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 Dichoso 2

Lumen Gentium, or Light of the Nations was one of 16 documents produced by

the Second Vatican Council. It came at a time when the Catholic Church was looking for

reform. Many understandings on liturgy, the sacraments, and the church in general

were explored and produced which would forever change the Catholic Church. These

changes had significant effects all throughout the world. There was much backlash and

debate whilethe bishops at the Second Vatican Council were discussing Lumen Gentium,

but in the end it was resoundingly accepted, approved, and finally promulgated by Pope

Paul VI on November 21, 1964. While the possibility of salvation for those outside of

the church was seemingly neigh prior to the document, it changed the possibility of

salvation to include them, stressing the special grace of Christ and thus opening the

gates for great strides in interfaith dialogue.

The Church from its many doctors and fathers had taken very hard lines about

salvation outside the church. According to Origen and Cyprian in the third century,

extra ecclesiamnullasalus, meaning, DzOutside the Church, no salvationdz(Dulles).

Augustine also said, Dzwhoever is separated from this Catholic Church, by this single sin

of being separated from the unity of Christ, no matter how estimable a life he may

imagine he is living, shall not have life, but the wrath of God rests upon himdz (Catholic

Answers). Thomas Aquinas further defined these terms of being inside the church

stressing the need to have faith not only in the existence of God and in divine

providence, which would have been sufficient before the coming of Christ. He says that
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DzGod now required explicit faith in the mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnationdz

(Dulles 19).

Lumen Gentium makes great strides away from these statements. It addresses

the possibility of salvation for other Christians, Jews, Mohamedans, and even as far as

Athiests. For the Christians, the document speaks of the common baptism that

Catholics share with them and their honor for the Sacred Scripture. It stresses that

some of them even have devotion toward the Virigin Mother of God. In paragraph 15 it

states, Dzin some real way they are joined with us in the Holy Spirit, for to them too he

gives His gifts and graces whereby He is operative among them with His sanctifying

power. dz The document further pursues the hope that all the Christian Church can one

day be united as Dzone flock under one shepherd. DzParagraph 16 goes further, recalling

that Dzthose who have not yet received the Gospel,dz or Jews, recalls the covenant made

by God with them. As Godǯs people, he would not so easily abandon them who are still

faithfully waiting for whom they believe to be the Messiah. Mohamedans are addressed

through their common faith in the Dzone and merciful God, who on the last day will judge

mankind.dz Even people who Dzin shadows and images seek the unknown God,dz are willed

to be saved according to the document. These are radical changes in previous thought.

Most amazingly the document goes to say that even whatever good or truth that can be

found in peoples, who by no fault of their own have not arrived at an explicit knowledge

of God, are preparations for the Gospel.

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This final point can be interpreted radically. What does it truly mean to know

God? A person may have been introduced to the concept of Christ before, but not

necessarily accepted Him because he may not truly Pnow Christ in his heart. In the

extreme example of someone being sexually abused by a clergy member, the victim

might feel great compulsions to leave the Church because that is soiled impression of

the Church he or she was exposed to. God understands the great perversion of image

this soul would have to Him and would certainly take this into mind in His judgment.

When Origen and Cyprian claimed that outside the church there is no salvation,

they are very harsh to places where the church does not exist. One cannot make the

bold assumption that a soul who has never accepted Christ whom was never exposed to

God is damned. If the church has not yet been brought to a certain corner of the world,

then how can one choose to be in the church?

Does this leave us with the lack of need for missionary work? On the contrary,

Lumen Gentium stresses missionary work in paragraph 16. Just because one does not

need to know Christ to attain salvation, does not in any way mean that they should not

know Christ. Theoretically you could walk from point A to point B in the dark, but it is

much better and much more kosher to travel with a guiding light; the guiding light that

is the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church contains all of the necessary tools to attain

salvation and was, Dzmade necessary by Christdz (Lumen Gentium 14). Paragraph 14

further humbles the exalted status of the Churchǯs children by stating that this status is

not attributed to their own merits, but special grace of Christ. It is this grace of Christ
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that allows the possibility for other to be saved. God does not want his people to be

damned. Grace can always supersede ignorance.

This new understanding taught by Lumen Gentium greatly expands the Body of

Christ. Every person no matter where they are, who they are, or what they believe

constitute the body of Christ. As a finger has no choice, but to accept sustenance from

the blood stream, every person has no choice but to accept sustenance from the living

spirit. We cannot choose to be a part of the body of Christ or not. We just are. This

analogy could be taken the wrong way in thinking that there are no means for

damnation, but in fact there are. The church fathers such as Ignatius of Antioch and

Jerome who believed that heretics, Dzbring sentence upon themselves by their own

choice to withdraw from the church,dz (Catholic Answers) were absolutely right. The

person must completely understand that what he or she is doing is detrimental to their

relationship with Christ and is choosing do it anyway with full understanding.

Damnation comes as a conscience choice when choosing to stray away from Christ; to

turn off the light of saving grace provided by Christ and His church. As the light to the

world, the Roman Catholic Church contains the most visible images of Christ to the

world through the sacraments.

This new approach to ecumenism and interfaith dialogue greatly improved

Catholic relations with peoples of other faith. It made other religious leaders more

comfortable in engaging with the Catholic Church knowing that the Churchǯs stance was
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not to outright proclaim their damnation. Great strides have been made in interfaith

dialogue since this document was adopted. While many theological points of

contention are simply irreconcilable, the understanding that almost all religions contain

whispers of truth, especially in regards to human dignity and basic moral codes, has

allowed the world to truly step into a modern era.

Lumen Gentium radically changed the understanding of Salvation in the Catholic

Church. Prior to the document, the churchǯs stance on salvation was too overreaching.

We cannot put limits on what God can and cannot do. We cannot say that God operates

by certain rules. We must operate by certain rules in order to work towards salvation,

but ultimately, God is the judge. He alone has the power to condemn and save. And it

is only through his son Jesus Christ that we will be allowed to enter into the Kingdom of

Heaven, no matter what happens in this exile.

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¦
 
Catholic Answers. "Salvation outside the Church. " 10 August 2004. Catholic

Answers. 12 April 2010 <http://www. catholic.

com/library/Salvation_Outside_the_Church. asp>. IMPRIMATUR: In accord

with 1983 CIC 827 permission to publish this work is hereby granted. +Robert

H. Brom, Bishop of San Diego, August 10, 2004

Dulles, Avery Robert Cardinal. "Who Can Be Saved?" First Things 180 (2008): 17-22.

The Second Vatican Council. "Lumen Gentium. " Vatican City: The Roman Catholic
Church, 1962. 9-17.