The third of a four-part series reflecting on the significance of the Second Vatican Council focuses on the Church’s understanding of mission.

As the Church celebrates the 60th anniversary (1965-2025) of Ad Gentes (For all Peoples), the Vatican II document on mission, it is enlightening to recall the evolution and subsequent impact of this pivotal document; one discovers a truly interesting and dramatic story!

During the third session of the Council, the task of preparing a working document was assigned to a five-man subcommission of the full Missions Commission. Father Johannes Schütte, superior general of the Divine Word Missionaries, was named chairman. This working group selected their own periti (theological experts); among them were Father Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI, and Father Yves Congar, named a cardinal in 1994. Maryknoll Bishop John W. Comber and U.S. Bishop Fulton J. Sheen also served on this working commission.

Numerous meetings were held to prepare the full schema on the missions; they were hosted by Father Schütte in Nemi, just outside Rome. The schema came up for discussion on the Council floor on Oct. 7, 1965. Father Schütte presented an introductory overview, stressing the fact that the Missions Commission had unanimously approved each chapter. Exactly two months later, when the revised text reached the Council floor for a final vote, it received only five negative votes and was adopted by 2,394 positive votes — the highest number reached for any single Vatican II document.

The mission document of Vatican II reflects the main features of the Church’s missionary reality.  This is the first time in the history of the Church that “the missions” were treated specifically by an Ecumenical Council. Commentators on Ad Gentes often highlight the breakthrough achieved by the Council on foundational doctrinal principles. The document asserts that the mission of the Church is modeled on the missio Dei, the divine missions of our Trinitarian God; thus, mission is centered on the design of the Father, the mission of the Son, and the mission of the Holy Spirit.

In the words of Ad Gentes: “The pilgrim Church is missionary by her very nature, since it is from the mission of the Son and the mission of the Holy Spirit that she draws her origin, in accordance with the decree of God the Father” (AG 2). Succinctly stated, mission is not just one of the many tasks or apostolates in which the Church engages; mission is the very essence or fundamental nature of the Church. Mission is not something that the Church “does”; mission is fundamentally what the Church “is.” Mission is the core identity of the Church.

In Rome, Bishop Comber converses with Bishop Maurice Michael Otunga, who would later become archbishop of Nairobi and the first Kenyan cardinal. (Maryknoll Mission Archives)

While the term “mission” retains its validity, today the Church prefers to use the term “evangelization.” For many Catholics this is a generally unfamiliar and relatively new term. Yet, Vatican II as well as recent popes have placed evangelization at the center of the Church’s identity and mission. Today the Church sees that the “principal elements” of missionary evangelization are: presence and witness; commitment to social development and human liberation; liturgical life, prayer and contemplation; interreligious dialogue; and proclamation and catechesis. 

The one evangelizing mission of the Church is comprised of these five component elements and authentic forms. This comprehensive, holistic vision is popularly termed “integral evangelization.” Viewing evangelization through its five essential dimensions results in clarity, insight, and proper integration. This is a Catholic vision of evangelization.

These five dimensions of an integral understanding of evangelization complement and reinforce each other. In speaking of the complexity of the Church’s evangelizing action, Pope Paul VI, truly a missionary pope, gave a timely admonition: “Any partial and fragmentary definition which attempts to render the reality of evangelization in all its richness, complexity and dynamism does so only at the risk of impoverishing it and even of distorting it.” Paul VI, now a canonized saint, continued: “It is impossible to grasp the concept of evangelization unless one tries to keep in view all its essential elements” (Evangelii Nuntiandi 17).

Pope Francis, who gifted the Church with Evangelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel), invited us to become enthusiastic missionary disciples (EG 119-121). In the message he prepared for World Mission Sunday 2025, Francis invited us to become “missionaries of hope among all peoples”; we are urged to “burn with holy zeal for a new evangelizing season in the Church.”

Today the Church emphasizes the missionary nature of the entire Church. Every baptized member of the Church is an evangelizer, whether layperson, ordained, or religious. Catholic evangelization engages the entire Church (from top to bottom), all states of life (lay, religious, ordained, married, single), all apostolic activities and forms of witness (the five principal elements). Truly, the totality of Christian missionary evangelization embraces all these aspects. For any Christian, to live is to evangelize!

Maryknoll Father James H. Kroeger recently published Walking with Pope Francis: The Official Documents in Everyday Language (Orbis Books – 2023) and Exploring Vatican II Treasures: Actors, Events, Insights (Faith Alive Books – 2024).

Featured image: Superior generals of mission institutes gather with Pope Paul VI in 1963. Maryknoll Bishop John Comber (sixth from left) served on the subcommission that wrote the Council document on mission. Also pictured (sixth from right) is Maryknoll Bishop Alonso Escalante, founder of the Missionaries of Guadalupe. (Pontificia Fotografia Felici/Maryknoll Mission Archives)