10/11/98

The Pope speaks about God: John Paul II as theologian

Pope John Paul II marks this month the 20th anniversary of his election to the Chair of Peter as Bishop of Rome. The Pope is often, in the American scheme of things, regarded primarily as an authority figure, a taskmaster, since our approach to religion, as to many things, is primarily legalistic. Stories about the Pope, any Pope, are usually dramas of individuals or groups finding ways to break free of religious authority. This approach has its limitations. It keeps us eternally adolescent in matters religious, and it misses entirely the Pope as bearer of a vision giving us insight into the ways of God. There are many reasons to be grateful to God for the ministry of Pope John Paul II; but one of the more important reasons is his theological vision, which will continue to shape Catholic teaching for generations to come. On this 20th anniversary, I would like to give a very inadequate snapshot of the Holy Father’s vision as theologian.

Theology is basically talk about God and Pope John Paul II’s theology is talk about God from within the tradition that unites us to Christ. A Pope is first of all witness to that tradition; but Pope John Paul II witnesses by placing the tradition in a theological context shaped by his personal dialogue with the basic concerns of this century.

“What does it mean to believe” is a frequent question in our day; and Karol Wojtyla, as a young priest, wrote his theology dissertation on faith according to the great Spanish mystic, St. John of the Cross. Theological concepts which analyze the mysteries of faith and contemplative wisdom which savors them are two complementary ways to talk about God, but both are completely dependent on the faith which is a response to God’s self-revelation in history. In the soul of a true contemplative, however, the dialogue between faith and charity has psychological consequences, and the young Polish theologian began to point to them. Father Wojtyla’s first theological work, written in Latin in 1948, was already an exploration into the self-consciousness of believers.

No Christian stands alone, and another question frequently asked by believers in our day is: “What does it mean to be with others in Christ, to form his body, the Church?” As Archbishop of Krakow, Karol Wojtyla explained and applied Vatican II’s theology of Church. He could do this all the more easily and authoritatively since he had played a major part in fashioning the Vatican II decrees on the Church in the modern world, on the apostolate of the laity and on religious freedom.

In the Church, a believer becomes conscious of his or her relation to God through Christ and of the mutual relations which bind believers to each other in Christ. The technical theological term for these relationships is ecclesial communion. Writing in 1972 on the sources of ecclesia1 renewal, Archbishop Wojtyla helped the Catholics of Krakow understand how the Church comes to be when believers share Christ’s gifts among themselves. All ecclesial gifts come to us from Christ’s redeeming death and resurrection, but three major gifts must be shared if a Church is to be complete. Christ is prophet, and so we share his truth. Christ is priest, and so we share his holiness. Christ is king, and so we share his rule. The sharing creates ecclesial communion, in which we experience ourselves as one in Christ.

With this experience comes a third question: “What does Christ want me to do with my life?” Archbishop Wojtyla taught that each person in the Church is called to share these gifts freely with everyone in the Church, although each person does so in a unique way. Each Christian believer is called to witness to Christ’s truth in the world, to make the world holy and to make Christ’s rule more visible in the world. A believer’s self-consciousness is created by the call from Christ to live out his or her particular vocation in the light of faith.

Each person’s vocation is a personal gift, but all gifts are shared according to the logic of the Church’s faith. Wojtyla’s constant concern, both in his philosophical anthropology and in his theology, is to put together in Christ the several components of the human personality and the objective truth of things. Subjective vocation does not war with objective faith. Only if we are united to God through our belief in creation, in the incarnation of the eternal Son of God, in our redemption by his death and his sending of the Holy Spirit after his resurrection and ascension into heaven--only if the faith marks and shapes our own self-consciousness can we understand what we are each called to be and to do. Fundamentally, the vocation of each human person is to be an image of God.

The human person as the image of God, an image restored by the Redeemer of the human race, is the center around which John Paul’s teaching as Pope revolves. If the most important question of this or any other age is, “Who is God?,” the clue to its answer lies in seeing truthfully the redeemed human person. Christ, the Pope wrote in his first encyclical, Redeemer of Man (1979), shows us God; he also shows us ourselves. The Christian believer is therefore in awe at the mystery of the human person.

Theologians had long pointed out that men and women are made in God’s image and likeness because they can think and will. Our intellects and our wills are spiritual faculties, not limited to particular material ends. They enable us to transcend limitations of space and time and they reflect in us the spiritual nature of God. Pope John Paul II does not deny this, but he is at pains to bring to the center of our consciousness a deeper truth: we are made in God’s image and likeness because we can sacrifice ourselves for God and for one another. A God who gives himself for our salvation is imaged by creatures who are generous, who share their every gift with each other.

Embodied spirits give themselves to one another using the gift of sexuality. Pope John Paul II created a theological stir by dedicating some of his first talks as Pope to a theology of the body. Basing his reflections on the first two chapters of the book of Genesis, the Pope explained that man felt alone among the animals, who are not persons, and alone also with God, who was without a body. God therefore created man and woman, so that each could be with and for the other. There are two ways of being human, so that the unity of our common nature can be made visible by the sharing of our different gifts. Marriage is a communion of persons based upon the sharing of the gift of sexuality and deepening constantly until every level of experience is shared in love.

The human body makes the invisible God visible, because God is self-giving love. Contemplating the doctrine of the Trinity, the Christian believer comes to know and love a communion of three divine persons, each of whom gives himself entirely to the others. Each person of the Trinity shares the very being of the other two persons; each is entirely with and for the other.

In his first years as Bishop of Rome, John Paul II spoke of the Triune God in three great encyclicals, Redemptor hominis (“Redeemer of Man,” 1979) speaks of a Son obedient unto death. Through Christ, the human race is freed from the sinfulness which stops us from giving ourselves to one another and prevents God from making us his sons and daughters. In Christ, the human race at the end of the second millennium finds the strength to conquer its fear of being destroyed by its own technological handiwork.

Dives in misericordia (“Rich in Mercy,” 1980) speaks of a merciful Father. Mercy, the Holy Father explains, should be understood as love which is anxious to forgive. God the Father is so anxious for our salvation that he sends his only-begotten Son who reveals to us the mercy of God. Putting this mercy into practice is the mission of the Church.

Dominum et vivificantem (“Lord and Giver of Life,” 1986) speaks of a Spirit whose work through the Church in the world enables God’s life to be shared universally. The Spirit transforms even suffering into love and restores the original unity of the human race. The unity of Trinitarian communion is made visible now in ecclesial communion and in the marriage of a man and woman who give themselves to each other in Christ. Faithful to Christ her spouse, the Church in every age brings forth new children for God’s Kingdom. Faithful to each other in Christ, human spouses enter into a union which brings new children into this world.

In this world, ecclesial communion is at the service of human solidarity; and the Pope’s theology reworks the Church’s social doctrine in a personalist and communitarian complement to the papal teachings of the last hundred years. Just as sexuality is more than a means for pleasure, so work is more than a means for making money. Labor is an expression of the worker’s subjectivity and freedom. In the economic order, people are the bottom line. In the political order, human freedom cannot be absorbed into any purely utilitarian scheme of things. A freedom which denies the created and redeemed nature of man will always end in totalitarianism.

Actor on the world stage, Pope John Paul works for the renewal of the Church so that the world can be changed into a civilization of love. For those who see with the eyes of faith, events corroborate the truth of his teaching. More importantly, his theology helps us know and love God .

Sincerely yours in Christ,

Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I.
Archbishop of Chicago