By Scott Ferrier, MJ • Phoenix, AZ

The challenge facing the Church at the beginning of the Second Vatican Council was daunting. The Church, “in the world but not of the world”, the Reign of God on earth, was nonetheless herself facing disunity and dissent. The Church and religious faith in God were losing ground as having relevance to persons in the modern world—often despised and opposed and seen as impeding man’s ‘progress’. Objective truth was now the domain of science and technology. It was “a new stage of history with profound and rapid changes” (Gaudium et Spes, 4). There was the risk of a split between a pre-Conciliar Church and a post-Conciliar one. So, there were two needs before the Council—overcoming the divisions within Christianity and how to express the Gospel anew to a world which had grown indifferent to the message of salvation.

The Church’s response was to first look upon her own mystery through a self-awareness and doctrinal penetration in order to be reminded of her origin, nature, identity, mission, and destiny. Christ is “the light of the nations” (Lumen Gentium) and the Church is called to bear witness to the Light. Her doctrine is not her own but is from the One who sent her. The question before the Fathers was how to proclaim the mystery of Christ in response to the new situations of contemporary culture with all its aspirations and problems. There was a need for a new impetus in evangelization. But the Church recognized that she first had to be evangelized if she was to evangelize. The importance of the role of the laity in the Church’s mission and the universal call to holiness were emphasized. An ecclesiology of communion, always there, surfaced. Renewed, she turned to the world, understanding that she must discern the signs of the times and interpret them in the light of the Gospel, engaging in a ‘dialogue of salvation’, not only to answer the hopes, desires and sufferings of this life, but to help others on the journey to supernatural beatitude. The Church was firmly convicted by her supernatural faith and by Revelation that Christ was indeed truly relevant to modern man.

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