The Evolution of Roman Catholic Ecclesiology: From the Council of Trent to the Second Vatican Council. Missiological implications and evaluation from the perspective of Orthodox Theology
The Evolution of Roman Catholic Ecclesiology: From the Council of Trent to the Second Vatican Council. Missiological implications and evaluation from the perspective of Orthodox Theology

Summary/Abstract: The Second Vatican Council indicates a radical departure from a Roman Catholic ecclesiology that had been preoccupied – especially since the period of the Protestant Reformation – with the external and institutional aspects of the Church. The teaching of the Roman Church and the theological writings that preceded the Council emphasized that the Church functioned as an “unequal society” of “flock and shepherds”, the face of the Church being inspired not by biblical sources but by the model of civil society. Until Vatican II, mission emphasized either “individual salvation” by incorporating the person into the body of the Church or the establishment of hierarchical Church structures in “mission territories”. In contrast to what has been stated above on ecclesiological issues, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium) brings into question the mystery of the Church as a people gathered in communion with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (LG4). Since Vatican II Roman Catholicism has rediscovered an ecclesiology of the communion of persons, and mission has been conceived as participation in the dynamic communion of the Trinitarian life of God. Orthodox theology unanimously places the Trinitarian doctrine at the centre of its theological thought when the nature of Christian mission is brought into question.

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