Zagreb, November 23, 1995 (IKA) – For the thirtieth anniversary of the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council, the editorial board of the Croatian Catholic weekly Glas Koncila organized a round table consisting of distinguished Catholic theologians and publicists: Dr. Tomislav Šagi Bunić, Dr. Bonaventura Duda, Prof. Željko Mardešić, Dr. Marjan Jurčević, Sister Ines Kezić, Dr. Nedljeko Ančić, Dr. Stjepan Kušar and Živko Kustić. The members of the editorial board participating were Dr. Josip Ladika and Ivan Miklenić. It had been a long time since such a meeting was held for experts to discuss the Second Vatican Council openly, and the actual implementation of its decisions and directives in the Catholic Church among the Croats, during both the long decades of the communist regime and the most recent democratic period. The round table discussion lasted approximately three hours and will be published in the coming issues of Glas Koncila.

Prof. Tomislav Šagi Bunić, the best known Croatian theologian, who at the time of the Second Vatican Council was a theological advisor to Council delegate Cardinal Franjo Šeper, said that this council was probably the most important since the Apostolic Council held in Jerusalem fifty years after Christ. At that time, the Church left the narrow framework of ancient Israel and entered the Mediterranean and Europe. Now from the European circle, the Church has entered the whole world. By the Council, the Church has presented itself as a servant of the human race that sees Christ the Lord in every person. The Council Church does not hold that there is always time but considers time to be an opportunity, as the right time, and devotes great attention to discovering the signs of the times.
Prof. Bonaventura Duda, a Franciscan and one of the best known Croatian theologians, emphasized that with the Council, the Church realized that Revelation is not a collection of truths but the person of Christ. The Church is called upon to be ahead of the times. According to the Church, Christ is embodied in the world and the Church is the sacrament of the unity of the whole world. It is necessary to believe that Christ is now acting through the person, and it is necessary to believe in oneself. Pope John Paul II cautioned that the European nations in 1989 took the risk of freedom that the Council called for. It can be said that the fall of communism is one of the basic fruits of the Second Vatican Council.
The distinguished Catholic lay sociologist Prof. Željko Mardešić, until recently known to Catholic public under the pseudonym of Jakov Jukić, cautioned how in our region the Counci became a symbol of many alliances and controversies. During the time of the Council, he and other young people followed Glas Koncila with great interest, learned a new Church language and assimilated the ideas of the Council. This all occurred in the prevailing Marxist atmosphere as a lack of freedom. People lived Christianity as resistance to this lack of freedom. The Church at that time and today has passed through labor pains in the birth of a newcharacter.
The Rijeka theologian and Dominican priest Dr. Marjan Jurčević said that for him the Council was personified in the person of Pope John XXIII who appeared as a prophet at the head of the Church. This was a Council of prophecy that was without precedent in the Church. The Church is still in the period of a type of modification regarding the external applications of the counciliar changes. A new concept of the person is offered that is still not defined. During the post-Council period, all the dangers have appeared that the Council announced. It can be said, remembering the Council document Joy and Hope, that to a great extent the time of joy has passed and only hope remains.
Sister Ines Kezić of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, one of the most outstanding Croatian female theologians, remembered the long pealing of church bells that announced the Second Vatican Council in her native Banja Luka. They told her it would be acouncil for unity among Christians and that little people were very important. She emphasized the question of the position of women in the Church in light of the Council teaching.
The editor of the distinguished Split theological journal Crkva i svijet (The Church and the World) Dr. Nedjeljko Ancic emphasized that the Church renounced the use of anathema and condemnation after the Second Vatican Council, deciding to leave the ghetto and open in many ways toward others and those who are different. Unfortunately, priests and high church officials are inadequately familiar with theCouncil.
The theologian Dr. Stjepan Kušar of the Catholic Theological Seminary in Zagreb remembers from his youth how the first fruit of the Council was a certain uneasiness among people. At that time, priests were speaking about the Council more enthusiastically than substantively. Kušar cautioned that contemporary people do not seek for faith to be proven or explained but first of all ask why we want to be Christians. People relate to religious content as to something offered on the market that they can freely choose according to their own taste and for their own use.
Živko Kustiæ, for many years editor of Glas Koncila and presently editor of the Catholic Press Agency (IKA) in Zagreb compared the present state of the Church with the state of ancient Israel before Christ#!s Death and Resurrection. Pope John Paul II constantly proclaims that the Church must be converted in itself in order to proclaim anew the Gospels to the contemporary world. Such conversion cannot be the fruit of any skill but the mystical dying with Christ. No one can yet see all the dimensions of this mystical death and resurrection of the Church in our time but faith fortified by the Council yields certainty.
After individual presentations, the participants had a very open and complex discussion in which they mentioned many painful andcrucial questions regarding the position and role of the Catholic Church during the present period of building a democratic society in the new Croatian state. (c11273hr/žk)