Pope Leo XIV Begins General Audience Commentary on Vatican II Document Gaudium et Spes

Pope Leo XIV has been commenting on the documents of the Second Vatican Council at his General Audiences, which are held on Wednesdays except during trips or illness. Before turning to the Pastoral Constitution *Gaudium et Spes*, he had addressed *Sacrosanctum Concilium*, *Lumen Gentium* and *Dei Verbum*. According to the report, he began his commentary on *Gaudium et Spes* on September 2, describing it as the basic document of Christian humanism.

At the September 2 audience, the Pope focused on the Constitution’s teaching on “the Church listening to and serving the world.” He treated the Church’s relationship with the contemporary world as a fundamental theme. He also recalled the opening address of St. John XXIII to the Council, in which the late Pope voiced disagreement with “prophets of calamity” who say that the present age has grown worse than the past and act as though they had learned nothing from history. Pope John XXIII had told the council Fathers that, in the present historical moment, Providence is leading humanity toward a new order of human relations.

The Pope noted that sharing and relating with humanity is the path Christ asks of the Church. The report says the Constitution opens by declaring that the Church feels as her own “the joys and hopes, the griefs and anxieties of the men of our time, especially of those who are poor or afflicted.”

According to the account, the Pope drew from this a basic principle of humanism, that of commitment. Self-giving to others, he said, calls believers to leave behind passivity and indifference toward events, toward history and the lives of people, and toward the rapid and profound change of the present day. Spectators cannot remain disinterested; instead, people must listen with the heart, allow themselves to be challenged, and get involved.

He returned to this theme by saying that believers are called to take responsibility for the difficulties of their brothers and sisters, especially those oppressed by injustice, discrimination and violence, a call to defend the weak (Psalm 82:3). The Pope held that only through self-giving and commitment can adequate responses be reached, sustained by the certainty that “the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.”

Source: Read the original report (translated from Spanish)