Responses to some questions
About those Vatican responses that were supposed to clear up questions on Church doctrine, but instead precipitated widespread confusion…
Let’s try to add more clarity.
First, here’s the document. Scroll down for the English. It was written mainly for theologians, which is why the press is having such a tough time trying to understand it. Actually, many of them are distinctly not trying to understand it, they’re using it as another occasion to pile on…
So then, here are some resources that will help you understand what the Church teaches about what the Church is, and to explain to angry friends that ultimately, it is the Body of Christ.
Many people misunderstand the nature of this teaching.
Indifferentists, going to one extreme, claim that it makes no difference what church one belongs to. Certain radical traditionalists, going to the other extreme, claim that unless one is a full-fledged, baptized member of the Catholic Church, one will be damned.
Socrates58 blog on ecumenism and Christian unity is filled with resourceful links.
Here’s one, “How Catholics View Protestants”, with excerpts from Vatican II’s Decree on Ecumenism.
Zenit carries this interview with Fr. James Massa, director of the U.S. bishops Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs. The Vatican document covers issues they deal with daily.
I think it is a necessary and helpful clarification on how Catholics understand the nature of the Church. Jesus Christ founded the Church as a visible and unified society that would exist until his return. Catholics believe that this one Church of Christ exists in all its fullness in the Catholic Church alone.
That doesn’t mean the one Church is not also present and active in Orthodox churches and Protestant communities for the salvation of their members. In fact, in these Christian bodies we find genuine elements of truth and holiness that inspire us, draw us into ecumenical dialogue, and make us yearn even more for the unity for which Christ prayed.
Now here’s an important point Fr. Massa makes, sort of answering ‘Why give these reponses now? Who asked?’
Seven year after “Dominus Iesus,” we are still facing a problem with insufficient attention to the Catholic doctrine of the Church. Perhaps in an effort to underscore God’s saving work in other churches and Christian communities, some theologians have failed to make it clear that the one Church of Christ is uniquely identifiable with the Catholic Church. Other churches and communities welcome the saving presence of Christ into their midst, but only in the Catholic Church does the one Church subsist in fullness. Contrary to what some Catholic theologians have written, there are no other “subsistences.”
Taken out of context, the document’s position on what groups deserve to be called a “church” might also appear to be jarring. The Orthodox churches are rightly called such because they’ve retained the sacraments and the ministry that exists in apostolic succession. Protestant communities lack a certain ecclesial substance, namely, the sacraments and ministry that unite us as one in the Body of Christ. But even the Orthodox, though very close to us in faith and practice, are still “wounded” in their communion because they lack the Office of Peter, the Pope…
I don’t think there is anything substantially new here. But I do believe that the restatement of the Catholic position offers those of us involved in the dialogues to take more seriously what are the Catholic “gifts” that we bring to the table. Pope John Paul II said that ecumenism is less an exchange of ideas than an exchange of gifts. Eucharist-centered worship, episcopal ministry, and papal primacy are the unique Catholic gifts. They should never be placed “under a bushel basket.”
Here’s a good summary:
Properly understood, the “Clarification” can be a real inducement to deeper and more honest dialogue between Catholics and their ecumenical partners.
But…first it needs to be properly understood.