Changes

In <i>Gaudium et Spes</i>(Joy and Hope in Latin), authored in and through the proceedings of Vatican II, the Church spoke explicitly about the current state of modern world, the growth of the secular sphere and the withdrawal from religion. It specified and clarified that the Church as a collective institution is not opposed to science, philosophy, technology or culture as many might perceive religion to be in opposition to these things. Instead, it reaffirmed that She saw these as goods. These goods only become corrupted, said the council, when they in themselves are upheld as man’s highest ends. The council strongly and unabashedly declared that because man was made for communion God and that the goods of science, philosophy, technology and culture would be empty--insufficient when sought as final ends in themselves.

The Council continues in stating that Church’s mission is to bring Christ to the world. The religious life should inform the political or public life. Being a Christian, a Catholic specifically, means allowing the love of God to radically transform your whole being, not just when one is at home in isolation: “This split between the faith which many profess and their daily lives deserves to be counted among the more serious errors of our age. Long since, the Prophets of the Old Testament fought vehemently against this scandal and even more so did Jesus Christ Himself in the New Testament threaten it with grave punishments. Therefore, let there be no false opposition between professional and social activities on the one part, and religious life on the other.”<ref>Vatican Council, Edward H. Peters, and Gregory Baum. <i> Second Vatican Council</i>, “Gaudium et spes: The Constitution on the Church in the Modern World” in The Documents of Vatican II, ed. Walter M. Abbott (New York: Guild Press, 1966), #41.</ref> All in all, the council’s message was one of not retreating from the world, but going forth into it with vigor, ardor and eagerness to share the Gospel.