Abstract
This study, which was presented at a symposium on Josef Smolik, first analyses how this author understood the prophetic role of the Church. According to Smolik, the prophetic charism makes it possible to discern God's will for the congregation, the church, and the individual.
Smolik, however, refuses to understand the prophetic role of the church as the ability to deduct God's action from history, or even to look into the details of God's intentions for the world. Rather, the role of prophecy is to encourage the believer to find his place in a complex world and to develop the right attitude toward it.
It seems that the issue of prophecy is not very prominent in the current theological discussion. This is due, among other things, to the great upheavals that the doctrine of providence has under - gone in the last century under the pressure of historical catastrophes.
Theology has not