Will Many Be Saved?

What Vatican II Actually Teaches and Its Implications for the New Evangelization

Ralph P. Martin

• Publisher: Eerdmans
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781467436328
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Denominations

The question of whether and how people who have not had the chance to hear the gospel can be saved goes back to the beginnings of Christian reflection. It has also become a much-debated topic in current theology. In Will Many Be Saved? Ralph Martin focuses primarily on the history of debate and the development of responses to this question within the Roman Catholic Church, but much of Martin's discussion is also relevant to the wider debate happening in many churches around the world.
In particular, Martin analyzes the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, the document from the Second Vatican Council that directly relates to this question. Contrary to popular opinion, Martin argues that according to this text, the conditions under which people who have not heard the gospel can be saved are very often, in fact, not fulfilled, with strong implications for evangelization.

Notes

Notes to Chapter I

1. Paul VI, Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii nuntiandi (hereafter EN) (On Evangelization in the Modern World), December 8, 1975 (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 1976), 2. The numbers after references to papal documents and the documents of Vatican II refer to the numbered sections of such documents, not to page numbers.

2. EN, 2.

3. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter, Redemptoris missio (hereafter RM) (Mission of the Redeemer), December 7, 1990 (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 1991), 2.

4. John Paul II, Apostolic Letter, Novo millennio ineunte (hereafter NMI) (At the Beginning of a New Millennium), January 6, 2001 (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 2001), 2.

5. Avery Dulles, “John Paul II and the New Evangelization,” in Church and Society: The Lawrence J. McGinley Lectures, 1988-2007 (New York: Fordham University Press, 2008), pp. 96-100.

6. RM, 33. Here John Paul II distinguishes three phases of the Church’s mission: the initial and primary preaching of the gospel to those who have never heard it, ad gentes; the pastoral care of those already evangelized, catechized, and living the Christian life; and the “new evangelization” or “re-evangelization” needed “where entire groups of the baptized have lost a living sense of the faith, or even no longer consider themselves members of the Church and live a life far removed from Christ and his Gospel.”

7. Benedict XVI has referred to this effect of secularism as a “dictatorship of relativism” numerous times, both before and after he was elected Pope. A recent instance is that of the General Audience of December 16, 2009. In a book he wrote shortly before he was elected Pope, Christianity and the Crisis of Cultures, trans. Brian McNeil (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2006), Joseph Ratzinger provides an analysis of the philosophical and political trends that have led to the current situation.

8. Joseph Ratzinger, New Outpourings of the Holy Spirit, trans. Michael J. Miller and Henry Taylor (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2007), p. 115.

9. NMI, 2.

10. NMI, 40.

11. RM, 3.

12. EN, 22.

13. EN, 27.

14. RM, 20.

15. RM, 46.

16. A recent major study of religious groupings in the United States has shown that the steady or slightly growing Catholic population is masking a steady and significant decline, apart from Hispanic immigration, primarily because so few people are entering the Catholic Church as a result of evangelization. The study shows that there is a lot of flux in all the religious groupings but the Catholic Church stands out from other groups in bringing in so few new members. See John Allen, “America’s Religious Marketplace,” http://ncronline.org/blogs/all-things-catholic/americas-religious-marketplace-real-catholic-problem-new-sales (accessed February 11, 2011), who in his interview with the directors of the Pew study, summarizes the findings: “For Catholicism, the banner headline was that there are now 22 million ex-Catholics in America, by far the greatest net loss for any religious body. One in three Americans raised Catholic have left the church. Were it not for immigration, Catholicism in America would be contracting dramatically: for every one member the church adds, it loses four.” See also Neil J. Ormerod, “The Times They Are A-Changin’: A Response to O’Malley and Schloesser,” in Vatican II: Did Anything Happen? ed. David G. Schultenover (New York: Continuum, 2008), p. 175. Ormerod makes the important point that an exclusive emphasis on “communion” and “the reform of the reform” in terms of the liturgy can produce an inward-turning, aesthetically oriented, culturally inflexible model of church that is not effective for evangelization. “I have argued that, at the very least, communion ecclesiology requires some balancing by an emphasis on the mission of the Church as defining its identity. . . . I would argue that a proper recovery of the Church’s essentially missionary character [RM 5] is needed to prevent the Church from slipping back into the classic conservative antitype from which it attempted to escape through Vatican II. It is simply overloading the language of communio to expect it to carry forward this missionary aspect.” See also Joseph Ratzinger, Pilgrim Fellowship of Faith: The Church as Communion, ed. Stephan Otto Horn and Vinzenz Pfnür, trans. Henry Taylor (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2005), p. 287, who makes a similar point: “For the Church it is never merely a matter of maintaining her membership or even of increasing or broadening her own membership. The Church is not there for her own sake. She cannot be like an association that in difficult circumstances, is simply trying to keep its head above water. She has a task to perform for the world, for mankind. The only reason she has to survive is because her disappearance would drag humanity into the whirlpool of the eclipse of God and, thus, into the eclipse, indeed the destruction, of all that is human. We are not fighting for our own survival; we know that we have been entrusted with a mission that lays upon us a responsibility for everyone. That is why the Church has to measure herself, and be measured by others, by the extent to which the presence of God, the knowledge of him, and the acceptance of his will are alive within her. A Church that was merely an organization pursuing its own ends would be the caricature of a Church. To the extent to which she is revolving around herself and looks only to the aims necessary for maintaining herself, she is rendering herself redundant and is in decline, even if she disposes of considerable means and skillful management. She can live and be fruitful only if the primacy of God is alive within her.”

17. It is beyond the scope of this book to engage in the discussion on the “hermeneutics of continuity” or “discontinuity” in interpreting Vatican II, the literature of which is sizable and growing. The research and argument of this thesis will demonstrate that, at least as regards LG 16, we see a great deal of continuity with the tradition, a continuity that is commonly overlooked. We do not intend by this to take a position on the wider issues of interpretation. It does seem clear, though, that there are significant elements of both continuity and discontinuity in the documents of Vatican II. The discontinuity cannot be held to involve discontinuity concerning doctrine, although a discontinuity of methodology, pastoral strategy, attitude, and formulation can certainly be demonstrated. Two recent books that tend to emphasize opposite sides of the “hermeneutical” discussion are John W. O’Malley, What Happened at Vatican II (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), and Matthew Lamb and Matthew Levering, eds., Vatican II: Renewal Within Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). Taken together, the two books provide a good range of opinions. More recently, Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council: A Counterpoint for the History of the Council, trans. Kenneth D. Whitehead (Scranton, PA: University of Scranton Press, 2010), has published a collection of his reviews, articles, and lectures on the literature that has appeared interpreting Vatican II. The book is valuable for its extensive review of the literature that has appeared in European languages, primarily Italian but also some French and German. Marchetto has a strong point of view that is very much opposed to what he considers the dominant interpretations of “discontinuity” influenced by the School of Bologna, typified by Alberigo’s five-volume work. He regularly criticizes mentions of Vatican II as an “event” and any opposition of the “spirit” to the letter. We have found useful insights in all of these works. We have also consulted, and found useful, Benedict XVI’s major address on the interpretation of the Council, “Address of His Holiness Benedict XVI to the Roman Curia” http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2005/ december/documents/hf_ben_xvi_spe_20051222_roman-curia_en.html (accessed February 11, 2011), in which he contrasts a “hermeneutics of discontinuity” with a “hermeneutics of reform.” Cardinal Ratzinger in his personal writings as theologian offers some profound insights into the interpretation of the Council. While his comments on the danger of discontinuity are well known, less well known, but nevertheless very important, are his insights into the dangers of “integralism” or “traditionalism” in the interpretation of the Council. Ratzinger is clear that there were significant theological shifts in the Council, that something did change, and that a suspicious and sectarian resistance to this change is a significant problem. See particularly Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology, trans. Mary Frances McCarthy (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987), pp. 370-78, 389-91. Also useful is Avery Dulles’s analysis of the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops held in 1985 to assess the work of Vatican II: “The Reception of Vatican II at the Extraordinary Synod of 1985,” in The Reception of Vatican II, ed. Giuseppe Alberigo, Jean-Pierre Jossua, and Joseph A. Komonchak, trans. Matthew J. O’Connell (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1987), pp. 349-63. We are in agreement with the hermeneutical principles advanced by Ormond Rush, Still Interpreting Vatican II: Some Hermeneutical Principles (New York: Paulist Press, 2004), that any sound interpretation of Council documents must take into account: the history of the development of the particular text, the sources used to develop the text, and of course, the final version of the text. The text in question then must be interpreted in light of other relevant texts in other Council documents. Third, attention must be paid to the “reception” of the text in the life of the Church, both in the subsequent theological literature and in pastoral life. We will employ each of these elements of a sound hermeneutics as they are relevant to our task. See Francis Sullivan, Creative Fidelity: Weighing and Interpreting Documents of the Magisterium (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2003), pp. 162-74, for a useful chapter on the question of the doctrinal authority of the various documents of Vatican II. See Ladislas Orsy, Receiving the Council: Theological and Canonical Insights and Debates (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2009) for a canon law perspective. See also John Michael McDermott, “Did That Really Happen at Vatican II? Reflections on John O’Malley’s Recent Book,” Nova et Vetera (English ed.) 8, no. 2 (2010): 425-66, for a lengthy critique of the hermeneutical approach tha...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Abbreviations
• I. Vatican II and the Priority of Evangelization
• II. Lumen gentium 16: Initial Observations
• III. Lumen gentium 16: The Doctrinal Development
• IV. The Scriptural Foundations of Lumen gentium 16
• V. Rahner and “Anonymous Christians”
• VI. Balthasar: Dare We Hope That All Be Saved?
• VII. The Pastoral Strategy of Vatican II: Time for an Adjustment?
• Appendix I: Lumen gentium 16
• Appendix II: Relatio on Lumen gentium 16
• Appendix III: Balthasar’s Criticism of Rahner
• Notes
• Select Bibliography
• Index