetz explains further that the Council’s “rich theol-
ogy of revelation inserts doctrine within the broader framework of God’s sharing of God’s self with
humanity. This recontextualization of doctrine invites a form of doctrinal humility. . . . This doctri-
nal humility is evident in the Council’s insistence that Revelation not be treated as a divine answer
book providing definitive solutions to all the questions of our time. . . . [T]he Council introduced a
crucial distinction [via the notion of the “hierarchy of truths”] between the content of divine revela-
tion, understood as God’s self-communication in Christ by the power of the Spirit, and those church
doctrines that, in varying degrees, mediate that content. In this context, doctrinal humility means
recognizing that, although church doctrine may mediate divine revelation, it never exhausts it”
(Gaillardetz, “The Pastoral Orientation of Doctrine,” in Go into the Streets! The Welcoming Church of
Pope Francis, ed. Thomas P. Rausch, SJ, and Richard R. Gaillardetz [New York: Paulist Press, 2016],
125–40, at 128). Gaillardetz’s strong distinction between the “content” of divine revelation and “doc-
trines that, in varying degrees, mediate that content” is not sufficiently precise to capture the actual
teaching of Dei Verbum, since Gaillardetz’s way of phrasing it risks bypassing the cognitive dimen-
sion of the personal “content” of divine revelation, and thus of the intrinsic bond between mediating
doctrines and the actual divine revelation. Of course, as Gaillardetz says, “the church must always
be open to the possibility that a doctrine may need to be reformulated in ways that better express
its deep meaning and that are more conducive to its proper communication in the modern age”
(Gaillardetz, “The Pastoral Orientation of Doctrine,” 127). When Gaillardetz responds to those who
hope that Pope Francis will “reverse this or that controverted church teaching” by stating that “his-
tory shows that doctrine changes when pastoral contexts shift and new insights emerge such that
particular doctrinal formulations no longer mediate the saving message of God’s transforming love”
(Gaillardetz, “The Pastoral Orientation of Doctrine,”, 137), the consequences of sharply separating
“doctrine” from the “content” of revelation are manifest, since the fundamental question is whether
“doctrinal formulations” are true. In fact, the content of the “saving message” and of “God’s trans-
forming love” was spelled out in great detail in the apostolic period, and there never was a “saving
message” without this cognitive content. Furthermore, the claim that “doctrinal formulations no
longer mediate the saving message” raises the issue of whether they ever did: are we dealing here
with development of doctrine or with doctrinal corruption? With regard to such “doctrinal formu-
lations,” Gaillardetz gives the example of usury, but he does not clarify whether he thinks that the
Church taught definitively about usury along lines that now the Church definitively rejects.

218 C on c l u sion
ing Word. The standard for such faith-knowledge must be more than the
determination that certain teachings are for many people “no longer com-
pelling.” The fact that Gaillardetz is known for his work on the Church’s
Magisterium makes the looseness of his formulations here particularly trou-
bling. Second, what is the status of the specific doctrinal and moral teach-
ings of the four Constitutions of Vatican II? Should they command the
obedient assent of believers, and if so, on what grounds? Or can the Coun-
cil’s teachings about the doctrinal and moral requisites of following Jesus
Christ be placed, if one disagrees with these teachings, among what Gaillar-
detz calls “the many compromises made to mollify the conservative minor-
ity”?39 For example, must Catholics affirm in faith the teaching of Lumen
Gentium that “[t]hrough this sense of faith which is aroused and sustained
by the Spirit of truth, the people of God, under the guidance of the sacred
magisterium to which it is faithfully obedient, receives no longer the words
of human beings but truly the word of God (see 1 Th 2:13)”?40
Gaillardetz is right to appreciate the Council’s “noncompetitive ac-
count of the relationship between pope and bishops.”41 But what happens if
or when a number of bishops in one country or region begin to take pasto-
ral steps that have moral and doctrinal import, and other bishops from oth-
er countries and regions deny that these steps accord with true holiness and
true discipleship to Jesus Christ? If the pope intervenes against (or favors)
one group of bishops over the other, will not the spurned group of bishops
find the pope’s exercise of authority to be negatively “competitive”? Gail-
lardetz similarly dodges the real issue when he observes, “Revelation, the
council teaches, begins not with a collection of doctrines but with God’s
Word. This Word is offered as an event of divine self-communication.”42 In

39. Gaillardetz, An Unfinished Council, 96.

40. Lumen Gentium, §12, in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 2, 858.
41. Gaillardetz, An Unfinished Council, 96.
42. Ibid., 99. In his “The Pastoral Orientation of Doctrine,” Gaillardetz notes that the “more
formal, propositional language inevitably puts doctrine at several degrees of abstraction from the
gospel as it is experienced concretely in the life of discipleship” (Gaillardetz, “The Pastoral Orienta-
tion of Doctrine,” 132), but the key is what “several degrees of abstraction” means. If it means that a
doctrinal truth (for example, “the Son is consubstantial with the Father”) is separate from believers’
concrete experience of the saving reality that it describes (in this case, the divine Son), then this
would be a misunderstanding of the way in which doctrine, in the act of faith, serves to unite the
believer concretely to saving realities.

C o n clu s i o n 219
fact, an “event of divine self-communication” must include ideas that are
communicated, and indeed this is what “a collection of doctrines” funda-
mentally is.
Even if not intentionally, Gaillardetz helps us to see that the Church
has a problem regarding divine revelation and its authority that no amount
of ecclesiastical power-restructuring can resolve. Modern people know
that Scripture is the product of many human authors and redactors from a
wide array of time periods and worldviews, culminating in the eschatologi-
cal fervor of the late Second Temple period. Modern people also under-
stand that the Church has existed in many different cultures, has changed
significantly over time in terms of its practices and doctrines, and has suf-
fered from strife and divisions. Why then should modern people accept
the teaching of Scripture and the Church as the authoritative word of God
for their lives?43 This is the problem facing Christianity in many areas of
the world today.
Fortunately, the Second Vatican Council addressed this problem in
profoundly helpful ways. The reforms mandated by the Council assist
modern people in perceiving that the gospel of Jesus Christ—as liturgi-
cally mediated in Scripture and Tradition by the Church—is true and
life-giving. The four Constitutions insist upon the reality and authority
of divine revelation. It is this salvific content of faith, expressive of the
Person of Jesus Christ, that therefore should be central in books on the
Council.
Drawing upon the homilies of Pope Francis, Robert Imbelli reminds
us: “The church’s distinctive mission is its witness and call to the world to
find its deepest transformation and true life in Christ for the greater Glory
of God—the glory revealed fully on the Face of Jesus Christ.”44 Our shar-

43. In his By What Authority? A Primer on Scripture, the Magisterium, and the Sense of the
Faithful, Gaillardetz suggests his affinity for the view that “the irreversibility of certain of the
Church’s teachings” flows from “the exercise of infallibility as an exceptional instance in which ele-
ments of church tradition, understood in the literal sense, are excluded from the possibility of dra-
matic reversal” (Gaillardetz, By What Authority? A Primer on Scripture, the Magisterium, and the
Sense of the Faithful [Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 2003], 51). Even if Vatican II’s Constitu-
tions counted as such an “exceptional instance,” Gaillardetz’s position does not exude confidence in
the fidelity of the contemporary Church’s mediation of divine revelation.
44. Imbelli, Rekindling the Christic Imagination, 96.

220 C on c lu s ion
ing in this glory revealed in Christ, who forgives and heals our sinfulness
and opens up the very life of the triune God to us, is what the Constitu-
tions of Vatican II are ultimately about. This is the test of every interpre-
tation of the Council: the ongoing theological event of Vatican II, as an
event of the Church’s faithful handing on of the apostolic gospel, must
have Jesus Christ at its center. “For no other foundation can any one lay
than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Cor 3:11).

C o n clu s i o n 221
B i b l i og r a p hy
B i b l i og r a p hy

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INDEX

abortion, 161 Benedict XVI, Pope, 3n10, 9, 180, 184–87,

Abraham, 42 188n43, 189–94, 196–97, 203, 204n87,
Acerbi, Antonio, 186n38 217
active participation, 6, 10–13, 18, 50–51, Berkouwer, G. C., 17n35
53–54, 59–64, 67–72, 74–80, 206–7, 216 Bernard of Clairvaux, 141
Adam, 152; as type of Christ, 152 Berzosa Martinez, Raul, 137n10
Ad Gentes, 12, 115n109, 159, 208 birth control, 212
aggiornamento, 19, 174n1, 178–79, 184n31, Blanchard, Shaun, 13n25
187, 191n53, 209 Blondel, Maurice, 19n38, 192, 196
Alberigo, Giuseppe, 14, 15n30, 177, 185, 187, Boeve, Lieven, 24
189, 191, 193 Bologna Schools, 189
altar: freestanding, 53n13 Borromeo, Charles, 101n73
analogy of faith, 42, 194n60 Bouillard, Henri, 212
Anointing of the Sick, 73, 113 Bouyer, Louis, 10, 12, 51–64, 65n64, 67, 69,
anthropology: christological, 170; theologi- 71–72, 75–79
cal, 11, 200 Boyer, Charles, 140n24
Antonelli, Cesare, 126n120 Boyer, Mark G., 53n13
apostles: commissioning of, 43, 65, 116; as Braine, David, 46n64, 137n11
witnesses of revelation, 28, 31, 34 Bugnini, Annibale, 77n74
Apostolicam Actuositatem, 12, 121n116, 208 Burke-Sullivan, Eileen, 172n76, 194n60
Aristotle, 145
atheism, 8, 135, 151, 169 Cajetan, 139, 145
Aubry, Augustin-Marie, 118n112 capitalism, 163
Augustine, 151 Casel, Odo, 51
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 20–21
Baius, Michael, 144 Cessario, Romanus, 100n68
baptism, 66, 75, 91, 110–12, 114, 117, 122, 216; Chantraine, Georges, 137n10
of infants, 73 Chenu, Marie-Dominique, 198
Barth, Karl, 17n35, 171n72, 202n82 Church: as body of Christ, 13, 81, 86, 89, 91,
Bea, Augustin, 22n6 93, 110, 119, 215; as bride of Christ, 89, 91,
Beal, Rose, 81 93, 109; Christ-given authority to teach,
beatific vision, 125, 139, 141–43, 146, 213n23 2n3; heavenly, 8; hierarchical constitution
Beauduin, Lambert, 51 of, 8, 87, 92, 95, 106–7, 114, 116, 128–30,
Bellarmine, Robert, 205 182, 205, 208, 215; holiness of, 89–90,

239
 Church: as body of Christ, (cont.) 33–49, 177–78, 181–82, 193, 213, 217,
92–96, 98, 107–8, 111, 122–24, 127, 129, 218n38
132; infallibility of, 93, 96–97; as inter- De Lubac, Henri, 3n10, 4n12, 5, 10, 12, 16,
preter of Scripture, 42; marks of, 129; as 22n6, 30, 53n14, 126n120, 129, 134–47,
Mystical Body, 11, 66, 94, 109–10, 204; as 152, 168–72, 179n13, 182, 184, 197–98,
people of God, 3n10, 39, 42, 55, 81, 85, 89, 202n82, 207–12
95, 98, 111–15, 133, 149, 215, 219; as perfecta De Moulins-Beaufort, Eric, 178n10
societas, 204; as personal reality, 40; re- Denysenko, Nicholas, 19, 50n1
forming the Church’s external structure, deposit of faith, 27, 47, 91, 99, 104, 106–7,
2n3, 3, 6, 216; as sacrament of salvation, 9, 118, 188n44
92, 124; as sacrament of the world, 171; as Descoqs, Pedro, 140n24
sacrament of unity, 78, 107, 112; as temple development of doctrine, 48n70, 96, 116,
of the Spirit, 81, 91, 112, 116 134n2, 181n19, 204, 218n38
Church-state relations, 165 Dignitatis Humanae, 7, 12, 122n118, 165n57,
Christus Dominus, 7, 12, 114n106, 116n110, 208
119n113, 208 direction of liturgical prayer, 10, 53, 56–58,
Chrysostom, John, 42 60–62, 64, 76–80, 216; facing East,
Cimorelli, Christopher, 132n140 56–58, 61, 64, 76, 78–80, 216; facing the
Clifford, Catherine, 7–9 people, 10, 53, 60–62, 77
collegiality. See episcopal collegiality discontinuity. See doctrinal rupture
Comte, Auguste, 169 divine revelation. See revelation
Comte, Bernard, 137n10 Divini Cultus (Pius XI), 51
Confirmation, 73, 112 divorce, 160
Congar, Yves, 4n12, 5, 10, 12, 16, 17n35, doctrinal continuity, 4n12, 5, 187–88, 190,
19n37, 48n70, 81–107, 109, 117, 128–32, 192–94, 203–4, 211n15, 217
136, 179n13, 180n14, 183n28, 186n38, 188, doctrinal rupture, 4n12, 5, 47–48, 191, 194,
193, 198, 201n80, 209–13 196, 218n38
Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. See dogma, 24, 48, 86–88, 96, 98, 130, 133, 179,
Sacrosanctum Concilium 207, 212; adequation to revelation, 24,
continuity. See doctrinal continuity 132n140; irreformability of, 212
contraception. See birth control Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revela-
covenant, 25, 55, 67, 91, 99, 112, 120, 160 tion. See Dei Verbum
Cross, 11, 31–32, 37, 53n13, 54, 66, 71, 107, 123, Dogmatic Constitution on the Church. See
127, 154, 169, 172 Lumen Gentium
Cullman, Oscar, 2n3, 17n35, 209 domestic church, 113
culture: legitimate autonomy of, 163 Dominus Iesus (Congregation for the Doc-
Cunningham, Lawrence, 208 trine of the Faith), 175n2
curia, 7n18, 16n33 Douthat, Ross, 201n80
Duffy, Eamon, 60n48, 62n54
Daniélou, Jean, 30 Dulles, Avery, 4n12, 5, 83n7, 86, 180, 186,
Danneels, Godfried Cardinal, 177 188, 212
D’Costa, Gavin, 7n18
deacons, 120; permanent diaconate, 120 Ecclesiam Suam (Paul VI), 1, 3, 178n11
death, human, 37, 150, 156 ecclesiology: communio ecclesiology, 3n10;
debitum naturae, 141 ecclesiological horizontalism, 7n16, 210,
De Chirico, Leonardo, 17n35 213; ecclesiology of communion, 185, 196;
deification, 35, 108 missiological ecclesiology, 195; political
Dei Filius (Vatican I), 23, 25, 29n36 decentralization in, 194–97, 206
Dei Verbum, 6–8, 10–11, 13n25, 14, 20–25, Echeverria, Eduardo J., 132n140

240 index
economy of salvation, 8, 25, 147 French Revolution, 191n53, 200n78
ecumenical dialogue. See ecumenism fundamental theology, 11
ecumenism, 7n18, 12, 17, 100n70, 104, 167,
184, 195–97 Gaillardetz, Richard, 7–9, 47–48, 171n72,
episcopacy, 116–19, 123, 133, 158, 219; as 216, 218–20
successors of the apostles, 116–17. See also Galot, Jean, 14n26
power distribution between pope and Garrigou-Lagrange, Réginald, 29
bishops Gaudium et Spes, 6–11, 14n26, 17n14,
episcopal collegiality, 3n10, 116, 117–18, 134–137, 147–69, 181–83, 194, 198–200,
212 211n16, 214, 217
Erasmus, 100 genocide, 166
Eucharist, 11, 34, 53n13, 54–55, 57–62, 64, George, Timothy, 17n35
66–67, 71, 80, 107–8, 110, 112, 114–15, Gertler, Thomas, 17n34, 171n76
119–20, 124, 155, 181n19, 182, 205, 213, Gilson, Étienne, 141n26
217; communion under both kinds, 64, grace, 6, 10, 12, 14, 36–37, 94–95, 98, 114–15,
72; frequency of reception of, 60, 64, 126–27, 133–35, 137–47, 150–51, 153–60,
72; sacrifice of, 53n13, 57–58, 64, 66–67, 162–64, 166–68, 171, 183, 207, 215, 217;
71, 76, 107, 112, 115, 120, 125, 213, 217; means of, 94–95, 98; nature and, 134–35,
tabernacle, 75 137–39, 147, 153, 161, 164, 171–72, 207,
Eucharistic adoration, 54 216; state of, 158
Eucharistic prayer, 10, 53n13, 61–64, 72, 80 Gravissimum Educationis, 12, 163n56, 208
evangelical counsels, 122–23 Gregorian chant, 74
Evangelii Gaudium (Pope Francis), 3 Gregory the Great, 59, 61
evangelization, 3, 16, 115 Grillmeier, Alois, 84
Evennett, H. Outram, 106n97 Grummett, David, 137n11
exegesis: historical-critical, 193 Guardini, Romano, 51
extrinsicism, 143 Guarino, Thomas G., 19n37
Guitton, Jean, 209
facing the people. See direction of liturgical Gy, Pierre-Marie, 51
prayer
Faggioli, Massimo, 12, 174–75, 184–99, Haight, Roger, 198n74
205–6, 214 Hanvey, James, 203–5
faith, 3, 66, 91–92, 109, 114, 117, 122, 129, 152, Healy, Nicholas J., Jr., 7n18, 48n70, 137n11
205, 213; invitation to, 3; obedience of, 8, hermeneutic of continuity. See doctrinal
47, 205, 213n23; and reason, 34 continuity
the fall, 36 Hilberath, Bernd Jochen, 14
Famerée, Joseph, 82n5 Hinojosa, Clara Dina, 76n71
Feingold, Lawrence, 137n11 historical consciousness, 11, 13, 184, 193
Feister, John, 76 history of salvation, 12
Fessard, Gaston, 30 Holy Orders, sacrament of, 73, 113, 116, 120
Feuerbach, Ludwig, 169 Holy Spirit: gifts of, 110, 113; guidance of, 1,
Figoureux, Loïc, 136n6, 210n10 39, 47, 194n60; inspiration of, 1; sending
First Vatican Council, 23, 34, 45, 116, of, 8, 37–38, 43, 91, 109, 181
188n44 Honorius, Pope, 97
Flynn, Gabriel, 6, 82n4, 85 Humanae Vitae (Paul VI), 175n2
Fouilloux, Étienne, 100n70 humanism, 162, 169
Francis, Pope, 3, 83n9, 184–85, 195, 218n38, human nature, 10, 12, 14, 161–62; as fallen, 14
220 Hünermann, Peter, 14
Frein, Brigid Curtin, 24n16 Hütter, Reinhard, 137n11, 198n74

i n d ex 241
iconography, 62 Komonchak, Joseph, 4, 19n37, 129n122,
image of God, 141, 150, 152–53; soul as image 171n70, 179n13, 189n46, 191, 198n74
of the Trinity, 141 Küng, Hans, 186, 208, 210
Imbelli, Robert P., 3n10, 12, 174–86, 190,
196–97, 199–200, 205, 213, 220 Ladaria, Luis, 14n28
infallibility. See Church. See also papal laity: dignity of, 120; work of, 8, 121–22
infallibility Lakeland, Paul, 215
Inter Mirifica, 12, 121n117, 148, 208 Lamb, Matthew L., 184n31, 195n62
interreligious dialogue, 7n18, 12, 167, Langevin, Dominic M., 65n64
195–97 La Poterie, Ignace de, 24n16
Islam, 115 La Soujeole, Benoît-Dominique de, 111n103
Israel, 13, 24, 36, 49 Latourelle, René, 10, 12, 24–33, 45, 212
Lawler, Michael G., 172n76, 194n60
Jackson, Pamela, 51, 76n71 Lefebvre, Marcel, 188n44, 208
Jesus Christ: ascension of, 65; aversion to Léger, Paul-Émile, 83n9
the revelatory primacy of, 180; death Lehner, Ulrich L. 13n25
of, 45, 51, 57, 66, 71, 73, 109, 126, 153, Leo XIII, Pope, 17n35
175n2, 181, 213n23; earthly ministry of, Liberius, Pope, 97
26; as goal of history, 8; Incarnation of, Lindbeck, George A., 17n35
38, 42–43, 91, 110–11, 127, 170; as Jewish Liturgical Movement, 50–52, 64, 71, 76n71,
Messiah, 36, 46, 55–56, 180; as mediator, 105–6
36, 125, 127; Paschal Mystery of, 11, 13–14, liturgy, 6, 8, 14, 16, 26, 50n1, 51–52, 54–55,
45, 54, 64–66, 76–77, 80, 105–6, 152, 59, 61–72, 75–80, 87, 96, 104–5, 125, 128,
207, 216; Passion of, 57, 65, 73, 95; priestly 163, 178, 195, 206, 213, 216–17, 220; chang-
office, 11, 66, 121; prophetic office, 11, 121; es to the rites of, 69–76, 117; clericaliza-
Resurrection of, 14, 37, 54, 65, 71, 73, 95, tion of, 60–61, 63–64, 77–79; devotional
109, 122, 153–54, 161, 175n2, 181, 192n56, practices and, 54, 62, 67; Eastern, 62;
213n23; royal office, 11, 121; sacrifice of, eternal liturgy, 19, 80; inculturation of,
10, 55, 120, 127, 205; as Suffering Servant, 71, 74, 96, 103; as source and summit
46; as Word, 14, 29, 34–37, 90, 127, 151, of Christian life, 8; synagogue-church
159, 170, 181 transition as pertaining to, 54–59; use of
Jewish people, 13, 115 Latin, 96
John Paul II, Pope, 3n10, 4, 9, 135, 187, Liturgy of the Hours, 73, 76
189–90, 198n74, 217 Long, Steven A., 137n11
Johnson, Luke Timothy, 180 López, Antonio, 168
John XXIII, Pope, 2–3, 14, 16, 48, 60, Lumen Gentium, 6–8, 10–11, 13n25, 14n26,
82–83, 135, 174, 178n11, 187, 197, 209; 81–84, 86, 90, 107–33, 171, 177, 181–82,
decision to call the Council, 16, 82 194, 214–15, 217
Jossua, Jean-Pierre, 82n4 Luther, Martin, 91n38, 100, 102–3
Journet, Charles, 96
Judaism. See Jewish people Magisterium, 8, 40, 89, 102, 160, 200,
Jungmann, Josef, 51 211n16, 219; dissent from, 194, 196;
justification, 34 ordinary, 192n56
Malloy, Christopher J., 137n11
Kasper, Walter, 198n74 Mannion, Gerard, 3n10
Kieckhefer, Richard, 77 Marchetto, Agostino, 189
kingdom of God, 43, 94, 109, 124, 155; Mariology, 13
inauguration of, 43 marriage, 73, 113, 160–61, 194n60
Koch, Kurt, 204n87 Marshall, Bruce D., 201n80, 203n85

242 index
Marx, Karl, 169 Nostra Aetate, 7, 12, 115n108, 167n59, 208
Marxism, 151, 211n16 nouvelle théologie, 16, 86n21, 176, 197, 203,
Mary, 13n25, 74, 84, 92, 94–95, 114, 125–27; 205, 208–9, 211
cooperation with Christ in work of salva- Novak, Michael, 186
tion, 126–27; devotion to, 128; as icon of nuclear weapons, 166
the Church, 92, 126, 128; inclusion of in
Lumen Gentium, 126, 219; as mother of Oakes, Edward T., 137n11
God, 114, 127; as new Eve, 126; as virgin, Oakley, Francis, 188n44
114, 127 obediential potency, 145–46
matrimony. See marriage O’Collins, Gerald, 23, 86n21, 175n2, 177,
McBrien, Richard, 212 181n19
McDermott, John M., 15n29 O’Malley, John W., 4n12, 7n16, 14–16, 83n9,
Mediator Dei (Pius XII), 51–52, 72 84–85, 191, 192n56, 202n81, 212
Meszaros, Andrew, 5n13, 23n13, 86n18, Optatam Totius, 12, 120n114, 208
132n135, 195n65 Orientalium Ecclesiarum, 12, 113n105, 117,
metaphysics, 211n16 208
Mettepenningen, Jürgen, 211 original sin, 151
Miccoli, Giovanni, 190n49 Ottaviani, Alfredo, 83
Michel, Virgil, 51 Ouellet, Marc, 17–18
Miller, Charles E., 67n66, 76n73
Miller, Vincent J., 80n91 papacy, 16n33, 113, 116–18, 133, 191n53, 205,
Minch, Daniel, 132n140 212, 217, 219. See also power distribution
mission. See evangelization between pope and bishops
Modernism, 104, 211n17 papal infallibility, 34, 96, 116–18
modern world, 8, 11, 13–14, 158, 170, 176, 195, Paschal II, Pope, 97
197–98, 200n78, 201n80 Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the
Moeller, Charles, 84 Modern World. See Gaudium et Spes
Monotheletism, 97 Paul (apostle), 40, 49, 133
Moses: experience at Sinai, 26 Paul VI, Pope, 1, 2n3, 3, 14, 16, 60, 126n120,
Muratori, Lodovico, 13n25 175, 178n11, 184, 186n38, 188n44, 209
Murray, John Courtney, 83n9 Pelland, Gilles, 217n36
Mystici Corporis (Pius XII), 205 Penance, sacrament of, 73, 113
people of God. See church
natural beatitude, 140 Perfectae Caritatis, 12, 208
natural desire: to see God, 135–36, 137n11, periti: role of, 16n31
142–46, 216; for the supernatural, 137n11, Pesch, Otto Hermann, 15
144, 146, 216 Philips, Gérard, 15, 84, 131n131
natural knowledge of God, 38 Pié-Ninot, Salvador, 14n28
nature. See human nature Pius V, Pope, 211
Neufeld, Karl Heinz, 136n9, 209 Pius VII, Pope, 97
Neuhaus, Richard John, 186, 187n41 Pius X, Pope, 50, 67n66, 200n78, 211
Newman, John Henry, 4n12, 97, 181n19 Pius XI, Pope, 51, 72, 200n78
Nicea, Council of, 49 Pius XII, Pope, 51, 72, 205
Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed, 192n56 pluralism, 11; religious, 196
Nichols, Aidan, 29n35, 51, 52n8, 82n5 pneumatology: of aggiornamento, 4n12
Nietzsche, Friedrich, 169 polygamy, 160
1985 Extraordinary Synod of Bishops, 2, 21, pope. See papacy
180n14, 185–86 Portier, William, 170
Norwood, Donald W., 17n35 Power, David M., 53n14

i n d ex 243
power distribution between pope and bish- sacramentals, 72–73, 76
ops, 3n10, 7n18, 16n33, 17, 82, 85, 205–6, sacraments, 11, 54, 58, 65–66, 71–73, 76, 83,
214, 219–20 88–92, 96, 98–99, 107–10, 114, 116, 119,
predestination, 94 122, 129, 205, 207, 216–17
Presbyterorum Ordinis, 12, 120n114, 208 sacrifice, 54–57
priesthood: of all believers, 50n1, 68, 80, 85, Sacrosanctum Concilium, 6–8, 10–11, 13n25,
112, 181n19 14n26, 16, 50–54, 62, 64–77, 80, 181–82,
priests, 10, 44, 53, 58–64, 68–73, 78–80, 97, 194, 198, 213, 214n24, 217
115, 120, 123, 130, 158, 181n19, 182; priestly Salzman, Todd A., 171n76, 194n60
identity, 181n19 Sarah, Robert, 83n9
Protestant liberalism, 202n82 Scarisbrick, J. J., 85n14
Protestant Reformation, 90, 97, 101 Schenk, Richard, 15n30
Prügl, Thomas, 14n28 Schillebeeckx, Edward, 84, 129, 130n127, 171,
pure nature, 139–40, 142 188n44, 211
purgatory, 125 Schindler, David L., 7n18, 48n70, 136n7
Schlosser, Marianne, 14n28
Rahner, Karl, 83n9, 84, 198, 214 Schnackenburg, Rudolph, 84
Ramage, Matthew, 7n18 Scripture: adequation to revelation, 24;
Ratzinger, Joseph, 4n12, 5, 20–23, 24n16, 79, canon of, 40; human authors of, 40–42;
84, 179n13, 180, 187, 189, 191, 193n58, 194, inspiration of, 8, 33, 40–41; interpreta-
196–203, 209–11; role as peritus, 192 tion of, 8, 33, 40, 42; in the life of the
Reconciliation. See Penance, 113 Church, 33, 43; as soul of sacred theol-
Redemptor Hominis ( John Paul II), 198n74 ogy, 44
Reformation. See Protestant Reformation Second Vatican Council: American
Regnon, Théodore de, 139 neo-conservative interpretation of,
religious freedom, 7n18, 13, 48, 165, 184, 186–87, 191; Christological interpreta-
201n80 tion of, 176; evangelistic task of, 1, 13, 115,
religious liberty. See religious freedom 180, 214; historicist reception of, 175–76,
religious life, 44, 73, 85n16, 121–24, 208 187–88, 192–93, 196–97, 198n74, 206;
ressourcement, 19, 104n89, 105, 174n1, liberal narrative of, 186; traditionalist
178–79, 181–82, 191n53 narrative of, 186; true and false reform in,
revelation, 2n3, 9–13, 21–47, 49, 132, 176, 12, 196, 217
178–79, 181–82, 192–93, 197, 202, 208, Segundo, Juan Luis, 215
210, 214–20; as communicating God’s Semmelroth, Otto, 16, 84
Word, 26–27, 29, 219; as event, 26; as sensus fidei, 8, 113
personal encounter, 9–12, 22–25, 27–44, Sermon on the Mount, 45
46–47, 49, 182, 216, 218n38; as proposi- sexual revolution, 201n80
tional, 6, 9–12, 22–28, 30–44, 46–47, 49, sin, 37
216–17, 218n38, 219n42; transmission of, Smedt, Émile de, 84
8, 26, 33–34, 38–40 Smith, Innocent, 131n131
Richard of Chichester, 175n2 Smulders, Pieter, 16, 84
rights, human, 156–57 socialism, 163
Rousselot, Pierre, 139 Son: as consubstantial with the Father, 49;
Roy, Philippe J., 14n27 sending of, 8, 14n26
Ruddy, Christopher, 3n10, 6n15, 182n24, Suárez, Francisco, 141n26
210n9 subsistit in, 8, 110, 111n103
rupture. See doctrinal rupture Suenens, Léon-Joseph, 84
Rush, Ormond, 4n12, 48n72 Sullivan, Maureen, 131–32, 214
supernatural, 134, 140–41, 149

244 i n d ex
Syllabus Errorum (Pius IX), 200n78 usury: revision of doctrinal formulation of,
synod of bishops, 130 218n38

Taylor, Charles 46n64 Van Beeck, Frans Jozef, 182n25

Theobald, Christoph, 177 Vatican I. See First Vatican Council
Thiel, John, 47, 48n70 Vatican II. See Second Vatican Council
Thomas Aquinas, 140, 145–46 Vereb, Jerome-Michael, C.P., 7n18
Thompson, Augustine, 60n48, 62n54 Vismara, Paola, 13n25
Thompson, Daniel Speed, 188n44 vision of God. See beatific vision
Thönissen, Wolfgang, 209n8 Von Balthasar, Hans Urs, 21, 30, 85n16
Tillard, Jean-Marie, 186n37 Vonier, Anscar, 95
Tilley, Terrence W., 48n70, 48n72, 188n44 Vorgrimler, Herbert, 14
Toletus, Francisco, 139 Vosko, Richard, 77–78
Torrell, Jean–Pierre, 22n6
Tradition, 1, 4n12, 8, 20, 24, 26, 28, 38–40, Wahlberg, Mats, 9n22, 46–47
42, 47–49, 54, 88, 103–5, 131, 178, 187, Walter, Peter, 188n43
188n44, 191–92, 194, 205–8, 211, 214, 216, Weigel, George, 82n5, 186
220; Church as living subject of, 104; Wenzel, Knut, 15
historicization of, 187 White, Thomas Joseph, 19n37, 82n5,
Trent, Council of, 34, 82n5, 87, 90, 101n73, 129n124, 137n11
106n97, 211 Wicks, Jared, 14, 16n31, 17n35, 82n5, 86n20,
Trinity, 29, 34, 36, 91, 124–25, 128, 141, 156, 115n107, 134n2, 135n5, 171n70, 174n1, 177,
179, 181, 221 213n23
triune God. See Trinity Wintz, Jack, 76
Turbanti, Giovanni, 134n2 Wojtyła, Karol, 4, 186
Wood, Susan, 134
Unitatis Redintegratio, 7, 12, 115n107, 167n58,
208 year, liturgical, 73–74; Good Friday, 74;
universal call to holiness, 3n10, 8, 12–13, 78, Holy Saturday, 74; Lent, 74
82–83, 122, 182

i n d ex 245
}
An Introduction to Vatican II as an Ongoing Theological Event was
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