We have all lived through a period of great change. There have been changes in Church life but there have also been enormous changes in our society. I would like to highlight here one particular change of importance to our lives and the life of the Church.
For the first time in history – as far as we know – there has been a change from societies which were explicitly religious to societies which are explicitly non-religious. There have been many changes from one religious tradition to another but there has never before been a change from a society which took God for granted to a society which prescinds from the existence of God. There are of course many people who believe in God in our society but at the social and cultural and political level, our society makes no reference to God. This has been a huge change in the history of Christianity. During most of Christian history God was built into the way all societies worked and the way people thought. This alignment of Christianity and society goes all the way back to the fourth and fifth centuries as the Roman Emperors – beginning with Constantine – promoted Christianity as the religion of the whole Roman Empire.
The above change I believe is the biggest factor in many of the difficulties and new experiences that are part of our lives today. We are in a position not unlike that of the first three centuries of Christianity where there was no societal backup to being a Christian. There is a positive side to this change which will be highlighted as this series continues; it is not a time to be nostalgic for the past.
The Second Vatican Council saw meeting this new situation as its major task. And that Council remains a watershed in our history. The document on the Church in the Contemporary Word called Gaudium et Spes was the critical document dealing with the new situation. The other document that we will often refer to in this new series of “Who do we think we are?” is the document on the Church itself which is called Lumen Gentium.
Published: 28 June 2024
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Mike Lescai says:
Thank you. You encapsulate so much of the root of problems in our society.