Page 149 - God's Church through the Ages - Student Textbook

The council called between 2,000 and 2,500 bishops and
thousands of observers, auditors, sisters, laymen and laywomen
to four sessions at St. Peter's Basilica between 1962 and 1965.
Cultural changes in the aftermath of World War II spelled a need
to reconsider church practices. These meetings did just that —
16 documents in total came out of it, laying a foundation for the
Catholic Church as we know it today.

O'Malley says a theme of the documents was reconciliation. In
keeping, they allowed for Catholics to pray with other Christian denominations, encouraged friendship with
other non-Christian faiths, and opened the door for languages besides Latin to be used during Mass. Other new
positions concerned education, the media and divine revelation.

Most prominently, says Xavier University's Peter A. Huff, the council highlighted the church's willingness to
operate in the contemporary realm.

"Prior to this time, the church had been almost seen as a fortress, very much concerned about its own internal
stability and integrity and engaging the world in terms of missionary activity," Huff says. "Pope John wanted to
reinforce that missionary mandate, but he also wanted to create an environment of dialogue, where the church
would engage in all the forces of the modern world."

Today, the council is credited with essentially shaping the modern Catholic Church. But some Catholics still look
fondly on the old days, and others are concerned about the interpretation of the council's legacy. Pope Benedict,
for one, is careful to emphasize that Vatican II was not a condemnation of the pre-council church.

"He wants to see Vatican II as a council of reform but a council that's in continuity with the Catholic past that
came before it," Huff says.

Fifty years since the council, O'Malley says that most young Catholics know little about this revolutionary period.

Joseph Washington, 1964 – 124

Joseph Washington published his book Black Religion in 1964, which he argues for the
distinctiveness of black religion in North America and the need for integration of Black theology
into mainstream Protestantism. Washington examines mid-twentieth century black culture and
folk religion, community and church, values and virtues, politics and polity, leaders and
leadership, integration and segregation.

Emergence of Postmodernism , c. 1970 – Post-modern Christianity is just as difficult to lock down in a concise
definition as post-modernism itself. What started in the 1950s in architecture as a reaction to modernist thought
and style was soon adopted by the art and literary world in the 1970s and 1980s. The Church didn't really feel
this effect until the 1990s. This reaction was a dissolution of "cold, hard fact" in favor of "warm, fuzzy
subjectivity." Think of anything considered post-modern, then stick Christianity into that context and you have a
glimpse of what post-modern Christianity is.

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