Henri de Lubac au Concile

Abstract

The note illustrates Henri de Lubac's attitude during the second Vatican Council as appearing from his carnets du Concile. He was involved from the very start of the Preparatory commission (1960) and was initially under the impression that he continued to be viewed with suspicion as a theologian who had strayed from the orthodox line (originating with the arguments surrounding his Surnaturel). He continued however, to interpret everything in the light of his own theology. Slowly though, above all after the second period of the Council, he became increasingly concerned particularly with regard to the weight given by many theologians to critical exegesis (in his view in conflict with the traditional hermeneutics of the meaning of Scripture) and the excessive horizontalism of the Church's opening up to the world which he considered would result in its secularisation. He was in favour of the Constitution of the Church in the contemporary world (Gaudium et spes) but feared that it would be wrongly interpreted after the Council. All this was further weighed down by a great sense of isolation even from his Jesuit brothers combined with the fear that the central message of his theology would not be heard.