Need for Vatican II Debrief


I am currently teaching an adult faith formation/catechesis training class on Scripture. We've been doing a combination of reading Scripture and Dei Verbum, the Vatican II document of divine revelation which deals with Scripture. On saturday, I came to what I consider a regrettable conclusion after a lengthy discussion of Vatican II. It has been 40 years since the council and I found that many of the adults in my class were debriefing for the first time on Vatican II.


It is sad that for something so powerful and life changing, people never got the opportunity to speak to someone about what happened. Basically, the church deliberated without their input, then came afterwards and told everyone, "here's what we are going to do, deal with it." Still now, emotions run very high. I'm not speaking about catechesis or the why's of Vatican II, just the fact that human beings need to talk about things that affect them. I think the most pressing need today in the Church is for parishes to offer extensive discussions and dialog on Vatican II. I think it would help people begin to feel like they can be a part of the Church and her agenda again.