Dominus Iesus: The Document and the "Spin"
By Douglas Clark
Headlines and editorial comments misled readers as to the purpose and content of Dominus Iesus.
Last fall's interminably long political season when "spin doctors" dominated the media also affected the press's response to the Vatican document Dominus Iesus (On the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church). Secular papers as well as editors in the Catholic press could not avoid the issue of "spin," that is, adding a subjective opinion to the reporting. One headline of the Washington Post (September 6, 2000) read, "Vatican Claims Church Monopoly on Salvation," while the Los Angeles Times (September 7, 2000) ran the headline "Salvation that Reopens the Door to Intolerance." No responsible editor of a Catholic newspaper, however, would even consider spinning the news in the rather shameless way common to political flacks. But the challenge of keeping the news objective is not limited to political reporting. A Catholic diocesan newspaper has the obligation to report pronouncements of the Church's magisterium honestly and in such a way as to gain them a fair hearing even when the message may be unpopular. The Catholic press's reporting of Dominus Iesus, issued September 5, 2000, by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is an excellent example of this editorial dilemma. In this essay I describe how the Southern Cross, the newspaper of the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia, of which I am the editor, handled the story, and I share some of the insights gained from the experience.
The first thing required when reporting on news that may be unpopular to many is accuracy. The Catholic News Service (CNS) offered a clear précis of Dominus Iesus in its news releases, while Origins printed the full thirty-six-page text. We at the Southern Cross decided to run the document as a front-page story in our September 16 issue. Because the CNS release not only offered a fair and logical summary of the document but also included a range of reactions from Catholic and other religious leaders, we decided to keep the CNS headline, "Vatican Document Warns Against Concessions to Religious Pluralism." This decision turned out to be fortunate for us, as one neighboring diocese ran the story with its own headline, "Catholic Christianity Necessary for Salvation" (echo of Pope Boniface VIII's doctrine "no salvation outside the Church"), a headline that caused an avalanche of complaints that reached the diocesan bishop, who then felt obliged to write a column expressing his regret at the headline and giving his own helpful exegesis of the document.
In the same Southern Cross issue, I penned an editorial entitled "Not Pride, but Humility," which gave my interpretation of the document. I saw Dominus Iesus as a reiteration of the teachings of the Second Vatican Council. I emphasized the parallel between the document's insistence on the unique saving role of Jesus and the universal mission of the Catholic Church, and drew some implications of this parallel teaching:
When anyone, Christian or not, receives God's grace, he or she is receiving Christ, who is that grace, consciously or not. If a Jew, a Moslem, or even a Hindu or a Buddhist outshines a professed Christian in the living out of the grace received, it is to the Christian's shame.
Likewise, all baptized believers belong, to some degree, to the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church; theologically speaking, there is no other. But it should be noted that "denominational" Christians, whose communities may lack one or more of the means of salvation abundantly present in the Catholic Church, may make greater use of them in their journeys of faith than do some Catholics, again to the shame of the latter. Not pride but humility prompts the Church to confess Jesus Christ as savior and herself as his gift.
I was pleased to notice that Pope John Paul II's own statement on the document (October 1) seemed to go in the same direction.
Letters to the Editor
The Southern Cross received its first letter to the editor on the topic of Dominus Iesus in time for its September 21 issue. It was a negative review of the document, but our policy is generally to print the letters sent to us. Although written by a Catholic, the letter implied doctrine that was classically Protestant. It insisted upon justification by faith alone and denied the necessity of the Church in salvation. I was certain that there would be rebuttals to this letter—and they arrived in due course.
Because honest reporting is part of our mission, I thought it proper to include in the September 28 issue two news briefs from CNS: "Jewish-Christian Dialogue Day Postponed After Jews Withdraw" and "German, Asian Reaction to ‘Dominus Iesus' is Negative." In the September 28 issue, I also published two letters criticizing the document and defending the negative review printed the week before: one was from a Catholic and the other was from a self-described "left-of-center Anglo-Catholic Episcopalian." (Publishing these two letters led to some privately expressed criticism from some of my brother priests regarding giving a forum to malcontents. I am convinced of the value of such a forum and was certain that the other side would soon weigh in. I was not to be disappointed.)
Then, in the October 5 issue, Southern Cross featured a front-page CNS story on the Holy Father's comments on Dominus Iesus, quoting him as saying, "Our confession of Christ as the one Son, through whom we see the face of the Father, is not arrogance that shows contempt for other religions, but a joyful recognition that Christ revealed himself to us without any merit on our part." Likewise, the pope added that when the document emphasizes the Church's position that the one Church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church, "it does not intend to express little consideration for the other churches and ecclesial communities." On the contrary, he said, the "Catholic Church suffers" to see that these other churches that contain "precious elements of salvation" have separated from the Catholic Church. "Thus," John Paul continued, "the document expresses once again the same ecumenical passion that runs through my encyclical, Ut unum sint (That All May Be One)." This October 5 issue published three letters—all from lay people—that refuted the first negative review. These letters ranged from a gently worded point-by-point critique of the review, to a more robust denunciation, and then to a complaint that our paper had printed the letter in the first place. At this stage, I thought that it might be helpful to append the following editor's note to the letters column:
This note is to make it clear why we do not usually respond with an editor's note to the letters published in this column. It is universally understood that letters to the editor do not necessarily represent the views of the editor or publisher of a newspaper. Only editorials, signed or initialed by the editors or publishers, represent the views of the newspaper. The editorial that appeared in the issue of September 16, accompanying the news story, represents the paper's stance.
The next issue (October 12) ran a CNS news brief, "Cardinal Ratzinger Says He Was Saddened by Reaction to Document," and three letters sharply critical of the now-notorious negative review and vigorously supportive of the document. Finally, the October 19 issue ran the final two letters on the topic: the first advocated compassion in ecumenical relations, and the second, by a priest, defended the document at some length. By now, the topic seemed to have exhausted itself.
Other Religious Journals
Meanwhile, other religious journals had weighed in on the question. America, in its October 28 issue, ran four articles analyzing the meaning and intent of Dominus Iesus. Their editorial, "Ecumenical Courtesy," singled out a few shortcomings of the document and highlighted the journal's concerns with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in general. The authors of two of the three feature articles also wrestled with the negative impact the document could have upon ecumenical dialogue, though many of the authors' comments actually addressed issues raised by Josef Cardinal Ratzinger's "Note," which accompanied the actual document. Finally, the fourth article, by Francis X. Clooney, "Dominus Iesus and the New Millennium," cautioned readers about the document's treatment of world religions.
The Tablet, in its November 18, 2000, issue, presented a dialogue between Eugene Fisher, associate director for the National Conference of Catholic Bishop's Secretariat of Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, and Edward Kessler, the executive director of the Centre for Jewish-Christian Relations. Though Fisher and Kessler had different views of the document, both treated it respectfully. This type of dialogue, while not providing detailed summaries or explanations of the document, allowed the debate occurring throughout the Church to be witnessed by the readers. It also allowed the Tablet to present Dominus Iesus—and the fervor it caused—without staking out a position of its own. A valuable point Fisher raised was that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was reacting to particular theologians who were ignoring or denying soteriological positions asserted by Vatican II. The theological context of this document must not be lost in its reading. Moreover, as Fisher claims in the Tablet dialogue,
This document needs to be read within the context of the rest of the Church's magisterial teaching, of which it is a part, but by no means the whole. It needs to be read tightly and technically. Read that way, it does not seek to add anything new of substance to what the Catholic Church has been saying since the Second Vatican Council. (1556-1557)
Indeed, this same method of reading should apply to all magisterial documents.
A Learning Exercise
What have I learned as a result of the Southern Cross's month-long coverage of this controversial document?
- The secular press, not realizing that Dominus Iesus reiterated the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, generally caricatured its author, Cardinal Ratzinger, as an inquisitor. Because the secular press misrepresented the document's statements on the Church's teaching, the Catholic press needed to present this teaching fairly and accurately.
- The Catholic News Service proved a reliable source of information, thanks particularly to its Rome bureau chief, John Thavis. Thavis's well-researched articles were so carefully arranged that paraphrasing them rather than using them verbatim might have proven unwise, as the neighboring diocese found out when it tried its hand at composing its own headline. The follow-up CNS news briefs and articles continued to clarify Dominus Iesus's intent, while pointing out areas for possible misunderstanding or disagreement, especially with its tone.
- Providing a forum both for those critical and for those supportive of the document seemed (and still seems) to be honest and fair. The letters to the editor helped identify the source of misunderstandings and the points in Dominus Iesus that needed clarification. I also thought from the beginning that letters critical of the document would be countered—more or less effectively—by the readership, as proved to be the case.
Does this kind of approach constitute "spin"? I do think that the CNS stories were extraordinarily accurate, even scrupulously so, and do not fall into the category of "spin." I suppose that any editorial, by definition, consists of "spin," but I would also claim that my editorial on the subject reflected my honest interpretation of the document and not some sort of party line. If an occasion arose in which I could not in good conscience support a given document or statement editorially, I would not pretend to do so, but would cede the editorial to someone who could. Finally, letter writers all had their own "spins" on the issue. Ultimately, the variety of their letters and the preponderance of those supporting the document justified our paper's providing them a forum.
Douglas Clark is the editor of the Southern Cross, the newspaper of the Diocese of Savannah, Ga.
[This article originally appeared in The Living Light Spring 2001, Vol. 37, No. 3. Copyright © 2001, The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. All rights reserved. Neither this work nor any part of it may be reproduced, distributed, performed or displayed in any medium, including electronic or digital, without permission in writing from the copyright owner. Subscribe to The Living Light.]
Christ Will Come Again
By Frank J. Matera
The story of Jesus did not end with the cross. Indeed it has not ended at all.
Every Sunday, when we recite the creed, we profess our faith that "he will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end." Then, at the eucharistic acclamation, we proclaim, "Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again." Finally, after reciting the Lord's Prayer, the priest prays, "Deliver us Lord, from every evil, and grant us peace in our day. In your mercy keep us free from all anxiety as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ." All these elements from the liturgy make clear that the Second Coming, the return of Christ—what the New Testament calls the "parousia"—plays a central role in our Christian faith. Indeed, were we to live our faith apart from this hope, our faith would be seriously deficient.
However, this hope that Christ will come again is somewhat puzzling, if not embarrassing, to many contemporary believers. If asked, "Do you believe that Christ will come again?" many, if not most, would respond, "Yes! But not in my lifetime." Such an answer is not surprising. After all, Christians throughout history have sold their possessions, gathered in community, and fervently waited for the Second Coming—only to be disappointed.
The simple fact is that we have been waiting for Christ to come again for two thousand years. Why should we continue to hope that he will come again? Before presenting an answer, a review of the biblical concept "the day of the Lord" is in order.
The Old Testament and the Day of the Lord
At the core of Israel's faith was a firm conviction that God would come in power to judge the nations and vindicate his people, Israel. This day of vindication was called "the day of Yahweh," or "the day of the Lord." Originally, it was to be a day on which God would punish Israel's enemies and vindicate his people. But as the concept developed, some of Israel's prophets realized that "the day of the Lord" would bring judgment and punishment to unfaithful Israel as well as to other nations. Particularly powerful statements about the day of the Lord are found in the prophets Amos and Zephaniah.
Woe to those who yearn for the day of the Lord!
What will this day of the Lord mean for you?
Darkness and not light!
As if a man were to flee from a lion,
and a bear should meet him;
Or as if on entering his house
he were to rest his hand against the wall
and a snake should bite him.
Will not the day of the Lord be darkness and not light,
gloom without any brightness? (Am 5:18-20)
Near is the great day of the Lord,
near and very swiftly coming;
Hark, the day of the Lord!
bitter, then, the warrior's cry.
A day of wrath is that day,
a day of anguish and distress,
A day of destruction and desolation,
a day of darkness and gloom,
A day of thick black clouds,
a day of trumpet blasts and battle alarm. . . . (Zep 1:14-16)
The concept of the day of the Lord was central to Israel's faith. On the one hand, Israel was confident that God would vindicate her on that day because her people were God's people. On the other hand, the people of Israel were deeply aware that the day of the Lord might also be a day of severe judgment for them as well as for the nations, if they were not faithful to God's covenant.
Jesus and the Day of the Lord
Jesus was a Jew, one of the people of Israel. Accordingly, his faith and his hope were nourished by the faith and hope of his people. Nurtured by Israel's scriptures, he knew that there would be a day of reckoning, a day of the Lord when God would manifest himself in power and majesty.
John the Baptist announced this day when he warned Israel to flee from the coming wrath. He baptized the crowds with water and prophesied that a mightier one would come, one who would baptize them with Holy Spirit and with fire: "He will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire" (Mt 3:12).
In this way John set the stage for Jesus, who announced that the time of waiting and hoping was fulfilled, and that the kingdom of God was making its appearance in his life and ministry. This kingdom was God's own rule; as Jesus proclaimed, God's rule was now invading human history and reclaiming creation anew. Thus Jesus cast out demons, healed the sick, ate with sinners, and called them to repentance because he knew that the kingdom of God was making its appearance in his life and ministry.
The ministry of Jesus did not completely correspond to what John the Baptist had anticipated. For while John expected a Messiah who would immediately cleanse and judge Israel, Jesus proclaimed God's rule in a surprising manner that manifested the abundant grace and mercy of God as well as God's judgment.
Jesus, however, was aware that although the kingdom of God had made its appearance in his life and ministry, its power and glory were still hidden. Thus, Jesus looked to a day when the rule of God, which his ministry inaugurated, would be established in power, might, and glory. To express this coming power and glory, Jesus spoke of his own return at the end of the ages when he would appear as the glorious Son of Man to gather his elect and judge the nations. Toward the end of his ministry, therefore, Jesus delivered a discourse in which he predicted that the temple of Jerusalem would be destroyed and that he would return on the clouds of heaven:
Immediately after the tribulation of those days,
the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light,
and the stars will fall from the sky,
and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.
And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a trumpet blast, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other. (Mt 24:29-31)
No one but God knows when this day will occur: "neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone" (Mt 24:36). Thus, it was more important for the disciples to be ready than for them to speculate about the time of his return.
To summarize, Christians believe that the day of the Lord began with the in-breaking kingdom of God that Jesus proclaimed. But the day of the Lord would not be complete until Jesus returned as the glorious Son of Man.
The Early Church and the Day of the Lord
The death of Jesus was a traumatic event that scattered the first disciples. Were it not for the resurrection, Jesus would have been remembered as just another prophetic figure of Israel's past—a prophetic figure who suffered a shameful death. But the story of Jesus did not end with the cross; indeed, it did not end at all. Rather, God vindicated the one whom human beings had put to death as a pretender, a false prophet, and a false messiah. The resurrection of Jesus was the turning point for the life of the early Church.
The Risen Lord gathered the flock that had scattered, and a new community took root. Deeply aware that God had vindicated Jesus, this new community remembered Jesus' words and deeds. It remembered that Jesus had inaugurated the kingdom of God and that he claimed he would return on the clouds of heaven as the glorious Son of Man to gather the elect and to judge the nations.
It is difficult for us today to understand the power unleashed by Jesus' resurrection. For those first Christians, the resurrection was something they personally experienced, long before they proclaimed it as a doctrine or teaching of the Church. The resurrection unleashed the power of God's Spirit in a new and dynamic manner. In the resurrection of Jesus, the early Church saw the foreshadowing of the resurrection of all believers, the turning of the ages, the beginning of the end, the day of the Lord.
Something changed, for a new age had broken in. To be sure, believers still lived in the old world of sin and death, but now they had a foothold in the new age of life and grace. The powerful experience of God's Spirit, unleashed by Jesus' resurrection, convinced them that they were living at the end of the ages.
We should not be surprised, then, that those first Christians hoped to witness the return of Christ in their own lifetime. Many fervently believed that Jesus, the Son of Man, would soon return to judge the nations. Thus, they gathered in Jerusalem, where they lived in community, waiting for the end of the ages.
Paul and the Day of the Lord
Paul of Tarsus, once a persecutor of the Church, became its most eloquent spokesman and its most fervent missionary. He established Christian communities in Asia Minor and Greece; more than any other missionary, he brought this new faith to Gentiles: those who were not Jews. At the heart of his preaching was a firm conviction that Christ would come again, most likely in his own lifetime.
The earliest letter that we have from Paul is probably his first letter to the Thessalonians, written about a.d. 50-51, twenty years or so after Jesus' crucifixion. This letter offers numerous references to the imminent return of the Lord. For example, at the beginning of the letter, Paul congratulates the Thessalonians because they "turned . . . from idols to serve the living and true God and to await his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus, who delivers us from the coming wrath" (1:9-10). In the middle of the letter he speaks of the Thessalonians as his "hope or joy or crown," about whom he will "boast" when Christ returns at his glorious "parousia" (2:19). And at the end of the letter, he prays that they will be "perfectly holy" and "be preserved blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ" (5:23). These statements make clear that when Paul went to Thessalonica, he taught his converts that Christ would come again soon. Accordingly, they must live holy and blameless lives if they hope to escape the coming wrath, the judgment of God, on the day of the Lord.
The Thessalonians evidently embraced Paul's teaching wholeheartedly. But his letter also indicates that they did not fully comprehend what he taught. Thus, in chapter four of this first letter, Paul dealt with a problem that seems strange to us today. Some members of the congregation at Thessalonica had died, and the Thessalonians were grieving because they thought that their deceased compatriots would not share in God's victory. Consequently, Paul writes to assure the Thessalonians that even the dead will share in God's victory at Christ's parousia, since those who have believed in Christ will be raised from the dead:
We do not want you to be unaware, brothers, about those who have fallen asleep, so that you may not grieve like the rest, who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose, so too will God, through Jesus, bring with him those who have fallen asleep. Indeed, we tell you this, on the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will surely not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself, with a word of command, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God, will come down from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore, console one another with these words. (1 Thes 4:13-18)
Immediately after this passage, Paul reminds the Thessalonians of something that Jesus had said: they must be vigilant because the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. "You, brothers, are not in the darkness, for that day to overtake you like a thief. For all of you are children of the light and children of the day. We are not of the night or of darkness" (1 Thes 5:4-5). This passage shows that even though Paul expected to be alive at the time of the parousia, he was deeply aware that no one knew the day or the hour.
Paul maintained his hope in the parousia throughout his life, even as the awareness that he might die before the Lord returned grew more obvious. But Paul's writings are clear: he was confident that he would be with the Lord until the time of final judgment, no matter when he should die, "So we are always courageous, although we know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yet we are courageous, and we would rather leave the body and go home to the Lord" (2 Cor 5:6-8).
The Day of the Lord in Other Writings
Christian writers who came after Paul also expressed this belief that Christ would come again. The Book of Revelation attests to a profound hope that Christ will come again, when it describes Christ coming on a white horse to destroy God's enemies:
Then I saw the heavens opened, and there was a white horse; its rider was called "Faithful and True." He judges and wages war in righteousness. His eyes were like a fiery flame, and on his head were many diadems. He had a name inscribed that no one knows except himself. He wore a cloak that had been dipped in blood, and his name was called the Word of God. The armies of heaven followed him, mounted on white horses and wearing clean white linen. Out of his mouth came a sharp sword to strike the nations. He will rule them with an iron rod, and he himself will tread out in the wine press the wine of the fury and wrath of God the almighty. He has a name written on his cloak and on his thigh, "King of kings and Lord of lords." (Rev 19:11-16)
But as time moved on, and Christ did not come again, the Church had to reckon with the "delay" of the parousia. Thus, the second letter of Peter is written in response to those who scorn the early Church because the parousia has not taken place:
Know this first of all, that in the last days scoffers will come to scoff, living according to their own desires and saying, "Where is the promise of his coming? From the time when our ancestors fell asleep, everything has remained as it was from the beginning of creation." They deliberately ignore the fact that the heavens existed of old and earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God; through these the world that then existed was destroyed, deluged with water. The present heavens and earth have been reserved by the same word for fire, kept for the day of