Good citizens

The conciliar constitution Gaudium et Spes and the task for Christians to discern the signs of the times

Times change. No one can question this, but the perspective one has on the changes can be very different. Between those whom the Latins already called "the praisers of times gone by" and who continue to say: "Ah, once upon a time!", and those who consider every innovation a positive progress, without even stopping for at least a few seconds to evaluate its true positivity, the space is large. Naturally, true wisdom, not only biblical but also simply human wisdom, has a behavior that is good to constantly resort to.

Even in the Church there are attitudes of judgment on the times that risk being superficial. From embracing every novelty, even the most bizarre ones, to an often proud defense of a past that perhaps never existed, we risk giving a face to our Mother Church in which we no longer recognize her and we struggle to recognize ourselves as being generated in her.

Due to certain events that occurred in my family's past and due to my two souls, Piedmontese and Roman, I have always been very sensitive to the question of the participation of Christians in public life. In our Church we certainly cannot say that the discourse has always been univocal, even if the commandment to be good citizens has been constant. It was already a point with which the first Christians, even under state persecution, defended themselves.

In the not so distant 18th and 19th centuries, with the political and cultural change that shocked much of the world, the opinions and warnings of the ecclesiastical hierarchy were very varied and sometimes we could, with today's mentality, consider them scandalous. From the concept that all authority comes from God and therefore from a strong bond between civil and religious authority, which have never been in perfect harmony, to an exasperated secularism that we sometimes find in our days, there is a space that the conciliar Constitution Gaudium et Spes attempted to travel by reflecting on the profound change underway that the Council, made up of bishops from the whole world, with different histories and cultures, wanted to decipher. It was not easy to find a common heart and thought, but the Holy Spirit, promised by Jesus, did his job. These are not sentences that will have to last forever; times will change again, but the Council said words that brought the topic into focus for our times. Perhaps the phrase: «From a more lively awareness of human dignity arises... the effort to establish a political-juridical order in which the rights of the person are better protected in public life: for example, the right to freely assemble, associate, expressing one's opinions and professing religion in private and in public" seems obvious to many today, but in the past it was not so obvious. Not even what follows: «In fact, the protection of the rights of the person is a necessary condition for citizens, individually or in groups, to be able to actively participate in the life and governance of public affairs».

If in the 19th century the Church in Italy prohibited Catholics from participating in public life, today it would rather push them to enter the political debate, whatever regime governs the nation. «All Christians must become aware of their special vocation in the political community. ... In what concerns the organization of earthly things, they must admit the legitimate multiplicity and diversity of temporal options and respect citizens who, even in groups, honestly defend their point of view." The distinction between Christianity, the fruit of a political power that unified everyone in a Christian world, and Christianity is something that has established itself today. And it is a good for the whole world.

Cesare Falletti

NP Ottobre 2023