The downside of dialogue…as compared with the Gospel

By Dr. Jeff Mirus ( bio - articles - email ) | Jun 23, 2025

If my title makes me sound like an old curmudgeon, I ask the reader to bear with me. Just because there is a downside to something does not mean that the thing in question never has value. But I was reminded of the downside of dialogue while reading a summary of the Second Vatican Council’s call for the Catholic Church to engage in dialogue with the various religions of the world. The problem, of course is that inter-religious dialogue is not only potentially fruitful but intrinsically dangerous. It has the inescapable effect of encouraging Catholics to at least temporarily suspend their witness to the truth for the purpose of more thoroughly understanding and befriending those who religiously adhere to various forms of error.

In its Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions (Nostra Aetate), the Second Vatican Council stated:

The Church, therefore, exhorts her sons, that through dialogue and collaboration with the followers of other religions, carried out with prudence and love and in witness to the Christian faith and life, they recognize, preserve and promote the good things, spiritual and moral, as well as the socio-cultural values found among these men. [2]

The hope that underlies this urgency, of course, is that an emphasis on mutual understanding may both foster peace and draw those who profess other religions into the fullness of Catholic truth. But the risk is that Catholics themselves might adopt a mindset which sees multiple religions as wholly proper and good. After all, why can’t we all just get along? And this attitude carries within it a very strong tendency to reduce or even hide the proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Even if we do remember the injunction in the text to witness to our own faith, we may do so simply by admitting or acknowledging it and moving on. Do we not too easily fall into the error that inter-religious “sharing” is a substitute for proclaiming the Gospel? Indeed, under the aegis of modern relativism, mutual understanding very frequently trumps adherence to the truth. What I am suggesting here is not that it is wrong to promote peace and understanding, but that it is hard to do that, especially in today’s atmosphere, without finding in it an excuse to ignore what Our Lord declared to be blessed:

Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you. You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trodden under foot by men. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. [Mt 5:11-16]

It is not enough, then, to recognize in a kindly tone that “you believe this, and I believe that” or that “you value this and I value that”. When dialogue dims the light of Christ, it becomes a tool of the Devil. Mutual understanding has value, but it does not nullify the Gospel.

Loving one another?

St. John the Evangelist records in his gospel many of the words of Christ before His arrest and crucifixion, especially those spoken in connection with the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper. Some of this guidance was framed as a command: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (Jn 13:34-5). But there is also a twist: “This I command you, to love one another. If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before you” (Jn 15:17-18).

This might be taken to refer to love among His disciples, and that is certainly an important feature of Christianity. But it is clear that those closest to Our Lord took this to refer to the difficult and self-effacing love expressed through the effort to bring others into the light of Christ—clear because this is the most marked aspect of their lives following Our Lord’s Resurrection and their reception of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. And it is just this that so often incurs the wrath of the world.

Except for the one whom Christ Himself regarded as a traitor (Mt 26:21-25; Mk 14:18; Lk 21-22; 48; Jn. 13:21), they all went out and preached the Good News. They all went out and made converts. In addition, it seems likely that we are to learn something from the experience of St. Paul. Recall that at one point Paul attempted to convert the Athenians by referring to the altar he had seen in Athens “to an unknown god” (cf. Acts17:15-33). Was this not an effort at religious dialogue? He made a few converts, but on the whole he sparked little interest except ridicule along with the possibility on the part of some that they might listen to him further at a later time.

So he left Athens and went on to Corinth where, as he explained in his first letter to the Corinthians:

I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God in lofty words and wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in much fear and trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. [1 Cor 2:1-5]

If this experience and resolution of St. Paul does not put religious “dialogue” in its proper place, then I suspect it is because “dialogue” never puts us in a state of weakness, fear, and trembling. There is a time and place for every good thing. But dialogue and even the corporal works of mercy can take us only so far. If we do not take St. Paul seriously on this point, we may well wonder whether we have reflected sufficiently on our inability to know the day or the hour when the Son of Man will appear as Judge (cf. Mt 24).

I admit that Our Lord said: “Blessed is that servant whom his master when he comes will find” giving “them their food at the proper time” (Mt 24:44-46; Lk 12:42-43). But what is that food? To this question, Christ answered: “My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work” (Jn 4:34). And what do we suppose Our Lord meant when He rebuked Satan by saying: “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Mt 4:4)?