George Cottier

Tertio Millennio Adveniente (n. 36) contains an invitation to a serious examination of conscience especially for the Church of today. "On the threshold of the new Millennium Christians need to place themselves humbly before the Lord and examine themselves on the responsibility which they too have for the evils of our day". The examination of the conscience embraces a vast horizon; it points to the eventual responsibilities active or passive, in the sense of guilty permeability to detrimental influences: religious indifference, secularism and moral relativism, the progression of the lack of religiosity, attacks against the righteousness of theological faith and disorientation due to theological positions which are contrary to the teachings of the Magisterium, the absence of discernment or even consent to the violations of fundamental human rights on the part of totalitarian regimes, co-responsiblity in the form of grave injustices and of social marginalization.

The list is concluded with the reception of the Council, "this great gift of the Holy Spirit to the Church on the setting of the second millennium". For each of the four Councilar Constitutions there is a question that is asked.

To measure the full importance of the theme, it is worthwhile going over the steps which demonstrate how this providential event, which was the Second Vatican Council, left its mark for the beginning of the upcoming preparations for the Jubilee (n. 17-20). In fact, an event of such importance inevitably had to raise opposing reactions: irritations or rejections, or, on the contrary, deviations in thoughts and in the practice of the norms with the pretext "spirit of the Council", an uncaring regard for the content. These extremes contain in them the evident confutation. Therefore, the examination of the conscience should above all regard the faith of the grand institutions of Vatican II, which perhaps have not unveiled all their rich potential. This kind of faith requires discernment, courage and perseverance.

In the reflection that John Paul II proposes, he attracts our attention on the richness of the content and on the evangelical style of a Council, on the whole similar to preceding ones, but quite different as well.

Vatican II focused on the mystery of Christ and on his Church and at the same time was open to the world. This opening was the evangelical response to the recent evolution of the world, from which the tragedies of our time demonstrate how much need there is for purification and conversion. Inheriting the experience of the preceding epoch, the Council opened a new epoch in the history of the Church. That is how it contributed to the new spring of Christian life, which will be the Great Jubilee, if Christians will be docile to the action of the Holy Spirit.

It is evident that the examination of conscience to which we are called is intrinsically tied to the new evangelization, which is presented as the establishment of the missionary afflatus of Vatican II and of its slant on theological hope. The message of hope is the message of the fullness of life, and whoever says life, says the emergence of the new. The examination of conscience on the reception of the Council must certainly point to the content, but also to its message which is more directly spiritual. Our preparation to the Jubilee will be truly adequate only if we know how to assimilate the profundity of this message. John Paul II wrote: "A great richness of content and the new tone, unknown up until now, with which the questions were presented by the Council, constitute a sort of announcement of new times. The Counciliary Fathers spoke the language of the Gospel, the language of the Discourse of the mountain and of the Beatitudes. In the message of the Council, God is present in his absolute rule over everything, but also as the guarantor of the authentic autonomy of temporal reality".

The new evangelization speaks of the language of the Gospel, the language of the Discourse on the mountain and the Beatitudes. In other words, the announcement of the Gospel must itself be also evangelical.

This means saying that the Church, "universal sacrament of salvation" (LG 48) and Christians, for whom they are, intend to be, let's say, transparent to the new life that they announce. It is understandable why the new evangelizzation cannot be disassociated, on the part of the disciples of Christ and for their same missionary vocation, from a walk of conversion.

Here we will remember the words of Paul VI: "Contemporary man listens more openly to the witnesses than the teachers, or if he listens to the teachers it is because they are witnesses" (Evangelii Nuntiandi, n.41).

The Discourse of the mountain opens the hearts and the spirit to the God in the Absolute, to his transcendencey and to his absolute rule. Speaking about evangelical style of the new evangelization means therefore underlining its quality expressly theological. This point, to me seems of major importance. Today we are part of an explosion of anarchic religious manifestations which are the consequence of spiritual frustrations caused by secularization. Disoriented and without guidance, many leave themselves to be fooled by false money, without speaking of the horizontal temptations, in which the temporal and the religious find themselves confused. Did any of these people try to speak to the living God? "This is the eternal truth, and they know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent" (John 17,3).

It is only at the light of this that precedes and is the prospective of the preparations for the Great Jubilee which can be defined as the spirit of the Council. "If we look an analogy in the liturgy, it could be said that the yearly Advent liturgy is the season nearest to the spirit of the Council. For Advent prepares us to meet the One who was, who is and who is to come". (ct. Ap 4,8).

Advent, is the time of "cheerful hope" (ct Rm 12.12). The hope and wait for he who comes will guide our conscience. It will be necessary then to concentrate the question on each of the grand themes of the Council, of which the Tertio Millennio Adveniente prepares the synthesis.(ct. n.19).

We add that even when the Church meditates on its own past, and on the sins of its children, it is upheld by the certainty of hope. It knows the real joy of every Jubilee, the joy of the remission of sins, the joy of conversion(cf n. 32).