International Journal for the Study of the Christian

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Mary – ‘Mother of the Church’: challenging

conciliar ecclesiology

Annemarie C. Mayer

To cite this article: Annemarie C. Mayer (2015) Mary – ‘Mother of the Church’: challenging
conciliar ecclesiology, International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church, 15:3, 186-198,
DOI: 10.1080/1474225X.2015.1079988

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1474225X.2015.1079988

Published online: 29 Oct 2015.

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International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church, 2015
Vol. 15, No. 3, 186–198, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1474225X.2015.1079988

Mary – ‘Mother of the Church’: challenging conciliar ecclesiology

Annemarie C. Mayer

On 21 November 1964, at the end of the third session of the Second Vatican Coun-
cil, the Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium (LG), was solemnly adopted
together with its final chapter on Mary. Simultaneously, Pope Paul VI proclaimed
the Marian title Mater Ecclesiae. This article will both review the Council’s debate
and identify the specifics of the title Mater Ecclesiae. The Council had rejected the
idea of awarding this title to Mary, even though chapter VIII of Lumen Gentium
mentions her ‘function as mother’ (LG 60). In proclaiming this title, Paul VI did not
follow the Council, which had located Mary within the Church. The question there-
fore arises as to whether Mary, as the ‘Mother of the Church’, is now placed outside
the Church.
Keywords: Mother of the Church; Lumen Gentium VIII; Mariology; co-redemptrix;
mediatrix; Marian principle; sensus fidelium; Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ

Introduction
On 21 November 1964, at the end of the so-called ‘black week’ that closed the third
session of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI proclaimed the Marian title Mater
Ecclesiae.1 At the same time the Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium (LG),
was solemnly promulgated, together with its final chapter on Mary. When discussing
this chapter, the Council had rejected the idea of giving Mary the title Mater Ecclesiae,
even though, in the conciliar document itself, mention was made of a ‘maternum
munus’, Mary’s ‘function as mother of men’ (LG 60). By proclaiming this new title,
Pope Paul VI opposed the Council, announcing the title by emphasising the verbs
‘declaramus’ and ‘statuimus’.2
What does this mean? The Council had placed Mary within the Church. Is she, as
the ‘Mother of the Church’, now taken out of it again, and placed in juxtaposition to
it? Is Mary a member of the Church, perhaps not just an ordinary member but the
Church’s first and exemplary member? Or is her relation to the Church rather a causa-
tive one? Is that a widening of the perspective, the crowning climax of a crisis of trust
between the Pope and the Council, a power gesture by the Pope, who, with this per-
sonal decision, disowns the collegial act of the Council, or is it an attempt at bridge
building with the conservative side?
The following article briefly reviews the Council’s debate (1), to explain the focal
points of the eighth chapter of Lumen Gentium (2), to look for the specifics of the

1
Paul VI used this title again in his homily on December 7, 1965 in the Basilica of Santa Maria
Maggiore.
2
Paul VI, ‘Allocutio’, ASCOV III/8, 916: ‘Igitur ad Beatae Virginis gloriam ad nostrumque sola-
cium, Mariam Sanctissimam declaramus Matrem Ecclesiae, hoc est totius populi christiani, tam
fidelium quam Pastorum, qui eam Matrem amantissimam appellant; ac statuimus ut suavissimo
hoc nomine iam nunc universus christianus populus magis adhuc honorem Deiparae tribuat eique
supplicationes adhibeat’ (my italics).
© 2015 Taylor & Francis
 International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 187

Marian title Mater Ecclesiae (3), and finally to sketch some Marian challenges for
conciliar ecclesiology (4).

1. ‘Ecclesia militans’ at the Council

The Council was preceded by the so-called ‘Marian era’ – one of its highlights being
the dogma, proclaimed by Pius XII in 1950, of the bodily assumption of Mary into
heaven.3 At that time, the question of Mary’s relation to the Church was, as it were,
quite topical. As early as 1957 the Mariologist Alois Müller commented:
Meanwhile, almost out of nowhere, and everywhere at the same time, the problem of the
relationship between Mary and the Church rose like a comet a few years ago. It is a sign
of the rapidity, indeed the suddenness of this development, that about ten years ago one
could, so to speak, still find nothing of it in the Marian literature of that time’.4
The high appreciation of Mariology is also reflected in the theological doctrines which
the Council Fathers held: many were inclined to a kind of mariological ‘maximalism’,
which felt committed to the two principles ‘potuit, decuit, ergo fecit’ (‘[God] could do
it, it was fitting, so he did it’) and ‘De Maria numquam satis’ (‘About Mary never
enough [can] be [said]’). Even before the Council, in a large number of petitions (about
600), these Council Fathers called for a detailed treatment of the Mariological question.
They expected from the Council a separate document on Mary, which would place her
in juxtaposition to the Church at the side of Christ and would perhaps apostrophise her
as ‘co-redeemer’ (corredemptrix) and ‘mediator of all grace’ (mediatrix).
Others, frowned upon as so-called minimalists, thus saw the sole salvific mediation
of Jesus Christ at risk and therefore tried to situate Mary alongside the redeemed
instead of at the side of the Redeemer by emphasising her affiliation to the Church.
The Preparatory Commission had made available a schema entitled De Maria, Matre
Iesu et Matre Ecclesiae5 and, as early as the second session, the dispute was externally
about whether the schema should be a separate conciliar document on Mary or whether
it should become part of the Constitution on the Church (not just an appendix of it!).
This was not merely an editorial question, but a theological one.
The supporters of a narrow mariological explanation argued it would be an inadmissible
limitation to view the task of the Mother of Jesus with regard to redemption only in con-
text with the Church […] The supporters of an integration in the Dogmatic Constitution
on the Church argued against this from the collective picture of salvation history, in which
Mary represents as the first believer the ’type’ of the Church.6

3
Cf. Pius XII, Munificentissimus Deus (DH 3900–3904): 1099–1101.
4
Müller, ‘Fragen und Aussichten der heutigen Mariologie’, 308: ‘Unterdessen ist, fast aus dem
Nichts und allenthalben gleichzeitig, seit einigen Jahren wie ein Komet das Problem aufgestiegen
von der Beziehung zwischen Maria und der Kirche. Es zeigt die Schnelligkeit, ja Plötzlichkeit
dieser Entwicklung, daß man vor zehn Jahren in der Marienliteratur des Tages noch sozusagen
nichts darüber finden konnte.’
5
In the second session the title was changed: De Beata Maria Virgine Matre Dei et hominum.
6
Pesch, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil, 193f: ‘Die Befürworter einer eigenen mariologischen
Erklärung argumentierten, es sei eine unzulässige Beschränkung, die Aufgabe der Mutter Jesu bei
der Erlösung nur im Zusammenhang mit der Kirche zu sehen […] Die Befürworter einer Ein-
bindung in die Kirchenkonstitution argumentierten dagegen vom Gesamtbild der Heilsgeschichte
her, in der Maria als die erste Glaubende den “Typus” der Kirche darstelle.’English trans., Pesch,
The Second Vatican Council, 184.
188 A.C. Mayer

After pleadings by Cardinal Rufino J. Santos (Manila) for an independent text and by
Cardinal Franz König (Vienna) for the integration, the crucial vote took place on 29
October 1963. The Council Fathers declared themselves by a narrow majority of only 40
votes (1114 to 1074) in favour of insertion into the Constitution on the Church. Has Mary
split the Council? was a headline the next day in a major Italian daily newspaper, given
the stalemate situation.7 An equally representative theological sub-commission
was entrusted with the revision.8 Its task was to harmonise the ecclesiotypical and the
Christotypical position9 in chapter VIII of the Constitution on the Church and to integrate
Mariology into the overall perspective of the understanding of Christ and the Church.
It is true that the integration of the teaching on Mary into the teaching on the Church
changed Mariology. Yet does it also have implications for ecclesiology? Karl Barth
remarked, ‘It was no accident that while Vatican II often acknowledged Mariology out
of a sense of duty, it deliberately avoided it in all the important statements, or used it
only for decorative purposes’.10 Does chapter VIII remain a mere appendix or is it
content-related to Vatican II’s concept of the Church? Could we maintain the following
thesis: If the title of ‘Mother of the Church’ is possible, Lumen Gentium VIII is not a
mere appendage?

2. Lumen Gentium VIII – a prudent text

The eighth chapter of Lumen Gentium is entitled ‘The Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of
God, in the Mystery of Christ and the Church’, a title prefiguring the theological
programme of the chapter. After the preface, which explains its inclusion in the
Constitution on the Church, Mary’s task is reflected in the economy of salvation, her
relationship to the Church is discussed and her veneration in the Church illustrated.
The claim of this eighth chapter of the Constitution on the Church, according to its
own evidence, is that it ‘does not wish to decide those questions which the work of
theologians has not yet fully clarified’ (LG 54). Ecclesiologically this chapter has so far
received little attention and a look into relevant manuals quickly shows that often they
only list the fact of its existence, but defer the interpretation to the treatise on
Mariology.11 The chapter is biblically, patristically and ecumenically oriented and
formulated around the title Theotokos (Mother of God) as its focal point. For ‘[i]n East

7
Theologians like Ratzinger, however, welcomed this decision as a ‘watershed of the Council’.
Cf. Ratzinger, ‘Erwägungen zur Stellung von Mariologie und Marienfrömmigkeit im Ganzen von
Glaube und Theologie’, 18.
8
Its members were Cardinals Santos and König, Bishops Doumith and Théas as well as the theo-
logical experts Gérard Philips, Leuven, and Carlos Balič OFM, President of the International
Marian Academy in Rome and architect of the schema of the Preparatory Commission.
9
This nomenclature can be traced back to Heinrich Maria Köster, cf. Courth, ‘Der mariologische
Beitrag von H. M. Köster’, 172f.
10
Barth, Ad Limina Apostolorum, 66: ‘die ganze Marienkonstruktion zwar öfters pflichtschuldigst
kommemoriert, sie aber in allen seinen wichtigen Aussagen sichtlich nicht oder nur zu dekora-
tiven Zwecken nötig hat.’ English trans., Barth, Ad Limina Apostolorum: An Appraisal of Vatican
II, 62.
11
Cf. e.g. Kehl, Die Kirche. In Wiedenhofer, ‘Ekklesiologie’, there is no reference to Mary, but
the tract is immediately followed by the one on Mariology. Kasper, Katholische Kirche, devotes
at least a sub-chapter to ‘Maria – Urbild der Kirche’, 215–22. English trans., Kasper, The Catho-
lic Church, ‘Mary – Archetype of the Church’, 145–50. A laudable exception to the ecclesiologi-
cal oblivion of Mary is Greshake, Maria – Ecclesia.
 International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 189

and West this title functions as the foundation of Marian veneration’.12 Together with
the title ‘Virgin’ it summarises the significance of Mary’s role in salvation history by
emphasising the Christological and pneumatological relationality of the mother of Jesus
to the Church. Mary’s Christ-centredness is expressed in her freely believing openness
to the Holy Spirit. The aim is thus to reduce the uncontrollable growth of a
co-redemptrix- and mediatrix-theology which could easily lead to misunderstandings.
Therefore, the title mediatrix is indeed mentioned in Lumen Gentium 62,13 but in a
rather descriptive way, and it is flanked by advocata, auxiliatrix and adiutrix.14 Liter-
ally the text reads, ‘[T]he Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of
Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix. This, however, is so understood that it
neither takes away anything from nor adds anything to the dignity and efficacy of
Christ the one Mediator.’15 The position of Mary is thus based entirely on Christ’s
mediatorship.
Although this might also be expressed appropriately in a juxtaposition of Mary and
the Church, the clear integration of Mary into the Church is, however, the more
unequivocal form of expression. Mary is the exemplary disciple of Christ who as the
first believer is the first member of the Church. Through her faith Mary actively enters
as a human being, in solidarity with all people, in the salvific event. As ‘Church in per-
son’16 she is the Church’s representative, realisation, norm and enabling reason. Her
free assent (Luke 1.38) is the prototype of what the community of believers is sup-
posed to do and is thus far not an expression of her co-redeeming function but of her
exemplary role for all Christians. Lumen Gentium 63 reiterates therefore, based on
Ambrosius,17 ‘Deipara est Ecclesiae typus’ – ‘the Mother of God is […] a type of the
Church’ (LG 63). The term typus ecclesiae sounds somewhat strange today. It serves to
show both Mary and the Church in the universal perspective of salvation history. The
real continuity and the inner connection of God’s action in history are expressed in this
typological interpretation. From time immemorial, the typology supports, for example,
the parallelisation with Eve. Resorting to Irenaeus,18 Lumen Gentium 56 states:
Hence not a few of the early Fathers gladly assert with him in their preaching: ‘the knot
of Eve’s disobedience was untied by Mary’s obedience: what the virgin Eve bound through
her disbelief, Mary loosened by her faith’. Comparing Mary with Eve, they call her
‘Mother of the living’, and frequently claim: ‘death through Eve, life through Mary’.

12
Hünermann, ‘Theologischer Kommentar zur dogmatischen Konstitution über die Kirche Lumen
Gentium’, 513: ‘Im Osten wie im Westen fungiert dieser Titel als Fundament der Marien-
verehrung.’
13
For the latest state of the art cf. Villafiorita Monteleone, ‘Die Mitwirkung Marias an der Erlö-
sung’, 22–36.
14
After the close of the Council Joseph Ratzinger lamented that there are hardly any Christologi-
cal titles of honour left which are not applied also to Mary (cf. Ratzinger, ‘Das Problem der Mar-
iologie’, 80: ‘Es gibt […] kaum noch christologische Würdetitel, die nicht auch auf Maria
angewendet werden.’)
15
The quotations of the Vatican II documents are given according to the translation edited by
Austin Flannery OP, Vatican Council II, vol. 1.
16
In this context Greshake refers to the ancient oriental concept of ‘corporate personality’ which
can be used for a city or a people and which expresses the relationship between two entities. Cf.
Greshake, Maria – Ecclesia, 66, 70f. and more often – referring to Wheeler Robinson, Corporate
Personality in Ancient Israel.
17
Ambrosius, Expositio in Lucam II, 7: PL 15, col. 1555.
18
Irenaeus, Adversus haereses III, 22, 4: PG 7, col. 959A.
190 A.C. Mayer

In parenthesis it should be noted: this typological parallelism is today criticised by fem-

inist theologians, as being at the expense of Eve or women in general.19 Furthermore it
would be a misunderstanding of typological thinking if Mary, at the expense of her
human-earthly being, were ‘reduced to a mere and therefore interchangeable exemplifi-
cation of theological facts. The meaning of a prototype rather remains safeguarded, if
the Church becomes visible in its personal form by the not interchangeable figure of
Mary.’20 In addition, the informational value of typologies is epistemologically to be
problematised and one should beware of an overload of its symbolic language. Thus a
Mary–Eve–Church typology, in conjunction with nuptial connotations (Mary, the new
Eve as bride of Christ, the new Adam), could take blasphemous interpretations (à la
Oedipus).
The symbolic language of the Marian title in the eighth chapter of the Dogmatic
Constitution on the Church focuses, in any case, on personal mutually interchangeable
images, which are an application of self-designations of Israel to Mary.
As Israel is not only called ‘daughter’ and ‘bride’, but also ‘virgin’ and ‘mother’, so is
Mary analogous: She is at the threshold between the Old and the New Covenant, ‘in per-
sona’ the holy Israel and ‘in persona’ the Church. As child-bearer of the Redeemer she is
also the mother of his mystical body, the Church.21

From the ‘Mater viventium’ in Lumen Gentium 56 and the ‘Mater fidelium’ in Lumen
Gentium 53, there is but a tiny step, which the Council did not in fact take, towards
this final conclusion.

3. The title ‘Mother of the Church’

In actual fact, discussion of the title Mater Ecclesiae was at times quite harsh. ‘If the
Church is our mother and Mary is the Mother of the Church, then Mary is our grand-
mother’,22 said the Mexican bishop Sergio Méndez Arceo (Cuernavaca) in his speech
on 17 September 1964, for which he was strongly reprimanded the following day. The
image or symbol of ‘Mother Church’23 actually conveys the meaning that believers are
reborn by baptism (cf. John 3.2f) and are accompanied as brothers and sisters of Christ

19
Cf. Beattie, ‘Mary, Eve and the Church’, 11–15 and Halkes, ‘Maria/Mariologie B. Aus der
Sicht feministischer Theologie’, 315–23.
20
Ratzinger, ‘Erwägungen zur Stellung von Mariologie und Marienfrömmigkeit im Ganzen von
Glaube und Theologie’, 25: ‘zur bloßen und damit austauschbaren Exemplifikation theologischer
Sachverhalte reduziert wird. Der Sinn des Typus bleibt vielmehr nur gewahrt, wenn die Kirche
durch die unvertauschbare persönliche Gestalt Marias in ihrer persönlichen Form erkennbar
wird’.
21
Menke, ‘Ein Spielball heftiger Kontroversen’, 659: ‘Wie Israel nicht nur “Tochter” und “Braut”,
sondern auch “Jungfrau” und “Mutter” genannt wird, so analog Maria: Sie ist an der Schwelle
vom alten zum neuen Bund “in persona” das heilige Israel und “in persona” die Kirche. Sie ist
als Gebärerin des Erlösers auch die Mutter seines mystischen Leibes, der Kirche.’
22
Sergio Méndez Arceo, ASCOV III/1, 541–4 and against him Bishop Laureano Castán Lacoma
(Siguënza) indignantly on the following day: ASCOV III/2, 15–18. The Avia-fidelis-Bonmot reads
in Latin ‘Si Maria esset Mater Ecclesiae, cum Ecclesia sit Mater nostra, Maria Avia dicenda
esset’. Already in the sixteenth century Francis of Sales (1567–1622) thought about this seri-
ously.
23
Its biblical origin is to be found in Galatians 4.26f. The idea is birth through baptism into new
life.
 International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 191

in and through the Church.24 Thus, the Church is seen as a universal family of
disciples. Lumen Gentium 64 emphasises:
the Church […] by receiving the word of God in faith becomes herself a mother. By
preaching and baptism she brings forth sons, who are conceived of the Holy Spirit and
born of God, to a new and immortal life. She herself is a virgin, who keeps in its entirety
and purity the faith she pledged to her spouse. (LG 64)
In this parallelisation the paradox of metaphorical expressions comes to the fore clearly
whenever a differentiated identity of Mary and the Church should be expressed.
At the Council a competition between the ‘Mother Church’ on the one hand and
the ‘Mother of the Church’ on the other stems from the fact that the title Mater Eccle-
siae is seen as a further expression of Mary’s parallelisation with Christ. Furthermore
the theological historical origin of the title had not been reappraised sufficiently at the
time of the Council, as Achim Dittrich speculates.25 In any case, the biblical foundation
of the title is John 19.25–30. With the words, ‘Woman, behold your son!’ and ‘Behold,
your mother!’ − to be interpreted typologically − the Crucified entrusts ‘Mother
Church’ to his favourite disciple who stands for faithful believers. By her faithful
assent, which she carried through until she stood under the cross, Mary represents both
Israel and the Church and makes the transition from the Old to the New Covenant.26
These considerations are summarised, in exemplary form, in Mary: Grace and Hope in
Christ (2004), an ecumenical document of the Anglican–Roman Catholic International
Commission (ARCIC):
Understood in terms of discipleship, Jesus’ dying words give Mary a motherly role in the
Church and encourage the community of disciples to embrace her as a spiritual mother.
[…] Mary is seen as the personification of Israel, now giving birth to the Christian com-
munity (cf. Isaiah 54:1, 66:7–8) just as she had given birth to the Messiah earlier (cf. Isa-
iah 7:14).27
It appears that even the ecclesiotypical parallelisation of Mary and the Church, with its
intentional statement that the Church belongs inseparably to Christ, at times runs the
risk of exaggerating unbiblically.
One final remark on this third point: on 29 October 1964 Cardinal Suenens still
insisted on suggesting an improvement to Lumen Gentium 65, explicitly to connect
Mary and the missionary activity of the Church.28 Thus the concluding paragraph on
the relationship between Mary and the Church focuses now on the Church’s mission
ad extra. It states:
The Church, therefore, in her apostolic work too, rightly looks to her who gave birth to
Christ, who was thus conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of a virgin, in order that
through the Church he could be born and increase in the hearts of the faithful. In her life

24
Cf. Greshake, Maria – Ecclesia, 137.
25
Cf. Dittrich, ‘Der Mater-Ecclesiae-Titel auf dem Zweiten Vatikanum’, 284. Cf. Dittrich, Mater
Ecclesiae. Geschichte und Bedeutung eines umstrittenen Marientitels. Statements like this title
are not traditional and can be found only rarely with individual authors, but emerge in the debate
again and again. Gabriele Roschini tries to show the contrary: Roschini, ‘Maria santissima solen-
nemente proclamata da Paolo VI. “Madre della Chiesa”’, 296–330.
26
Cf. Schürmann, ‘Jesu letzte Weisung’, 13–18, as well as Wilckens, Das Evangelium nach
Johannes.
27
Anglican–Roman Catholic International Commission, Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ, no.
26f.
28
The same he had already mentioned on December 4, 1962 (cf. Patrum orationes, ASCOV I, 4,
226) and referred to it again on September 17, 1964 (ASCOV III, 1, 505).
192 A.C. Mayer

the Virgin has been a model of that motherly love with which all who join in the Church’s
apostolic mission for the regeneration of mankind should be animated. (LG 65)

As a function of the whole Church, the apostolic activity of the Church is seen under
Marian typology.
Although Cardinal Suenens was a strict proponent of the ecclesiotypical position,
he did not see any problem in speaking of Mary’s motherly role over against the
Church. He had already made this clear in 1951: ‘Mary and the Church are in fact not
two different realities; they are effectively one and the same mystery that is simply con-
sidered under two different points of view.’29 The title Mater Ecclesiae was not used
by the Council because it puts Mary in opposition to the Church and is not as clearly
immune against Christotypical ambiguities as is the path which the Council ultimately
has taken, namely returning to the ecclesiotypical paradigm of patristic times.30 Even
without this title the final version of Lumen Gentium was adopted on 18 November
1964 with 2096 votes in favour and only 23 votes against.

4. Marian challenges for conciliar ecclesiology: a selection

Objectively, however, it seems that even the ecclesiotypical approach − provided that it
emphasises the close interlocking of Mariology and ecclesiology − is not able to
exclude the title Mater Ecclesiae completely. In view of the inseparability of Mary and
the Church, which it is able to express,31 some Marian challenges for conciliar ecclesi-
ology are outlined, by way of conclusion, below.
In the first place, the way in which Pope Paul VI acted has to be questioned. Was
it his concern to show that both Mary and the Pope are not only to be placed in but
also above the Church?32 Given the formal boundaries of Lumen Gentium, chapter
VIII, his strategy might have been to set the regulatory framework more widely and
thus create a leeway for theological creativity.33 As shown, the title Mater Ecclesiae
was implied in many passages of chapter VIII. The title was not made explicit until the
reception of the Constitution on the Church by the Pope himself. However, this deliber-
ately did not result in an authoritative interpretation by the Pope. Formally, however,
the action of Paul VI was (not only in the question of this Marian title, but in the
whole ‘black week’) a challenge to the collegiality and synodality newly emphasised
by the Council. In the aftermath of the Council no overcoming of centralism took
place. On the contrary, some bishops, to quote Thomas Reese, were ‘behaving like

29
Suenens, Apostolat und Mutterschaft Mariens, 192f.: ‘Maria und die Kirche sind in der Tat
keine zwei verschiedenen Wirklichkeiten; sie sind gewissermaßen ein und dasselbe Geheimnis,
das nur unter zwei verschiedenen Gesichtspunkten betrachtet wird.’
30
This needs to be pointed out against Mattei, Il Concilio Vaticano II.
31
Cf. Menke, ‘Ein Spielball heftiger Kontroversen’, 659; ebenfalls Ratzinger, ‘Erwägungen zur
Stellung von Mariologie und Marienfrömmigkeit im Ganzen von Glaube und Theologie’, 22:
‘Alles was später Mariologie sein wird, ist zunächst als Ekklesiologie vorgedacht worden.’ This
refers back to Müller, ‘Fragen und Aussichten der heutigen Mariologie’, 301: ‘Maria war in den
ersten Jahrhunderten nicht vergessen oder verloren, sondern verwahrt und aufgehoben in der
Kirchentheologie.’
32
Thus Laurentin, Mutter Jesu – Mutter der Menschen, 15f.
33
In any case, mariological maximalism continued to exist also after the Council, as showed the
2001 petition of more than 540 bishops and 45 cardinals, among them Schönborn and Lustiger,
addressed to Pope John Paul II. It stipulated to proclaim three new Marian dogmas: corre-
demptrix, mediatrix und advocata. The Pope declined this request. Cf. Munsterman, Marie Coré-
demptrice ? Débat sur un titre marial controversé, 9.
 International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 193

branch managers of a multinational corporation where directives from the top are
expected to be obeyed without question’.34 A Mary-oriented ecclesiology however also
requires ‘new orientations that favour the emergence of churches with subject charac-
ter’35 and thus, in turn, lend countenance to an ecclesiology of communio. The subject
character is related to the position of the individual church (ecclesia particularis) and
its bishop in relation to other particular churches and to the universal Church: the bish-
ops should ‘live in communion with one another and with the Roman Pontiff in a bond
of unity, charity and peace’ (LG 22). Lumen Gentium 23 makes the basic correction in
the statement on particular churches:
which are constituted after the model of the universal Church; it is in these and formed
out of them that the one Catholic Church exists. And for this reason precisely each bishop
represents his own Church, whereas all, together with the pope, represent the whole
Church in a bond of peace, love and unity.36
According to Lumen Gentium 27, the bishops are vicars of Christ, not of the Pope37
and Lumen Gentium 28 emphasises, together with Lumen Gentium 23 (there even
twice), that dioceses are portiones and not partes of the universal Church.38
A church that emulates Mary cannot be triumphalistic. For Mary’s faith was quite
contested. If one identifies − with Hans Urs von Balthasar,39 Angelo Scola and others
− a Marian and a Petrine principle40 in the Church, this must not lead to bigotry at all.
On the contrary, the Church is to take seriously the Marian primacy of receiving, enact-
ing and practising her faith. This inevitably leads to a relativisation of the Church’s
institutional side. Indeed this side – ultimately as a consequence of God’s incarnation –
aims at the individual visible-symbolic mediation of the immediacy of God and an
expression of this ‘complex reality’ (LG 8)41 is necessary. Yet here, too, the pre-
Socratic maxim of μηδὲν ἀγάν, ‘nothing too much’, is valid. Given an overwhelming
wealth of administrative mechanisms and structures, it is a question of balance and of
the right measure. The Council’s statements on Mary meant for Joseph Ratzinger in
1968: ‘The Church is not an appliance, is not merely an institution and also is not one

34
Reese, Inside the Vatican, 2.
35
Legrand ‘Die Entwicklung der Kirchen als verantwortliche Subjekte’, 145: ‘Neuorientierungen,
die das Aufkommen von Kirchen mit Subjektcharakter begünstigen.’
36
The authoritative Latin version of Lumen Gentium 23 reads: ‘ad imaginem Ecclesiae universalis
formatis in quibus et ex quibus una et unica Ecclesia catholica exsistit. Qua de causa singuli
Episcopi suam Ecclesiam, omnes autem simul cum Papa totam Ecclesiam repraesentant in vin-
culo pacis, amoris et unitatis.’
37
Cf. however Codex Iuris Canonici, can. 331: ‘Ecclesiae Romanae Episcopus, in quo permanet
munus a Domino singulariter Petro, primo Apostolorum, concessum et successoribus eius trans-
mittendum, Collegii Episcoporum est caput, Vicarius Christi atque universae Ecclesiae his in ter-
ris Pastor’ (my italics). There the title vicarius Christi is reserved for the Pope alone.
38
Cf. also the definition of diocese in the Decree on the Pastoral Office of Bishops in the Church
Christus Dominus 11.
39
Cf. Balthasar, ‘Klarstellungen’, 72, which underlines that, in Mary, the Church was already
there before men were appointed into office by ordination (‘schon da, ehe die Männer ins Amt
eingesetzt wurden’).
40
Cf. Scola, ‘The Theological Foundation of the Petrine Dimension of the Church’, 12–37 as well
as, in addition, Baldini, Principio Petrino e principio Mariano ne ‘Il complesso antiromano’,
who underlines that Mary is the universale concretum of the Church.
41
Cf. Greshake, Maria – Ecclesia, 455, as well as Pottmeyer, ‘Der Papst Zeuge Christi in der
Nachfolge Petri’, 60, and Kasper, ‘Der Geheimnischarakter der Kirche hebt den Sozialcharakter
nicht auf’, 232–6.
194 A.C. Mayer

of the usual sociological entities – she is a person. She is a woman. She is a mother.’42
On 24 September 2011 he emphasised, as Benedict XVI, in Freiburg im Breisgau: ‘We
must honestly admit that we have more than enough by way of structure, but not
enough by way of Spirit.’43 The necessary reforms are now getting slowly underway
under Pope Francis.44
The Marian perspective mainly focuses on the communio-inspired structures of the
Church that precede any hierarchical church structure, such as the priesthood of all
believers which biblically is based on 1 Peter 2.4–10. At the proclamation of Mater
Ecclesiae, Paul VI had explicitly emphasised that Mary was not only the mother of the
laity, but also of the ordained.45 This in turn underlines the communio-structure of
God’s people. The Second Vatican Council does not begin with an ecclesiology ‘from
below’, it
rather begins with the joint participation of all in the prophetic, priestly and royal ministry
of Jesus Christ. In doing so, the Council begins with that which is common to lay people,
priests and bishops and which precedes all later distinctions, encompasses them and
continues in all of them: with the common priesthood of all the baptised.46
The prophetic ministry of all believers is closely related to the sensus fidelium, the
sense of faith of the faithful, as a locus theologicus, i.e. as an authority to consult for
determining what is or is not a tenet of faith. The ARCIC enquiry into the Catholic
Marian dogmas focuses on the fact ‘that the Bishop of Rome defined these doctrines
independent of a Council’.47 The Catholic answer is: the Magisterium has preached
nothing else than the consensus ecclesiae, formed by the sensus fidei of all the faithful,
that is to say the definitions of the Marian dogmas ‘gave voice to the consensus of faith
among believers in communion with the Bishop of Rome’.48 In the text quoted here
from Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ, the Anglicans respond that for them, ‘it would
be the consent of an ecumenical council which, teaching according to the Scriptures,
most securely demonstrates that the necessary conditions for a teaching to be de fide
had been met’.49 Is the same not true also for Catholics? The question of teaching
authority within the Church is certainly not just an ecumenical problem, for the same

42
Ratzinger, ‘Die Ekklesiologie des Zweiten Vatikanums’, 52.
43
Benedict XVI, ‘Speech at the Meeting with the Council of the Central Committee of German
Catholics (ZDK)’.
44
Cf. Legrand, ‘Les réformes du pape François. L’Évangile en première place et une Église vécue
comme communion’, 26–38; Legrand, ‘Réformer la papauté pour servir l’unité entre les Églises’,
565–76; Mayer, ‘Pope Francis – A Pastor according to the Heart of Christ’, 147–60.
45
Paul VI, ‘Allocutio’: ‘Mariam Sanctissimam declaramus Matrem Ecclesiae, hoc est totius populi
christiani, tam fidelium quam Pastorum, qui eam Matrem amantissimam appellant’.
46
Kasper, Katholische Kirche, 286f: ‘vielmehr mit der gemeinsamen Teilhabe aller am prophetis-
chen, priesterlichen und königlichen Amt Jesu Christi. Damit beginnt das Konzil mit dem, was
Laien, Priestern und Bischöfen gemeinsam ist und mit dem, was allen späteren Unterscheidungen
vorausliegt, sie umgreift und sich in ihnen durchhält, nämlich mit dem gemeinsamen Priestertum
aller Getauften’. English trans., Kasper, The Catholic Church, 198.
47
Anglican–Roman Catholic International Commission, Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ, no. 62.
48
Ibid.
49
Ibid. Cf. also Hintzen, ‘Das anglikanisch–katholische Dialogdokument “Maria: Gnade und
Hoffnung in Christus”‘, 179f. For the significance of Mary in ecumenical dialogue cf. also
Groupe des Dombes, Mary in the Plan of God and the Communion of Saints and Bilaterale
Arbeitsgruppe der DBK und der Kirchenleitung der ELKD, Communio Sanctorum.
 International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 195

question becomes pressing beyond the much-vaunted ecumenical inopportunity of the

title Mater Ecclesiae. Should the Pope alone (ex cathedra Petri) decide or, better,
together with the Council?
What does moreover happen if the sensus fidei of the faithful were no longer to
accept a church doctrine, perhaps even a binding one? In Lumen Gentium 12 the papal
teaching is not tied to the Church’s sense of faith, which is exercised, ‘guided by the
sacred teaching authority (magisterium), and obeying it’. On the other hand, the refer-
ence to the sensus fidelium (i.e. the supernatural appreciation of the faith) is a concreti-
sation of what had already been underlined by the First Vatican Council, that the Pope
is not infallible outside of and in opposition to the Church, but rather the Church can-
not err in faith, or as Augustine puts it, ‘from the bishops to the last of the faithful’.50
The final point to address in this context illustrates, on the basis of the Suenens
proposal, the link between a Marian-shaped and a missionary Church. In 1531 Juan
Diego, a simple Mexican, reported that he had had an apparition of Mary. Ever since
then, at the heart of the Marian Shrine in Guadalupe, the image of Mary is shown on a
piece of Mexican coat fabric. Mary is now no longer the prototype of a church coming
from outside, but of an indigenous church which is growing in the Mexican nation
itself and is rooted there: ‘The appearance of Mary in Guadalupe was, so to speak,
expressive of the fact that the gospel had made the transition to the Mexican people
themselves, and that a community of faith had arisen among them.’51
Yet the term ‘missionary church’ does not only relate to mission overseas. It is
much more connected with the mission of the Church that consists of taking Christ
to the people. Here, too, it appears that the proposal by Cardinal Suenens is more
than a mere postscript to Lumen Gentium 65. It does not only refer to the prophetic
(indeed also socio-critical) statements of the Magnificat, but points to the fact that
evangelism happens thanks to believers in whom Christ is born again (Gal. 2.20) so
that their lives become a living Gospel. Again, Mary is a prototype of this attitude.
Thus the final chapter of Lumen Gentium forms a bridge to Gaudium et Spes and to
the Church in the world of today which seeks to find its place in a perhaps unfamil-
iar, seemingly strange, manner and context. Changing images of Mary52 are simulta-
neously always also an indicator of changing images of the Church. If in no other

50
Lumen Gentium 12 formulates this in reference to Augustine, De Praedestinatione Sanctorum,
14, 27: PL 44, 980.
51
Vischer, ‘Mary – Symbol of the Church and Symbol of Humankind’, 8.
52
Cf. for instance the Walking Madonna by Elisabeth Frink in front of Salisbury Cathedral who
is, as the caption on a postcard photograph by Michael Blackman claims ‘Walking with purpose-
ful compassion as a member of the community of the Risen Christ to bring love where love is
absent’ http://crated.com/art/138513/walking-madonna-of-salisbury-cathedral-2-by-linseywilliams?
product=FP&size=16|12&frame=BF&edge=250MA (accessed July 19, 2015). Or even more to
the point, the Madonna with Child of the Millennium 2010 series by the Armenian artist Tigran
Tsitoghdzyan http://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Millenium/204141/107788/view (accessed
July 19, 2015) who comments on his picture: ‘This new project is intended to expose the identity
of contemporary man in the era of cultural globalization, technological revolution and biological
distortion. […] The old, the new are getting closer and closer to each other […] I’m interested to
take very casual scenes and add a[n] iconic gesture, combining it with old masters layered oil
technique.’
196 A.C. Mayer

way, at least in this regard a causal link between Mary and the Church is thus justi-
fied in the title Mater Ecclesiae.

Notes on contributor
Annemarie C. Mayer is professor of Systematic Theology and the Study of Religions in the
Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies of the Katholieke Universiteit (Catholic University),
Leuven, Belgium, and one of the academic editors of this journal. She serves on the Reformed–
Catholic International Dialogue and on the Joint Working Group between the World Council of
Churches and the Roman Catholic Church. Until 2013 she held the post of Catholic Consultant
to the World Council of Churches in Geneva and taught Fundamental Theology at the University
of Fribourg, Switzerland. Until 2010 she taught at the Institute for Ecumenical Research in the
Catholic Faculty of Tübingen University, Germany.

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