"Evangelical radicalism" means detachment (first of all with the heart)
of everything for the Gospel, even by loved ones, even from his own
life: "Since many people went with him, he turned and said: If anyone
comes to me, and hate not his father, his mother, his wife, children,
brothers, sisters, and even his own life, he can not be my disciple.
Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me can not be my
disciple” (Lk 14.25 to 27).
The "evangelical radicalism", secondly, is not reserved only for a
select few, but it is a necessity for anyone who wants to follow Jesus:
"A scribe came up and said: Master, I will follow you wherever you go.
Jesus replied: Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the
Son of man hath not where to lay his head. And another of his disciples
said: Lord, let me go first and bury my father. Jesus said to him:
Follow me and let the dead bury their dead” (Mt 8,19.22). John Paul II
said: "For all Christians, without exception, the radicalism of the
Gospel is a basic and indispensable requirement, which flows from Christ
to follow Him and imitate Him in the intimate communion of life with Him
wrought by the Spirit".[1]1
The "Gospel’s radicalism", finally, not only is about the personal life
of the individual Christian, but - as Jesus insists - must shine above
all in the living testimony of the Church: "You are the light of the
world can not be hidden a city set on a mountain [...], let your light
shine before men" (Matthew 14:16). So, instead of making a speech on the
general vocation of all Christians to perfection, the celebration of the
50th anniversary since the beginning of Vatican II suggests rather to
ask how the Church has understood the call to reconcile the "evangelical
radicalism." This is what is also called the card. Martini’s interview-
testament, released a few days before he died. "The Church - says
Archbishop - has lagged behind 200 years. Why do not you shake? We
afraid of? Fear instead of courage? Faith is the foundation of the
Church. Faith, trust, courage".[2]
2
With what credibility - we add - we can speak of "Gospel’s radicalism"
in our time, if the Church does not give first witness? That is why it
is important to brush up on the subject of the Council on the need for a
prophetic Church, poor and free.
A prophetic Church
The Council, shifting the focus from the corporate to the ecclesiology
of communion, led the Church to rediscover the prophetic nature of her
mission of proclaiming and witnessing to the "evangelical radicalism”.
For this reason, today she no longer appears as a "perfect society", nor
is deemed no longer a closed temple reserved for Catholics; she is
defined, however, "the People of God journeying through history," that
is, open community, which, in different ways, belong or are ordered both
the Catholic, and Christians of other denominations, and all men that
God saved without distinction” (cf. LG 13). The Church of the Council,
that is, goes out of the closed walls of the temple and becomes
prophecy: is near to all and is in every place where people lives,
works, builds the focus the city, suffers and dies.
This obviously has profoundly changed the relationship of the Church
with the world: you think, for example, to the changing relations with
the State, to the numerous initiatives of intercultural and
interreligious dialogue, to the positions taken in front of the
application of new technologies in medicine and to human life or the
challenges of justice and peace, hunger, and economic development.
Less brave, however, (not to mention insufficient) is the commitment of
the Church - in the past 50 years - in view of the renewal of her inner
life, on which the Council had insisted. Indeed, the Council was very
clear: the ecclesiology of communion - he said – cuts to the root all
forms of "clericalism", so that in the Church there are not Christians
of Series A (the clergy) and of Series B (the laity), but "is a common
dignity of members deriving from their rebirth in Christ, a common grace
of children, a common vocation to perfection"(LG 32).
As a result - further he specifies - the authority in the Church is not
bureaucracy or administration, but service and witness; Hierarchy lies
not above but within the People of
God; the successor of Peter is not an emperor, but he is the "servant of
the servants of God," in the mystical body of Christ; the faithful lay
are not minors or "missed priests" or delegates of the clergy, but
they receive directly by Christ, in Baptism and Confirmation, the unique
mission, typical of the whole People of God, as they also - in their own
way - participate in the priestly, prophetic and kingly office of Christ
(cf LG 31).
For this reason, on the basis of communion ecclesiology , the Council
was able to request that the "collegial spirit" is extended to the whole
life of the Church, beyond the collegiality in the strict legal sense,
as provided in the relations between the Pope and the bishops. The
"collegial spirit", therefore, should have informed all forms of
collaboration and participation between the different components of the
Church; not only for reasons of organizational efficiency, but for a
deeper ecclesiological and prophetic reason.
No one doubts obedience to the Magisterium and the Hierarchy set by
Christ himself as the foundation of the Church. However, the same Holy
Spirit, which relies on the Hierarchy the mission of guiding the People
of God, also distributes among the ordinary faithful of every rank,
gifts or gifts for the renewal and growth of the Church, which must be
recognized and received with gratitude (cf. LG 12). Obedience therefore
does not exclude, but presupposes dialogue within the Church, animated
by a sincere "collegial spirit" or synod, at all levels of community
life.
All these things the Council has told and asked very clearly 50 years
ago. Yet, we are still far from having put into practice. There is no
doubt that, with regard to internal reform, the Church is long overdue.
A poor Church
Another essential aspect of the "evangelical radicalism", about which so
much has insisted the Council, it is poverty: "as Christ carried out the
work of redemption in poverty and oppression, so the Church is called to
follow the same path in communicating to men the fruits of salvation
[...]; although to accomplish her mission he needs human resources, she
is not up to seek the glory of the earth, but to spread, even by her own
example, humility and self-denial"(LG 8).
The "renewed" Church of the Council, that is, has to be poor and to love
the poor of preferential love. Is this not a demagogic or ideological
choice, but of the Gospel. Poverty, in fact, shows the gratuitousness of
God's salvation, who, though He was rich, became poor that we might
become rich through His poverty (cf. 2 Cor 8:9). About the radical
nature of poverty Jesus is explicit: "Do not carry neither purse, nor
scrip, nor shoes" (Lk 10:4), that is to say: use, yes, the
goods you need and that are necessary, but do not put your trust in
them. The preferential option for the poor stems not only from the fact
that Christ has taken the face and the wounds of the poor, but also by
the knowledge that they not only need help, but they also have much to
give: they are carriers, in fact, of a message of great importance for
the life of the Church, and for the social and political life. Their cry
while on the one hand reports what they lack and which they are
entitled, on the other hand indicates the priority decisions to be done
to build a society worthy of man.
The "evangelical radicalism”, therefore, goes beyond the duty of
benevolence and almsgiving to the poor and requires that we share their
problems, that we are walking with them, we do ours their problems,
their fears and hopes. If we serve the rich, the rich can reward us,
which makes less clear our witness; but if we serve the poor, who can
not repay, then the evangelical witness is without shadows: really love
appeared in the world!
A Free Church
The Council has said explicitly: "the Church does not place her hope in
privileges offerred by the civil authority. Indeed she will renounce the
exercise of certain rights legitimately acquired, where she shoul find
that their use could cast doubt on the sincerity of her testimony or new
circumstances demand other provisions" (GS 76). Of course the Church is
not denying the right and the duty to maintain cordial relations with
political institutions, but the Council recalls the danger that
diplomacy limits and curbs prophecy. The concordats and the
exchange of diplomatic missions between the Church and the States
belonging to the old regime of Christianity, are old wineskins, which
obscure to the eyes of our time the "evangelical radicalism." It is
important that the Church is and appears free from any attachment to
power, humble and helpless witness of the Gospel, which puts her trust
only in God's Word, in the sanctity of her children and serving the
poor, avoiding -as the Council suggests- even the only appearance on the
privileges granted by the powers that be.
Nor we can forget that the "poor", according to the Gospel, are also
those who are suffering because of their irregular situation and
exclusion in which they often are. Among them the card. Martini recalls,
in his spiritual testament, the divorced and remarried and extended
families, often left to fend for themselves even within the Church. Why
- Cardinal asks- rather than discussing whether the divorced can take
Communion, we ask how the Church can help with the power of the
sacraments, the "poor in spirit", which are in complex family
situations? The sacraments are not a tool to restore the violated
discipline, but an aid to the most "needy" in the difficult moments of
the journey and weaknesses of life.
In conclusion, 50 years after the Council, it is time to reopen with
courage the discussion on "evangelical radicalism" and on his testimony
in the Church. The Year of Faith, called by Benedict XVI, may be a good
opportunity to shoot with confidence the path of renewal, undertaken
with the Council, but stopped in the middle.
[1]
JOHN PAUL II, Apostolic Exhortation Pastores Dabo Vobis (25
March 1992), n. 27.
[2]
C.M. MARTINI, L’ultima intervista, in "Il Corriere della
Sera," 1st September 2012.
Bartolomeo Sorge sj
Director of
«Aggiornamenti sociali»
Piazza San Fedele, 4 - 20121 Milano