The attempt of the Church’s Council to renew its life and to enter into a dialogue with the non-Catholic world has led in fact to the attempt to find ways of communicating with, or of understanding, at different levels, elements within itself and the world in which it finds itself. If the first discovery of the Council was the need for the bishops to communicate with each other, to form a collective mind, and to learn to regulate the processes of civilised discussion, the second was that ancient defensive positions should not prejudice the necessity for intelligibility in a world increasingly literate. The first led to a restatement of the primitive teaching about the bishop’s role, both as representative of the local church, and as a member of that group, or college, that succeeds to the apostles, and shares with the successor of Peter in the direction of the Catholic Church. The implications of this, both in the traditional ecclesiastical sphere, and in relation to the sharing of the presbyterium, or priestly group, in the affairs of the local church, and in the necessarily growing part the holy people of God will take in areas, till recently confined to clerics, is in principle outlined in the Decree on the Church, though the carrying out of the implications of the decree may take long enough.