Last year, we marked the sixtieth anniversary of the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council. Its teachings and reforms have shaped our lives as Catholics, but how well do we really know what it said? 

This summer, STM is forming a reading group for alumni to get better acquainted with the major documents of the Second Vatican Council. Inspired by Pope Leo XIV, who has dedicated his general audiences this year to an ongoing catechesis on Vatican II, we will read the Council's four major constitutions (Dei Verbum, Lumen Gentium, Sacrosanctum Concilium, and Gaudium et Spes). These documents are meant to be accessible to lay readers, so they're not overly technical or long, but they are rich and thought-provoking. Pope Leo said in January, "While we hear the call not to let [the Council's] prophecy fade, and to continue to seek ways and means to implement its insights, it will be important to get to know it again closely, and to do so not through 'hearsay' or interpretations that have been given, but by rereading its documents and reflecting on their content." We'll do just that, sharing our insights and asking whether the documents still have the power to inspire and challenge us, as individuals and as a church, sixty years after their composition.

All meetings take place on alternating Sundays over Zoom and begin at 1:30 pm. A chaplain at STM will facilitate each session.

Schedule
Jun 7: Dei Verbum: Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation (full text), with Fr. Gregory Waldrop, SJ
Jun 21: Lumen Gentium: Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (chapters 1–4), with Pauline Little
Jul 5: Lumen Gentium (chapters 5–8), with Pauline Little
Jul 19: Sacrosanctum Concilium: Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (full text), with Fr. Joseph MacNeill
Aug 2: Gaudium et Spes: Dogmatic Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (Part I, through paragraph 45), with Fr. Joseph MacNeill
Aug 16: Gaudium et Spes (Part II to end), with Fr. Joseph MacNeill

Questions?

Please contact Mollie Wilson O'Reilly '03, molliesy03@yahoo.com.

Please register using the button below. Note that there is one link for all sessions.

Participation is all sesssions is not mandatory. Feel free to attend the meetings that work for you and skip those that do not.