An Introduction to Gaudium et Spes

The next document of Vatican II is perhaps my favorite.  While Lumen Gentium is a document about the Church itself, Gaudium et Spes is the document about the place of the Church within Humanity.  When I was first writing this, I was going to write about the relationship between the Church and Humankind, but this document makes it clear that the Church is not in a relationship with Humankind, as if they were two separate things, but is a part of Humankind.  It exists within humanity.  As the title states, "The joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the people of our time, especially of those who are poor and afflicted, are the joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the followers of Christ as well."  This is significant to me.  As the Church, we do not only sympathize with those who suffer.  It's easy to feel sorry for people.  No, the Church empathizes.  She feels the same pain.  It is human to be able to imaginatively put yourself into the place of one who suffers, if you haven't felt the same thing personally, and then, feeling with them, be moved to act for them.  How many people in this world, I wonder, know that the Church feels sorry for them, but feel that she is not really interested in feeling their pain?  It is our call as the people of God and followers of Christ to feel WITH others, not just for others.

The document says that it is the “human person that is to be saved, human society which is to be renewed.”  And it is the whole human person: body and soul, heart and conscience, mind and will. 

It is this document where the phrase “signs of the times” comes into play.  This document is an opening in the church.  It is why Pope Benedict the XVI could say that priests and religious should make use of technology to spread the Gospel.  If the Church does not use the language of the day, then the gospel message will not be given.  That language can be social media, movies, TV, Radio.  How many of you watch EWTN or listen to Relevant Radio?  Both of these happened because of Vatican II.

Most of the Introduction talks about the state of the world in the 1960s.  It speaks of radical change because of technology, of the dichotomy inherent in the human condition, of the wealth and poverty, the desire for a better material life while rejecting the spiritual side.  My own ongoing vocation story testifies to this split.  I can’t count the number of people who have wanted to share their spiritual life with me who are afraid that the rest of the world will think them crazy.  In this document, the Church offers itself in service to the world.  Over the next articles I’ll explore this in greater depth.

(For those who may not know, the top picture is Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta and the bottom is Servant of God Dorothy Day.)