The Pastoral Review

Model Article

Life Begins at Forty

Gerald O'Collins SJ

Here, the author reflects on some of the changes brought about by the Second Vatican Council in the life of the Church and in his own life.

All change!

Called by John XXIII on 29 January 1959, when he had been Pope for only ninety days, the Second Vatican Council was the most significant religious event of the twentieth century. He wanted to update and renew spiritually the Catholic Church, heal divisions within Christianity, and alter the Church's reactionary attitude to the world. The Roman Catholic Church would never be the same again, nor would my own life.

I followed the first two sessions of Vatican II (October-December 1962 and October-December 1963) from a great distance, since I was completing my basic theological training at a seminary in a northern suburb of Sydney, Australia. For the third session of the Council (October-December 1964) I was in Münster (Germany), doing my year of 'tertianship' (1964-65) or final spiritual formation as a Jesuit. Some liturgical changes mandated by the Council were beginning to arrive: at Mass the altar now faced the people; when I was with other priests we could concelebrate the Eucharist; at weddings and baptisms there were already rituals available in German and lay people could follow what was being said. The exorcism at baptism, however, was not yet translated. When I asked the parish priest of a church in Trier where I worked for two months, he told me: 'The devil doesn't understand German, only Latin.'

In the summer of 1965 I crossed the channel to England and began my doctoral studies at Cambridge University. From there I experienced the fourth and closing session of Vatican II and wrote an article for The Month (June 1966) on Dei Verbum (DV), the Constitution on Divine Revelation, calling it 'one of the most significant results' to come from the Council, because it showed 'a deeply biblical, serene and historical approach' to its three major themes: 'revelation itself, its transmission, scripture and its inspiration, interpretation and place in place in the life of the Church'. I was delighted with the way the document described revelation as being primarily the self-revelation of the tripersonal God, which involves a call to the personal commitment of faith and to sharing in the divine life. Dei Verbum, along with another document from the final session, Gaudium et Spes (GS), the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, have remained key texts for my teaching and writing.

Two passions

But what did the Council do for me personally - as a Catholic Christian and a Jesuit priest? It reinforced two passions that had already been growing in my life: a love for the scriptures and a commitment to fostering relations with other Christians and with members of other faiths. First, the deep reverence for the scriptures that pervaded the whole of the Council's work and, in particular, Dei Verbum, strengthened my desire to live an existence that draws its light and life from the Bible. Second, right from my childhood my parents had encouraged contacts with those of other churches and faiths. That 'social' ecumenism developed under the influence of Vatican II into a deeper ecumenism 'of the heart'.

Searching for roots

The Council also nourished three new personal developments. First, Perfectae Caritatis (PC), the Decree on the Up-to-date Renewal of Religious Life prompted me and many other Jesuits to search for our roots in the teaching and life of our founder, St Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556). That decree wanted members of religious institutes to retrieve, in the changed conditions of our times, 'the spirit and aims' of their founders or foundresses (PC 2). Over the centuries various Jesuit practices had somewhat obscured what Ignatius taught and stood for, above all through his precious guide for times of intense prayer, The Spiritual Exercises, a book and a practice that have enriched the lives not only of Catholics priests, religious and lay people but also of many non-Catholic Christians. In my novitiate in Australia (1950) and then again in my tertianship in Germany (1964), I had spent a month in prayer and silence, making the thirty-day 'retreat'. But on both occasions the director of the retreat followed a custom which had grown up after the time of Ignatius and preached instructions at us three or four times a day. To recover my Ignatian roots I decided to follow the example of many other Jesuits in the post-Vatican II years and seek personal renewal by making the thirty-day retreat a third time. I did so in the summer of 1977, and on a one-to-one basis under a director with whom I met only once a day. That silent month spent in a house of prayer in Los Angeles endorsed and encouraged my life as a Jesuit priest more than anything else I experienced in the aftermath of the Council.

Discovery of public worship

A second wonderful development in my personal life which I owe to the Council was the discovery of the public worship of the Church. I had grown up as a rigidly precise altar-boy, who observed all the rubrics when serving Mass. That total attention to a set of prescribed words and actions, while admirable in some ways, often distracted one's attention from what the liturgy or the community's reverent veneration of the tripersonal God entails. At the heart of the liturgy is the celebration of the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Jesus Christ: the centre of the universe and of history

The name of the Lord brings me to my third and greatest debt to Vatican II - the decision to centre my theological work on Jesus in an unqualified way. I have always delighted in the providential fact that the Council's first document, Sacrosanctum Concilium (SC), promulgated in December 1963, dealt with the Church's liturgy, while the last (and longest) document, promulgated in December 1965, dealt with the Church in the modern world, Gaudium et Spes. 'Liturgy' originally referred to both Christian worship and to the service of the world in need. In a remarkable but still neglected passage, Sacrosanctum Concilium links the priestly work of Christ to the entire world: 'Jesus Christ, the High Priest of the New and Eternal Covenant, by assuming a human nature, has introduced into this earthly exile that hymn which is sung throughout all ages in the halls of heaven. He attaches to himself the entire human community and has them join him in singing this divine song of praise' (SC 83).

This vital link between Christ and the world in all its joys, sufferings and hopes was to be spelled out at length by Gaudium et Spes, along with the Church's deep desire to help all human beings to know, love and follow him. What I treasured in Gaudium et Spes was its capacity to hold together various themes about Jesus: his role as both creator and redeemer (GS 45), his life, death and resurrection (GS 22), his inseparable relationship with the Father and the Holy Spirit (GS 22, 92-93), and his vital link with every human being (GS 22).

By the time Sacrosanctum Concilium was promulgated, Paul VI had been elected Pope (21 June 1963), and right from the speech with which he opened the second session of the Council the following September, he showed how he centred his life and ministry on Christ. He kept coming back to the two questions: 'Who is Christ in himself? Who is Christ for us?' That centring on Christ guided Paul VI in his efforts to implement the Council.

When John Paul I became Pope in 1978, I was in Rome for his election and the whole of his tragically short pontificate. One of his remarks that I have continued to cherish was: 'It is only Jesus Christ we must present to the world.' After a papacy lasting only 33 days, John Paul I died and was succeeded by the first non-Italian for over four and an half centuries, the Polish cardinal who took the name of John Paul II. Naturally I rejoiced when he dedicated his first encyclical, Redemptor Hominis (RH)(the Redeemer of the human person) of March 1979 to Jesus Christ, 'the centre of the universe and of history' (RH 1).

In his homily at the inaugural Mass of 24 April 2005, Benedict XVI insisted that the Church is 'young and alive', because 'Christ is alive'. It is his 'love that redeems us'. It was in terms of Christ that the new Pope took up his ministry as successor of Peter: 'If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great.’ Benedict XVI ended his homily with words that echoed John Paul II and serve to sum up the central message of Vatican II: 'Open wide the doors to Christ, and you will find true life.'

Paul VI, John Paul I, John Paul II, and Benedict XVI have all strengthened my conviction that any efforts to renew the Church through the teaching of Vatican II will remain spiritually empty, emotionally hollow and doctrinally unsound, unless they draw inspiration and life from the Founder of Christianity himself. During the Extraordinary Synod of 1985, called to review the work of the Council twenty years after it closed, I cheered when I read the speech of Archbishop Frank Rush of Brisbane, the President of the Australian Bishops' Conference. He concluded by saying: 'The Church needs to search for and shape an answer to the only ultimate question: Who is Christ for the world of today?'

Both for students of theology and teachers of religion and for ordinary readers, I have repeatedly tried to answer that question - through articles in magazines and through entire books. If what I write helps some people to 'know Jesus more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow him more clearly' (from a prayer by St Richard of Chichester), I will be more than satisfied. I passionately believe that the teaching of Vatican II can help bring about this happy result.

In his spiritual testament, made known shortly after his death on 2 April 2005, Pope John Paul II wrote about Vatican II: 'For a long time to come, it will be granted to new generations to draw on the riches which this Council of the twentieth century has blessed us with.' One generation has passed and a second is well established, since the Second Vatican Council ended forty years ago in 1965. As someone who spans three generations, I write this article at the time of the fortieth anniversary of the closing of the Council. I experienced Vatican II as a wonderful injection of new life. I will keep trying to remind the older generation and convey to the younger something of what the Council achieved and just how important it was and remains.

The Council issued no specific document about Jesus Christ. But his presence pervades all sixteen documents. The Constitution on the Church in the Modern World never loses sight of the Son of God who truly became 'one of us', and 'worked with human hands, thought with a human mind, and loved with a human heart' (GS 22). The Constitution on Divine Revelation ends with a hymn to the scriptures through which Christ is experienced and the Eucharist through which he becomes most closely present (DV 21-26). The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy proclaims that sharing in the Mass, the supreme 'activity' of the whole Church, sets the faithful 'aflame with Christ's love' (SC 10).

In the last analysis, what the Council sought was nothing less than to help believers further among the human family a life-transforming experience of Jesus. One might sum up its deepest message by applying some words of a former general of the Jesuit Order, the saintly Pedro Arrupe (1907-91): 'Fall in love with Jesus, stay in love with Jesus, and that will decide everything.'

Gerald O'Collins SJ teaches at the Gregorian University in Rome. Among his recent publications is Catholicism (Oxford University Press: 2003). In early 2006 Paulist Press (Mahwah, New Jersey) will publish Living Vatican II. The 21 st Council for the 21 st Century.





Model Article Life Begins at Forty Gerald O'Collins SJ Here, the author reflects on some of the changes brought about by the Second Vatican Council in the life of the Church and in his own life. All change! Called by John XXIII on 29 January 1959, when he had been Pope for only ninety days, the Second Vatican Council was the most significant religious event of the twentieth century. He wanted to update and renew spiritually the Catholic Church, heal divisions within Christianity, and alter the Church's reactionary attitude to the world. The Roman Catholic Church would never be the same again, nor would my own life. I followed the first two sessions of Vatican II (October-December 1962 and October-December 1963) from a great distance, since I was completing my basic theological training at a seminary in a northern suburb of Sydney, Australia. For the third session of the Council (October-December 1964) I was in Münster (Germany), doing my year of 'tertianship' (1964-65) or final spiritual formation as a Jesuit. Some liturgical changes mandated by the Council were beginning to arrive: at Mass the altar now faced the people; when I was with other priests we could concelebrate the Eucharist; at weddings and baptisms there were already rituals available in German and lay people could follow what was being said. The exorcism at baptism, however, was not yet translated. When I asked the parish priest of a church in Trier where I worked for two months, he told me: 'The devil doesn't understand German, only Latin.' In the summer of 1965 I crossed the channel to England and began my doctoral studies at Cambridge University. From there I experienced the fourth and closing session of Vatican II and wrote an article for The Month (June 1966) on Dei Verbum (DV), the Constitution on Divine Revelation, calling it 'one of the most significant results' to come from the Council, because it showed 'a deeply biblical, serene and historical approach' to its three major themes: 'revelation itself, its transmission, scripture and its inspiration, interpretation and place in place in the life of the Church'. I was delighted with the way the document described revelation as being primarily the self-revelation of the tripersonal God, which involves a call to the personal commitment of faith and to sharing in the divine life. Dei Verbum, along with another document from the final session, Gaudium et Spes (GS), the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, have remained key texts for my teaching and writing. Two passions But what did the Council do for me personally - as a Catholic Christian and a Jesuit priest? It reinforced two passions that had already been growing in my life: a love for the scriptures and a commitment to fostering relations with other Christians and with members of other faiths. First, the deep reverence for the scriptures that pervaded the whole of the Council's work and, in particular, Dei Verbum, strengthened my desire to live an existence that draws its light and life from the Bible. Second, right from my childhood my parents had encouraged contacts with those of other churches and faiths. That 'social' ecumenism developed under the influence of Vatican II into a deeper ecumenism 'of the heart'. Searching for roots The Council also nourished three new personal developments. First, Perfectae Caritatis (PC), the Decree on the Up-to-date Renewal of Religious Life prompted me and many other Jesuits to search for our roots in the teaching and life of our founder, St Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556). That decree wanted members of religious institutes to retrieve, in the changed conditions of our times, 'the spirit and aims' of their founders or foundresses (PC 2). Over the centuries various Jesuit practices had somewhat obscured what Ignatius taught and stood for, above all through his precious guide for times of intense prayer, The Spiritual Exercises, a book and a practice that have enriched the lives not only of Catholics priests, religious and lay people but also of many non-Catholic Christians. In my novitiate in Australia (1950) and then again in my tertianship in Germany (1964), I had spent a month in prayer and silence, making the thirty-day 'retreat'. But on both occasions the director of the retreat followed a custom which had grown up after the time of Ignatius and preached instructions at us three or four times a day. To recover my Ignatian roots I decided to follow the example of many other Jesuits in the post-Vatican II years and seek personal renewal by making the thirty-day retreat a third time. I did so in the summer of 1977, and on a one-to-one basis under a director with whom I met only once a day. That silent month spent in a house of prayer in Los Angeles endorsed and encouraged my life as a Jesuit priest more than anything else I experienced in the aftermath of the Council. Discovery of public worship A second wonderful development in my personal life which I owe to the Council was the discovery of the public worship of the Church. I had grown up as a rigidly precise altar-boy, who observed all the rubrics when serving Mass. That total attention to a set of prescribed words and actions, while admirable in some ways, often distracted one's attention from what the liturgy or the community's reverent veneration of the tripersonal God entails. At the heart of the liturgy is the celebration of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus Christ: the centre of the universe and of history The name of the Lord brings me to my third and greatest debt to Vatican II - the decision to centre my theological work on Jesus in an unqualified way. I have always delighted in the providential fact that the Council's first document, Sacrosanctum Concilium (SC), promulgated in December 1963, dealt with the Church's liturgy, while the last (and longest) document, promulgated in December 1965, dealt with the Church in the modern world, Gaudium et Spes. 'Liturgy' originally referred to both Christian worship and to the service of the world in need. In a remarkable but still neglected passage, Sacrosanctum Concilium links the priestly work of Christ to the entire world: 'Jesus Christ, the High Priest of the New and Eternal Covenant, by assuming a human nature, has introduced into this earthly exile that hymn which is sung throughout all ages in the halls of heaven. He attaches to himself the entire human community and has them join him in singing this divine song of praise' (SC 83). This vital link between Christ and the world in all its joys, sufferings and hopes was to be spelled out at length by Gaudium et Spes, along with the Church's deep desire to help all human beings to know, love and follow him. What I treasured in Gaudium et Spes was its capacity to hold together various themes about Jesus: his role as both creator and redeemer (GS 45), his life, death and resurrection (GS 22), his inseparable relationship with the Father and the Holy Spirit (GS 22, 92-93), and his vital link with every human being (GS 22). By the time Sacrosanctum Concilium was promulgated, Paul VI had been elected Pope (21 June 1963), and right from the speech with which he opened the second session of the Council the following September, he showed how he centred his life and ministry on Christ. He kept coming back to the two questions: 'Who is Christ in himself? Who is Christ for us?' That centring on Christ guided Paul VI in his efforts to implement the Council. When John Paul I became Pope in 1978, I was in Rome for his election and the whole of his tragically short pontificate. One of his remarks that I have continued to cherish was: 'It is only Jesus Christ we must present to the world.' After a papacy lasting only 33 days, John Paul I died and was succeeded by the first non-Italian for over four and an half centuries, the Polish cardinal who took the name of John Paul II. Naturally I rejoiced when he dedicated his first encyclical, Redemptor Hominis (RH)(the Redeemer of the human person) of March 1979 to Jesus Christ, 'the centre of the universe and of history' (RH 1). In his homily at the inaugural Mass of 24 April 2005, Benedict XVI insisted that the Church is 'young and alive', because 'Christ is alive'. It is his 'love that redeems us'. It was in terms of Christ that the new Pope took up his ministry as successor of Peter: 'If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great.’ Benedict XVI ended his homily with words that echoed John Paul II and serve to sum up the central message of Vatican II: 'Open wide the doors to Christ, and you will find true life.' Paul VI, John Paul I, John Paul II, and Benedict XVI have all strengthened my conviction that any efforts to renew the Church through the teaching of Vatican II will remain spiritually empty, emotionally hollow and doctrinally unsound, unless they draw inspiration and life from the Founder of Christianity himself. During the Extraordinary Synod of 1985, called to review the work of the Council twenty years after it closed, I cheered when I read the speech of Archbishop Frank Rush of Brisbane, the President of the Australian Bishops' Conference. He concluded by saying: 'The Church needs to search for and shape an answer to the only ultimate question: Who is Christ for the world of today?' Both for students of theology and teachers of religion and for ordinary readers, I have repeatedly tried to answer that question - through articles in magazines and through entire books. If what I write helps some people to 'know Jesus more clearly, love him more dearly, and follow him more clearly' (from a prayer by St Richard of Chichester), I will be more than satisfied. I passionately believe that the teaching of Vatican II can help bring about this happy result. In his spiritual testament, made known shortly after his death on 2 April 2005, Pope John Paul II wrote about Vatican II: 'For a long time to come, it will be granted to new generations to draw on the riches which this Council of the twentieth century has blessed us with.' One generation has passed and a second is well established, since the Second Vatican Council ended forty years ago in 1965. As someone who spans three generations, I write this article at the time of the fortieth anniversary of the closing of the Council. I experienced Vatican II as a wonderful injection of new life. I will keep trying to remind the older generation and convey to the younger something of what the Council achieved and just how important it was and remains. The Council issued no specific document about Jesus Christ. But his presence pervades all sixteen documents. The Constitution on the Church in the Modern World never loses sight of the Son of God who truly became 'one of us', and 'worked with human hands, thought with a human mind, and loved with a human heart' (GS 22). The Constitution on Divine Revelation ends with a hymn to the scriptures through which Christ is experienced and the Eucharist through which he becomes most closely present (DV 21-26). The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy proclaims that sharing in the Mass, the supreme 'activity' of the whole Church, sets the faithful 'aflame with Christ's love' (SC 10). In the last analysis, what the Council sought was nothing less than to help believers further among the human family a life-transforming experience of Jesus. One might sum up its deepest message by applying some words of a former general of the Jesuit Order, the saintly Pedro Arrupe (1907-91): 'Fall in love with Jesus, stay in love with Jesus, and that will decide everything.' Gerald O'Collins SJ teaches at the Gregorian University in Rome. Among his recent publications is Catholicism (Oxford University Press: 2003). In early 2006 Paulist Press (Mahwah, New Jersey) will publish Living Vatican II. The 21 st Council for the 21 st Century.