Bishops at the first session of Vatican II. Credit: CNS

Sixty years ago this week, Pope Paul VI gave the closing address at the last general meeting of the Second Vatican Council. It is a curious address to read today, because it feels confident at times and yet also imbued with a certain recognition that the council had introduced as many new issues as it had resolved. “[I]f quite a few questions raised during the course of the council itself still await appropriate answers, this shows that its labors are now coming to a close not out of weariness, but in a state of vitality which this universal synod has awakened,” he said. “In the post-conciliar period this vitality will apply, God willing, its generous and well-regulated energies to the study of such questions.”

A sense of vitality that followed was due in no small part to a document promulgated on that same day, Dec. 7, 1965, the “Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World,” better known by its first words in the Latin text: “Gaudium et Spes.” Its famous opening lines are still known by heart by many of the faithful who were inspired by the document’s embrace of the world and strikingly hopeful tone: “The joys and the hopes, the griefs and the anxieties of the men of this age, especially those who are poor or in any way afflicted, these are the joys and hopes, the griefs and anxieties of the followers of Christ. Indeed, nothing genuinely human fails to raise an echo in their hearts.”

Why was “Gaudium et Spes” considered so different from previous Vatican declarations, including many from Vatican II itself? The “pastoral constitution” (in contrast to “Lumen Gentium,” Vatican II’s “dogmatic constitution”) did not address issues of doctrine or specific issues needing clarification, but instead took a more programmatic and holistic approach in addressing the modern world directly on issues like social justice, violence, human development and more—and with an openness to the outside world that was relatively new to such documents.

“I vividly remember the surge of joy and hope I felt while reading it for the first time as a young Jesuit novice 40 years ago,” wrote the theologian David Hollenbach, S.J., in America on the 40th anniversary of “Gaudium et Spes” in 2005. “Its inspiring message described how Christ’s grace could energize one’s whole life, drawing mind and heart into the service of God and of those who suffer because of social neglect or exclusion.”

Much of that surge of hope and optimism came from the difference in tone and approach in “Gaudium et Spes” from previous Vatican documents. Even Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI), no fan of the way the constitution was received in the years after the council, described it in 1975 in Principles of Catholic Theology as “a revision of the Syllabus of Pius IX, a kind of countersyllabus.” No longer was the modern world conceived as the enemy of the church, as in Pius’s anti-modernist “Syllabus of Errors” of 1864, but as (at the very least) a dialogue partner and/or the very vineyard in which the church labored.

Cardinal Leo Jozef Suenens of Belgium gets much of the credit for laying the groundwork for “Gaudium et Spes” earlier in the council, but many other experts and scholars played a role. Among them were the French priest Pierre Haubtmann, the Dominican theologians Yves Congar and Marie-Dominique Chenu, and the Jesuit Jean Daniélou. Other periti whose influence can be found in the final document are Joseph Ratzinger and Henri de Lubac, S.J.

Not everyone was a huge fan of “Gaudium et Spes,” then or now. Some theologians, especially in recent decades, have judged “Gaudium et Spes” to be a bit naïve about human nature and societal progress—given the struggles the church and the world both have experienced in the six decades since. In a 2005 article for America, Gerald O’Collins, S.J., stated that he remained “passionately committed to the council as a continuing source of enlightenment and fresh life for the whole church and beyond,” but also recognized some misgivings: “We can admire the openness to change and to renewal of so many of the council’s protagonists. But today millions of Catholics and others worry about their security and fear losing their identity.”

And, of course, the world is always going to be seen as the source of evil by some Christians, and the past by definition as better than the future. Cardinal Avery Dulles, S.J., said about the council in America in 2003, “While reformers caricature the preconciliar church as tyrannical and obscurantist, traditionalists idealize the preconciliar church as though it were a lost paradise.” In that sense, any departure from tradition was going to be anathema for some. 

Regardless, there is no question that “Gaudium et Spes” had a huge influence in the church and its impact continues to be felt—not least in the burgeoning of many fields of theology that found inspiration in its call for an approach to society and the world that emphasized contextual and multicultural realities. How many of our theologies from the margins, or praxis-based theological methods, have their origins in “Gaudium et Spes”? Many lay-directed initiatives in the church were inspired by the constitution as well, and their fruits continue to be realized today.

It is also hard to imagine the church embracing the “preferential option for the poor” the way it has without the influence of “Gaudium et Spes.” The principle—though present to some degree throughout Catholic social teaching—came into widespread usage in the years after the council, foremost through the statements of the Catholic Bishops of Latin America at their conference in Medellín (1968) and Puebla (1979). In a globalized world dominated by neoliberal economic policies, the church’s option for the poor has come to represent one of its most prophetic stances.

“Gaudium et Spes” also stressed a particular theological point that had not always been clear in the documents of previous councils: At the core of every Christian life should be the desire to be a follower of Christ, not the church or the world themselves. This also marked an important moment in the council itself, because while “Lumen Gentium” and “Dei Verbum” were clearly forerunners of “Gaudium et Spes” in this respect, the council itself had no document focusing directly on Christ.

As the Rev. Robert Imbelli noted in a 2013 article for America,“What is remarkable about this pastoral constitution is precisely the doctrinal foundation it lays for its commitment and concern. That foundation is strikingly Christological.” He identifies a crucial passage, No. 45, in the constitution as the lynchpin:

For the Word of God, through whom all things were made, was made flesh so that as perfectly human he would save all human beings and sum up all things. The Lord is the goal of human history, the point on which the desires of history and civilization turn, the center of the human race, the joy of all hearts and the fulfillment of all desires.

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Our poetry selection for this week is our 2025 poetry roundup, put together by our staff. Readers can view all of America’s published poems here.

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Happy reading!

James T. Keane

James T. Keane is a Senior Editor at America.