Those who point to a new, ecumenical thrust in Vatican II insist that the term was introduced as a compromise after much discussion, and acknowledges new elements in the council's teaching.
Komonchak points out that since "some wanted to strengthen the statement, others to weaken it" the Doctrinal Commission of Vatican II decided to stay with the change of verb.
He suggests that following "the first rule of conciliar hermeneutics", we should examine statements of Vatican II about these "ecclesial elements" found outside the Catholic Church.
This is reinforced in the decree on ecumenism (Unitatis redintegratio) which says: "Very many, of the most significant elements and endowments that together go to build up and to give life to the Church itself can exist outside the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church: the written Word of God, the life of grace, faith, hope, and charity, with other interior gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as visible elements [...] [and] not a few of the sacred actions of the Christian religion".
"[2] Sebastian Tromp, a Dutch Jesuit, a Scholastic theologian and close to Pope Pius XII, is considered to have been the main though unacknowledged author of Mystici corporis Christi.
As advisor to Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani during Vatican II, Tromp was also, according to existing tape recordings and diaries, the father of "subsistit", which to his understanding of Latin did not mean anything new but indicated completeness.
[11] Some identified what they considered to be inconsistencies in the Congregation's own 2007 responsa, and pointed out that it was at variance with several prominent theologians who took a more liberal interpretation, such as Christopher Butler, Yves Congar, George Tavard, Joseph A. Komonchak, and Francis A.
[12][2] In a 2000 interview with Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, then-Cardinal Ratzinger, head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (later elected Pope Benedict XVI), responded to criticism of Dominus Iesus as follows:[13] Cardinal Dulles argues subsitit in to be "an expression deliberately chosen to allow for the ecclesial reality of other Christian communities", implying that non-Catholic Christians are members of the Body of Christ, and thus of the Church.
[14] Catholic priest Hervé Legrand [fr] states that the part concerning subsistit in within the 1985 notification concerning Leonard Boff's books, as well as within Dominus Iesus, are wrong.