Q’s from the Pews: Documents of Vatican II (Snippets –Vol 2/9): August 17, 2025

Volume II: Lumen Gentium or LG (translated as: Light to the Nations) was the first document worked on, but the second published. This document, along with Dei Verbum (The Word of God), form the center of Vatican II teachings. LG defines what The Church is. This is what Vatican I had intended for its third document, The Church of Christ: a comprehensive document on the nature of the Church. LG declares The “Church of Christ” as the proper term for the one true Church. Christ is the Light of all nations, and His Church, through the Mystical Body, carries out His work of salvation. The Church is a Mystery, because like the Incarnation, it has two natures. The Church is Christ himself with His Mystical Body of all disciples. Thus the Church has a human structure. At the same time, through the Holy Spirit and Christ, it is of the Divine. This Mystery that is the Church of Christ has five essential components.

In its human structure, it is a community of disciples (with a hierarchy and structure), an institution (visible to the world – places of worship), and a herald (of the Gospel). In its Divine nature it is the Mystical Body (all baptized Christians), and a sacrament (able to confer sanctification- especially through the Eucharist).

LG declared that the Church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church. “With the expression, (subsists in,) LG sought to harmonize two doctrinal statements: The Church of Christ, continues to exist fully only in the Catholic Church, and (all Christian churches) derive their efficacy from the very fullness of grace and truth entrusted to the Catholic Church.”‌ (Dominus Iesus 16)

The Church then is One (through the Mystical Body), Holy ( through Christ and the Holy Spirit), catholic (meant for all nations), and Apostolic (thus has a hierarchy and structure).

Send any questions to: dre@saintcolumbachurch.org