Salvation for the Sinned-Against

Han and Schillebeeckx in Intercultural Dialogue

Considine

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9781630878887
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

The problem of the barbarous excess of human suffering is becoming the main question of global Christianity. In an intercultural, globalizing world, how do we envision the wounds of sin and God's saving work of healing, liberation, and redemption? Salvation for the Sinned-Against attempts to address these questions and to suggest a renewed understanding of God's salvation for the victims of sin within the intercultural and globalizing context of the twenty-first century. It offers a thorough treatment of Edward Schillebeeckx, intercultural hermeneutics, and the Korean concept of han, and brings them into dialogue with the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World Gaudium et spes. This book is the first in-depth study of han from a Roman Catholic perspective and the first to attempt to integrate han into Roman Catholic theology in order to begin to envision salvation for the sinned-against creature. Its insights into the experience and message of salvation for the sinned-against (as well as the perpetrators) speak not only to the ecclesial sphere but to the public sphere and beyond. Although written from a Western, North American social location, this is a book that can be useful far beyond this context.

1

Gaudium et spes: A Relatively Inadequate Soteriology for the Sinned-Against Creature

In this chapter, I will briefly discuss the anthropology and soteriology in the document Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et spes, solemnly promulgated by Pope Paul VI and the Second Vatican Council in 1965.1 The purpose of this chapter is to outline the anthropology and soteriology of this document and then offer a critique that demonstrates its relative inadequacy: a lack of a thick description of the effects of sin upon the sinned-against creature as a supplement to its anthropological focus upon the sinning creature and the Sinned-Against Creator. This underdevelopment in anthropology leads to a relatively inadequate soteriology.

The Pastoral Constitution’s Christian anthropology rightfully focuses upon the sinning creature’s alienation from the Sinned-Against Creator, as well as the modern questions of meaning, existence, and atheism to which this is connected. But this Christian fundamental anthropology and soteriology needs to be supplemented, at the foundational level, by an accounting of a Christian anthropology of woundedness of the sinned-against creature and the work of the Living God of Jesus Christ in healing the victims’ wounds and calling the violators to repent. In other words, the Pastoral Constitution offers a vision of Christian salvation that primarily focuses upon the sinner with reference to the problems of meaning and atheism while failing also to focus sufficiently upon the sinned-against creature with reference to the problems of innocent suffering and non-persons.2

This chapter will proceed in three sections. First, I will briefly introduce the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), its purpose, and accomplishments. I will discuss Pope John XXIII’s underlying theme of aggiornamento in convening the Council, the global reach in the preparation for and execution of the Council, and the diversity of the documents promulgated over its four sessions. I will also discuss the genre of a Pastoral Constitution that is unprecedented in the history of documents solemnly promulgated by the Roman Catholic Church.

Second, I will discuss the basic anthropology and soteriology expressed in the document and in particular in chapter 1. I will outline the Pastoral Constitution’s understandings of original human dignity, the violation of human dignity through sinning against God the Creator, the connection between this sinning and the problem of modern atheism, and a focus upon eschatological salvation over moments of fragmentary salvation. I will also show that this Christian anthropology and soteriology is connected to the priority that the Council Fathers give to the problems of human meaning and modern atheism—the non–believer—over the problems of oppression and innocent human suffering—non–persons.3

Third, I will offer a critique of the basic Christian anthropology of Gaudium et spes and make an argument as to why this anthropology and soteriology are relatively inadequate: the document does not provide a sufficient description or understanding of the effects of sin upon the human person in this world. In other words, Gaudium et spes concerns itself with the “joys and hopes, griefs and anxieties” of modern women and men but it does not provide a thick description of the woundedness inflicted upon the sinned-against creature, by sinners, in the presence of the Living God. I will discuss the roots of my critique in Latin American theologies of liberation and in particular observations by Virgilio Elizondo and Gustavo Gutiérrez. I will then examine the evidence in the text of Gaudium et spes that would seem to contradict my critique and argument through its discussion of the sinned-against creature and the work for healing, liberation, and reconciliation in this world. Nevertheless, I will show how my critique and argument dispels these counterpoints and then I will reiterate that much of the Pastoral Constitution’s relative inadequacy is linked to its primary concern with non-believers and its secondary concern with non-persons. This is a shortcoming in the anthropology that is at the foundation of its soteriology. I will conclude with an observation about the dual concern of Edward Schillebeeckx with non-persons and human suffering as well as non-believers and human meaning.

At the outset, it is important to point out that the purpose of this chapter is neither to engage nor to evaluate the ongoing hermeneutical debates concerning the most faithful way to interpret Vatican II. Much of this debate revolves around questions of continuity or discontinuity with the other ecumenical councils as well as the question whether or not anything happened at all. These questions continue to be explored in depth by other scholars (although no broad consensus has been reached).4 The purpose of this chapter is quite narrow. I will examine the document itself, and in particular Part One, in order to describe and critique the anthropology and soteriology that it articulates. I choose Gaudium et spes because it is an authoritative articulation of Roman Catholic anthropology and soteriology. Although I will not ignore the context in which it was written nor the history of its development, I will focus my analysis upon the text of Gaudium et spes in its final form.

Section One: The Second Vatican Council: A Brief Introduction5

It is not an exaggeration to describe the Second Vatican Council as the most important event for Roman Catholicism since the Council of Trent. Stephen Schloesser observes that the Council had a broad vision and intended to address the pressing issues of the day. Schloesser writes that, in light of the monumental changes in the world at the time, “the council needed to go back to the big issues and revisit fundamental questions. In such a world as this, What or who is God? What or who is the human person? What is the point of human existence? What is salvation? If salvation is available to those outside the Church, what is the Church? What is its role in history?”6

The Second Vatican Council, as envisioned by Pope John XXIII, found its theme in aggiornamento.7 In Italian, this term refers to the work of “bringing up to date” or “modernizing.” This is the term used by Pope John XXIII as he announced his intention to convoke an ecumenical council in 1959. The Pope’s announcement occurred just a few months after the conclave that elected him and caught most of the Church (and the world) by surprise.8

The Pope made it clear that this was to be a pastoral council. The Council was neither to be fully confrontational with the world nor to be solely concerned with condemning its errors. Rather, Pope John XXIII hoped to address the problems arising in the global church as it found itself in a rapidly changing world. Pope John XXIII hoped that the Council would enable the Church to begin to dialogue with the modern world and not merely condemn it through canons and anathemas. Pope John XXIII’s theme of aggiornamento was embraced by a majority of participants in the Council. As John Langan has observed:

The Fathers of the Council give up the defensive, admonitory, regretful, alienated tone that has so often shown up in church pronouncements about the state of the modern world. They show more readiness to learn and less to condemn, more inclination to respect the complexity and worth of the world on its own terms, and less inclination to treat it as simply the object of religious imperialism.9

In Pope John XXIII’s 1959 speech, in which he expressed his intent to convoke an ecumenical council, the Pope provided some comments as to what the Council would entail.10 His comments, however, were ambiguous and led to great speculation as to what the nature and purpose of the council would be. Giuseppe Alberigo argues that the pope did indeed have a clear intent in convoking the council:

The pope wanted a council that would mark the end of an era; a council, that is, that would usher the Church out of the post-Tridentine era, and to a certain extent out of the centuries-old Constantinian phase, and into a new phase of witness and proclamation. The major permanent element of tradition judged most suitable would be enlisted to nourish and guarantee the fidelity to the gospel during such an arduous transition.11

Moreover, Alber...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Short Glossary of Korean and Chinese Terms
• Chapter 1: Gaudium et spes: A Relatively Inadequate Soteriology for the Sinned-Against Creature
• Chapter 2: The Bridge: The Soteriology of Edward Schillebeeckx
• Chapter 3: Theological Method: Intercultural Hermeneutics and the Semiotics of Culture
• Chapter 4: An Outer-Hearer’s Understanding of Korean-American Theologies of Han
• Chapter 5: Intercultural Dialogue: Toward a Roman Catholic Soteriology for the Sinned-Against
• Bibliography