Poised between memory and hope

Fifth Sunday in Eastertide – May 2, 2010 – St. John’s, Goshen

We continue our fifty-day celebration of Easter, the Church’s sustained meditation on the fruits, consequences, implications of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Church arose out of faith that God, who was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, had raised the crucified Jesus of Nazareth from the dead, made him Lord and Messiah, and granted forgiveness of sins in his name. The Church stands in that same faith today. It is why we gather here today, why we listen to the Scriptures that express the impact of that faith on the minds and hearts of the first generations of Christians.

Today’s readings poise us between a beginning and an end.

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Interpreting Gaudium et spes

Here is an essay which discusses the last stages of the redaction of Gaudium et spes and the constrasting interpretations and evaluations of it that were offered right after the Council by three theologians who belonged to the “progressive” group at the Council. It was an effort both to show that the conciliar dynamics are not accurately analyzed as a battle between Cowboys and Indians and to explain in part the split that occurred among the conciliar majority after Vatican II.

JAK – Views of Gaudium et spes