24
26.âPaul VI invited us to deepen the call to re-
newal and to make it clear that renewal does not
only concern individuals but the entire Church.
Let us return to a memorable text which con-
tinues to challenge us. âThe Church must look
with penetrating eyes within herself, ponder the
mystery of her own being⦠This vivid and live-
ly self-awareness inevitably leads to a compari-
son between the ideal image of the Church as
Christ envisaged her and loved her as his holy
and spotless bride (cf.
Eph
5:27), and the actual
image which the Church presents to the world
today... This is the source of the Churchâs he-
roic and impatient struggle for renewal: the
struggle to correct those flaws introduced by
her members which her own self-examination,
mirroring her exemplar, Christ, points out to her
and condemnsâ.
23
The Second Vatican Council
presented ecclesial conversion as openness to a
constant self-renewal born of fidelity to Jesus
Christ: âEvery renewal of the Church essentially
consists in an increase of fidelity to her own call-
ing⦠Christ summons the Church as she goes
her pilgrim way⦠to that continual reformation
of which she always has need, in so far as she is
a human institution here on earthâ.
24
There are ecclesial structures which can
hamper efforts at evangelization, yet even good
23
âP
aul
VI, Encyclical Letter
Ecclesiam Suam
(6 August
1964), 9, 10, 11: AAS 56 (1964), 611-612.
24
âS
econd
E
cumenical
V
atican
C
ouncil
, Decree on
Ecumenism
Unitatis Redintegratio
, 6.
