Russell Shaw on the Need for Vatican II

Did We Really Need Vatican II? by Russell Shaw

Ecumenical council? Or general synod of the Latin churches, with participation of some of the Eastern churches in communion with Rome?

Pope St. John XXIII put it clearly in his opening address to the council on October 11, 1962. The “greatest concern” of Vatican II, he declared, was to guard Christian doctrine and teach it “more efficaciously.” That included the truth about “the whole of man, composed as he is of body and soul” and created by God not only for life on earth but for eternal life in heaven.

The council did its best, and that was pretty good. Central to its teaching was the Christocentric affirmation that it’s Christ who “fully reveals man to himself and makes his supreme calling clear” (Gaudium et Spes 22). The Church has been developing that exalted vision of human dignity ever since, most notably via the personalism of Pope St. John Paul II.

Was personalism and human dignity the answer?