The Second Vatican Council was not merely an event in human history. It was also an event in the mind, which permanently reshaped the way Catholic Christians viewed themselves and their church. For the first time Catholics acknowledged the cultural and ecclesial plurality that existed in their own house and in the larger world. They embraced processes such as collegiality, ecumenism and liturgical adaptation which allowed them to deal with plurality. For this reason the twenty- five years that followed the council have been just as important as the council itself in shaping Catholic self-understanding. This book and the two volumes which preceded it represent a systematic attempt to understand the council from the vantage Point of two and one-half decades. It is not merely retrospective but, as Rene Latourelle points out in his introduction, it is prospective. It views the council as a starting-Point, a promised land, and as the context of
achievements still to come. The publishing venture has drawn together some of the finest Catholic theologians from all parts of the world, including such English-speaking scholars as Avery Dulles, Robert White, Jared Wicks, Francis A. Sullivan, Raymond L. Burke, Robert Taft, James Swetnam and Gerald O'Collins.
The first section of this volume considers the renewal of religious life. The second evaluates progress in ecumenism and relations with non-Christian religions. The third deals with seminaries and theological formation, and the final section examines some new prospects that have arisen since the council.