This unique work - no other work yet available in English treats this subject - illustrates the contribution of these Councils in the development and formulation of Christian beliefs. It then shows how their legacies lingered throughout the centuries to inspire - or haunt - every generation.

It is taken for granted today among theologians that the principal achievement of the Second Vatican Council was its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium. It is beginning to be equally taken for granted that the core of this central document is its vision of Church as communion. "Communion," Pope John Paul II has said, "is the very mystery of the Church." Church: A Spirited Communion grows out of the ecclesiology of the Council as a systematic treatment of this notion of communion. Church: A Spirited Communion is not, however, a book only about the Church. It is a book about the...