The first Constitution on the Church clarifies that the Council does not consider the Church as a reality closed in on itself, but in reference to Christ. “Christ is the light of peoples, and this sacred Council, met together in the Holy Spirit, ardently desires that the light of Christ, reflected on the face of the Church, should illuminate all men and women…”
In the background we recognise an image from the theology of the Fathers, which sees the Church as the moon, not giving off its own light, but transmitting the light of Christ’s sun. Ecclesiology is shown to be dependent on Christology, and linked to it.
Seeing as no one can speak correctly about Christ, about the Son, without at the same time speaking of the Father, and seeing that we cannot speak correctly about the Father and the Son without listening to the Holy Spirit, the Christological vision of the Church is necessarily broadened into a Trinitarian ecclesiology (LG 2-4). The discourse on the Church is a discourse about God, and only in this way is it correct.
Card. Joseph Ratzinger
L’ecclesiologia della Costituzione Lumen gentium
Nuova Umanità 22 (2000/3-4) p. 396
(published by the Priestly Branch of the Focolare Movement)
A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to John 1:19-28
19 And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20 He confessed, he did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” 21 And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the prophet?” And he answered, “No.” 22 They said to him then, “Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” 23 He said, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, `Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.” 24 Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. 25 They asked him, “Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?” 26 John answered them, “I baptize with water; but among you stands one whom you do not know, 27 even he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” 28 This took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.
I wasted a lot of time chasing vanities, I spent my whole youth in useless pursuits, for I threw myself totally into learning doctrines whose wisdom was declared by God to be foolishness.
Then one day I seemed to awake from a deep sleep. As I turned my eyes to the wonderful light of evangelical truth, I understood the uselessness of the wisdom of the masters of schools of this world, made of nothing.
I bitterly regretted my miserable life and formulated a prayer. I asked to be shown a way that would open the interior life for me.
Saint Basil
Epistle 223, 2
(published by the Priestly Branch of the Focolare Movement)
A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to Luke 2:16-21
16 And they went with haste, and found Mary and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger. 17 And when they saw it they made known the saying which had been told them concerning this child; 18 and all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart. 20 And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them. 21 And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.
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