The Church as a Conspiracy of Unity

Abstract

A Church of unprecedented diversity will face an old problem: how to avoid breaking down into ethnically based theologies and local churches. It will face the challenge of how to sustain unity theologically, without resorting to a unity forced through a culturally dominant or hegemonic communication of the faith practiced by a local majority of Catholics. John Courtney Murray's idea of "conspiracy" critically retrieved and applied to an ecclesial context, specifically a theology of vocation which embraces formal (as in institutionalized) and informal commitments of practicing the faith could provide a solution where different groups of Catholics can live out their particular cultural instantiations of faith while conspiring toward authentic unity amongst themselves.