The foundations for Francis’s approach—affirmation of the centrality of Christ and of the value of other religious traditions—were laid at the Second Vatican Council. “The Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these religions,” states the December 1965 declaration Nostra aetate. “She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men.” How the Triune God is present in non-Christian traditions has never been specified in Church teaching. As the culminating document of Vatican II, Gaudium et spes, put it, “The Holy Spirit in a manner known only to God offers to every man the possibility of being associated with this paschal mystery.”
Source: Commonweal Magazine
