Buddhist-Christian Dialogue as a New Way of Being Church in Vietnam

The Catholic Church, since Vatican II, has sought to rediscover its identity in its relationships with other religions. Indeed, Vatican II dedicated an entire document to this matter and urged its members to dialogue with believers of other religions. This dialogue is more crucial to the church in Asia, where Christians are the minority among believers of Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, etc. In Vietnam, the Catholics comprise a small number of the population, while the majority are Buddhists. No matter how crucial Buddhist-Catholic dialogue is for the existence of the Church, the Catholic Church in Vietnam remains static. This paper examines the gap between the teachings and practice of the Vietnamese Catholic Church in Buddhist-Christian dialogue and explores how dialogue could be a new way of being church in Vietnam. I approach this by illustrating the reasons for Buddhist-Christian dialogue, proposing some methods of dialogue as suggested by magisterial teaching, and concluding with a prediction of its fruits and limits, along with suggestions for ways forward.