Sixty-four years after Vatican II opened (11 Oct 1962), the test is conversion, not a finished checklist. Lumen gentium: People of God, shared baptismal dignity. Gains: Scripture, lay roles, conferences, councils, movements. Unfinished: clericalism, women’s place in decisions, youth heard more than spoken about. The 2024 synod tied that vision to communion, participation, and mission.

“Signs of the times”: engage the world without swallowing it. Gaudium et spes and Dignitatis humanae shaped rights, peace, development, and ties with other Christians, Jews, Muslims, and other faiths. Polarization: some want a pre-Council Church; others treat the Council as the last word. Both miss the point, the piece says.

Not liturgy-only. Abuse, migrants, and the poor test service. Francis at 60 Anniversary of Council: People of God, not a quarrel. Yes, the Church is durably changed; no, renewal was never a closed list. In Asia, dialogue is daily. Live the Council; do not only defend it.

The Second Vatican Council did not set out to produce a perfect Church.

It sought to help the Church rediscover her deepest identity and speak the Gospel more convincingly to a changing world. Sixty-four years after the Council opened on Oct. 11, 1962, the decisive question is not whether Vatican II has been “implemented” completely. It is whether the Church has truly entered the spirit of conversion the Council demanded.

The 60th anniversary of the opening was marked in 2022. Yet the question remains remarkably current.

In a world marked by war, religious polarization, migration, inequality, ecological crisis and declining trust in institutions, the Council’s vision still challenges the Church. Indeed, some of its most important work may still lie ahead.

A Church that sees herself differently

One of Vatican II’s greatest achievements was its renewed understanding of the Church.

Lumen gentium described the Church not simply as an institution governed from above, but as the........

© Eurasia Review