What are some of the significant contributions made by Vatican II to the world?

Answer 1

A:

The Second Vatican Council made its most significant contribution to the world outside the Church itself, by declaring that the Catholic Church does not hold the right to determine what non-Catholics should believe, how they should worship or what religious instructions their children should receive. It declared that all persons have a right to worship as they please, even in countries where the Catholic Church the majority religion, and that the state should not interfere in religious observance.

The previous declarations on these issues were contained in the Syllabus of Errors, issued by Pius IX in 1864, in response to the Enlightenment. It was considered by Catholic theologians as having binding force, although opinion was divided as to whether each and every statement defined in the Syllabus as false was infallibly false. It condemned as false statements requiring separation of Church and state, as well as all statements in support of religious freedom. In states where Catholics are in the minority, they have the right to public worship. In states where others faiths are in the minority, they have no right to public worship because only the true faith has the right to public worship.

Perez Zagorin (How the Idea of Religious Toleration Came to the West) considers the Declaration on Religious Freedom, passed by the Council in December 1965, to be an accomplishment of world importance. It signified a complete reversal of the Catholic Church's former inimical attitude to toleration and announced its adherence to religious freedom as a universal principle and contemporary obligation and necessity. Fiercely debated and meeting with considerable resistance from some Vatican officials and a number of bishops, it states, "the human person has a right to religious freedom." It asserts that all men are to be immune from coercion by individuals, social groups, or any human power, so that "In matters religious no one is forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs. Nor is anyone to be restrained from acting in accordance with his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits." Furthermore, "the right of parents are violated, if their children are forced to attend lessons or instructions which are not in agreement with their religious beliefs."

The Declaration also acknowledged that the Church had acted at times in ways "which were less in accord with the gospel and even opposed to it," but does not express any contrition or apology for the Church's record of religious persecution.

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AnswerAccording to the last couple popes, the most significant contributions made by the Second Vatican Council are still to be realized. The Council started with some wonderful work on the Sacred Liturgy, but, almost in total, their recommendations have been totally ignoring. In the second year, the Church addressed the issues of the means of social communication, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, the Decree on the Eastern Churches, and the Decree on Ecumenism. Probably this last has had a significant contribution as the Church has reached out to the Orthodox and to her separated brethren in the protestant ecclesial communities. One thing that is very evident fifty years after this great Council is the fact that the Church most definitely does not operate on modern "fast time". After every major Council in the Church it has taken nearly a century for the dust to settle, and I would contend that it is just starting to now. I would not look to understand the Council's significant contributions for another thirty years or so. Most of the things that have happened in the Church in the last fifty years have not been contributions of the Council, most people have never read the documents and are only going on what "common wisdom" has said.