On the 50th anniversary of Vatican II

Today is the 50th anniversary of the opening session of the Second Vatican Council. I marked the occasion by contributing a post to the Associated Baptist Press ABPnews Blog offering a Baptist appreciation for an aspect of that momentous development. I'll post the full text here on Ecclesial Theology in a few days; in the meantime, here's an excerpt from the opening of the blog post:

Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council by Pope John XXIII on October 11, 1962. My service as a member of the Baptist World Alliance delegation to a series of bilateral ecumenical conversations with the Roman Catholic Church held from 2006 through 2010 has given me a deepened appreciation for many aspects of the work of that council and its legacy.

In particular, I’ve come to see that the Catholic Church is not unlike the Baptist tradition in terms of the role that forms of dissent play in the theological development of both traditions (though Catholics do not describe it as “dissent”—more on that distinction later), and that this feature of Vatican II suggests some ways Baptists might see themselves as participants in the ongoing formation of a larger tradition that includes the Catholic Church along with all Christian churches.

Read the full post on the ABPnews Blog.