The Theology/Theologians of Vatican II Notes by Sister M. Lalemant Pelikan,RSM March, 2013 I. Theology begins with Truth received through Revelation. Its task is to understand the truth that God has revealed. Or another way of stating it: Theology is the disciplined exploration of Revelation. It is Bound by Scripture and Tradition Searches for deeper insights Attempts to articulate the good news for each new generation It would appear that the task of a theologian is quite simple: to study the divine-human relationship and then articulate its meaning for others BUT: Good theology requires a sound methodology; and a study of how theology has evolved over the years demonstrates 2 things: The importance of methodology for the theological process The many changes in the methodology employed. BEFORE Vatican II, the philosophical presuppositions were drawn primarily from the medieval scholastics, which held certain beliefs in common including disdain for the conclusions of modern science and a general ignorance of the historical critical method. II. Shifts in theology leading to Vatican II 1. From a classicist world view ( which maintained the truth of the past as certain and unchangeable for every future time and culture) to a historically conscious world view (which holds that every expression of a theological truth is historically conditioned, a product of the time period in which it is expressed). Example of an onion with truth at its core: 1
each generation peels off a layer. Take slavery, women s voting, for example; weren t they always wrong or right?? John XXIII, at the opening of the Council, distinguished the ancient deposit of faith in itself from the ways that the faith is expressed for every generation: As each age presents new data, new questions, new discoveries that theologians must think about when they seek to give reasons for the hope that is in them! 2. In the area of methodology. Before the Council, the primary methodology was deductive: to begin their investigations with the Divine Partner, which did not take the human condition into consideration as a genuine source of truth in the doing of theology. Example: Be ye perfect AS your heavenly Father is perfect --- but we re not God! The awareness of the need to take seriously the world in which the people of God live results from the shift to an inductive methodology, that focuses on the human person AS a source of truth in the theological process. John Henry Newman, in the 19 th Century, said, Theology is a search for the meaning of man saved, rather than an abstract definition of God who saves man. The reality of the human condition becomes a factor in doing theology. The Opening line of Gaudium et Spes spells it out: The joys and the hopes, the griefs and the anxieties of the followers of Christ indeed nothing genuinely human fails to raise an echo in their hearts Safeguard against relativism (the view that truth changes with changes in culture and societies, and varies from individual to individual) IS the very Gospel itself!! 3. The shift in the way we taught the faith or a shift from the Apologetic approach to the Foundational approach. 2
The Apologist s task was to state the faith, not to explain it. The Baltimore Catechism is an example of this. We knew what the Church taught, but not necessarily WHY. The 1960 s brought the question What does it mean? NOW the task was to provide the foundation for the faith; the People of God wanted to know why! The Christian story is reasonable; it makes sense. It speaks to the deepest needs of the human condition. And following St. Anselm s famous quote, Faith seeks understanding, the NEW THEOLOGIANS were doing just that --- making the act of faith reasonable, giving reasons to believe! NEW THEOLOGIANS (nouvelle theologie) Genuine commitment to historical and critical methodology Disenchanted with Scholasticism Desire to return to Bible and Patristic time period for theological guidance Openness to ecumenical dialogue Appreciation for the concept of ongoing-revelation, the idea that while the basic truths of the faith do not change or increase, God continues to speak to us (through the living words of the scriptures, worship, the signs of the times, and in many other ways. Between Vatican I and Vatican II, the SOURCE for theology was the official teaching office of the Church, the Magisterium. It was a theology based on Papal Encyclicals and magisterial utterances. As such, the task of the theologian looked more like being a mouthpiece for official teaching than giving reasons for the hope that is in them. Dissatisfied with this perception, theologians came to realize: 3
Catholicism must be defended by reason, not by force (John Henry Newman) It is not authority which makes the truth; it is truth which judges authority. (Yves Congar,OP) The goal of theology is not only the maintenance of Christian doctrine, but its furtherance. (Johann Sebastian von Drey The absolute need to make theology respectable in the modern world to place theology at the service of Christian faith and life. (Karl Rahner) The need to demonstrate how the Christian faith answered the desires and questions of men and women in the world. THE PERITI - Theologians at Vatican II These were the pivotal figures, who were convinced that theology needed to dialogue with the modern world; that we needed a new language of faith in order to tell the Christian story in a faithful, credible, and intelligible manner. And to meet the emerging crisis of faith, they looked to the past to inform the present to the scriptures and the early Church Fathers. The efforts of these new theologians produced a religious revitalization that was a far cry from the non-historical and rationalistic approach of neo-scholasticism. They managed to do what great theologians MUST DO: Find a way to mediate the gospel to believers in their respective historical context. One last thing these men shared: all of them found themselves officially disciplined in one way or another by the Church authorities of their day. But their stories did not end there! We find the imprint of these great theologians in the Documents of Vatican II, especially with regard to the church s attitude toward the world, toward the laity, toward itself. 4
Names of the Theologians at Vatican II Yves Congar, OP M. D. Chenu, OP Henri de Lubac, S.J. Jean Danielou Karl Rahner, S.J. John Courtney Murray Gerard Phillips 5