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Ecumenism for Catholics William Steele ––
Kinds of Ecumenism The word ‘Ecumenism’ comes from the Greek oikoumene, meaning ‘the whole inhabited world’. The ‘Ecumenical Movement’ is the effort, under God, to bring the whole Christian world visibly and convincingly into one community, one Church. John 11:52 says that Jesus died ‘to gather into one all the scattered children of God’; ecumenism is a way of continuing this work of Christ. The ultimate hope is that, in God’s time, the whole inhabited world will be united and reconciled in Christ as one family, one People of God. The fundamental purpose therefore of ecumenism is mission, bringing the whole world to Christ. There are many ways of doing this unifying work, and the word ‘ecumenism’ has unfortunately become associated, at least in some people’s minds, with a bureaucratic, structured way. But there are other ways too which are also ‘ecumenism’: quiet prayer with our fellow Christians, personal friendships, working together from a Christian motive for peace and justice. A very deep kind of ecumenism can exist in an ‘inter-church’ marriage, where both partners are committed followers of their own separate traditions. These ‘warmer’ kinds of ecumenism are not usually called ‘ecumenism’, and unlike the structured kind they do not have a written history; but without them the structured kind is dead. Both kinds in fact are needed, and both are the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Twentieth Century has been called ‘The Century of Ecumenism’, because of the enormous advances in structured Christian unity, but at the turn of the Century enthusiasm for this kind of ecumenism seems to be on the wane, at least in Britain. This is perhaps to do with the diminished interest in organised religion. Maybe the less structured kind of ecumenism will now come into its own, to engage the hearts of more Christian people – who knows ? The Change in Catholic Teaching In the summer of 1996, in Malines/Mechelen in Belgium, there were celebrations to mark the 75th anniversary of the ‘Malines Conversations’, which began in 1921. These Conversations were unofficial talks between small groups of High Church Anglicans and French and Belgian Catholics. They discussed the possibility of the Church of England being reunited to Rome in some special way (e.g. with its own hierarchy and customs distinct from the British or Irish Catholic Church. The phrase they used was ‘united, not absorbed’.) The 1996 affair was quite an occasion: a Cardinal from Rome representing the Pope, several English Catholic Bishops, the Archbishop of Canterbury, plus some 150 other British, French and Belgian Anglicans and Catholics. The contrast with the Malines Conversations of the 1920s could not have been sharper. Then, the authorities on both sides viewed them with suspicion, if not downright hostility. Cardinal Bourne, the Archbishop of Westminster, was furious with the Catholic Archbishop of Malines, Cardinal Mercier, for doing this kind of thing behind his back, and wrote to tell him so. The Conversations ended in 1925, and in 1928 Pope Pius XI wrote a fiercely anti-ecumenical encyclical letter, Mortalium Animos, attacking the ecumenical movement, and by implication attacking the Malines Conversations. Ecumenism, said Pius, was playing fast and loose with the truth. He referred to ecumenists dismissively as ‘pan-Christians’. The only form of unity was for everyone else to admit their errors and come back to Rome, and he urged Catholic bishops to do all they could to ‘avert this evil’ of ecumenism. The reason for the change between 1928 and 1996 was above all the Second Vatican Council. The Council published its Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis Redintegratio, in 1964. This is the fundamental text for studying the present-day Catholic attitude to ecumenism. Far from calling ecumenism an ‘evil’, it calls it ‘a movement fostered by the grace of the Holy Spirit’, and urges all Catholics to ‘respond to the grace of this divine call’ [UR.1]. There has been a very real change here, a conversion of heart and mind – certainly on the official level. Since then, other documents have appeared strongly reinforcing this. In 1993 the Holy See published the Directory for the Application of Principles and Norms on Ecumenism (part legislation, part teaching, part vision and encouragement). The Directory hammers home the message that Catholics need to be informed about ecumenism, converted to it, and involved in it.1 Shortly afterwards, in 1995, Pope John Paul wrote an encyclical on ecumenism, Ut Unum Sint (‘May they All be One’). The Catholic Church, he says, ‘has committed herself irrevocably to follow the path of the ecumenical venture’ [UUS.3] and at the end of the letter, in a moment of conversion no other Pope has ever had, he invites the leaders of the other Christian traditions to advise him on how he should exercise his Papacy, because the Papal Primacy has so often been the cause of division, whereas it should be a force for Christian unity and harmony [UUS.95-96]. ECUMENISM: AN HISTORICAL OUTLINE The Break with Judaism In Acts 2:42 ff. It says that the first Christian community
In other words, we have a picture of a common faith, a common life in union with the Apostles, common worship, and deeds of charity. The essentials of true Christian unity, you might say. But even if that ideal scenario ever literally existed, it certainly didn’t last long. Quarrels soon began. In the First Epistle to the Corinthians St Paul is constantly appealing for unity and charity, and elsewhere in the New Testament these virtues are clearly preached. In other words, the Church from the start knew what its life should be like, even though Christians knew only too well that it was very far from that. This conviction has never disappeared, and is the incentive of the movement for unity. Acts 15 describes the Church in its first major crisis, about the very nature of the new Christian community in relation to the People of Israel. If a Gentile, a pagan, wanted to become a Christian, was Jewish membership necessary as well as faith in Christ and baptism? The calm account in Acts surely hides a controversy that was anything but calm. It must have caused agonies of heart-searching among these predominantly Jewish Christians, and the loss of many Jewish Christian members, when the decision was finally made that Jewish membership was not required. This must have been a significant moment in the break between Church and Synagogue, and from then on the weight of numbers must have tilted more and more towards a non-Jewish membership. This is the most ancient division of all, as far as the Church is concerned. St Paul reflects on it with intense pain in Rom 9-11. The healing of God’s people, he says, will not come about until that original rupture has been healed. In Rom 11:16-36 he insists that the Jews are still God’s chosen People, still that ancient ‘olive tree’ on to which we Gentiles were grafted. In verses 28-29 he says
Christians over the centuries have not sufficiently reflected on these words of St Paul. The continued existence of the Jewish people and their faith over all this time, through periods of terrible persecution and geographical dispersion, is of real theological significance. They still have a part to play in the loving designs of God. The First Millennium The Greco-Roman world in the early centuries had an influence at its widest from Spain to the Punjab. Alexander the Great once stood on the banks of the Indus. The Greco-Roman culture was certainly the dominant one, but there was still a multitude of other cultures, other languages, other religions. Christianity, when it came, spread along the trade-routes into a world we would describe today as thoroughly ‘pluralistic’. The challenge was how to convey the original Palestinian, Semitic message effectively, yet faithfully, to that great assortment of people. Inevitably there were in those first centuries tensions and sharp divisions even over the most fundamental matters of all: the nature of God, the nature and identity of Christ, and the material-spiritual nature of human beings. Not only was there a rich and valuable diversity of insight, but there were sometimes divisions in matters so fundamental that they threatened the very existence of the Church as one body, proclaiming one faith. The question, ‘What in this situation are the limits of legitimate diversity?’ sometimes takes many years to answer; yet instinctively the Church knew, and still knows, that unity at any price is no unity at all. This conviction has remained ever since, and is the challenge and the task of the ecumenical movement. The Era of the ‘Ecumenical Councils’ At the beginning of the Fourth Century the Emperor Constantine brought the Christian Church out of persecution and granted it a favoured status in the Empire. At that point the Church began to develop its organisation, and it was possible to argue the doctrinal and disciplinary issues much more openly. It was the era of the great formative ‘Ecumenical’ Councils: i.e. Councils of the world-wide Church as they knew the world then: The Councils of Nicaea 325, Constantinople 381, Ephesus 431 and Chalcedon 451. These Councils gradually established what was to be orthodox Christian belief concerning Jesus Christ and the Trinitarian nature of God. The Assyrian Church of the East As was to happen time and again (not least at Vatican II) these unifying decisions also led to division, because some groups could not in conscience accept what was decided – or rather what they thought was decided, in the confused terminology of those days. For example, after Ephesus 431 the Christians further east in Mesopotamia and Persia thought the Council was denying the humanity of Christ, so there was a separation. These Christians still exist today in that part of the world (Iraq and Iran). Until recently the rest of the Christian world gave them the heretical label ‘Nestorian’, implying that they divided Christ into two beings, but in recent years joint ecumenical study, endorsed by the Vatican, has revealed what confusion of language there was. In 1994 the Vatican came to an agreement with these Churches that their differences over belief about Christ were matters of language and emphasis, not of substance. These Churches are now known by the more polite name ‘Assyrian Church of the East’. Oriental Orthodox It was a similar story after Chalcedon 451. Other Christians in Egypt and elsewhere thought the Council was dividing Christ, so again there was a separation. They too still exist today, and for centuries we in the West labelled them with another heretical title: ‘Monophysite’ (’single-natured’) because we thought they were denying the true human nature of Christ. Similarly, after joint study, in a common profession of faith recited by Pope Paul VI and the Coptic Pope Shenouda III in 1973, it was acknowledged on both sides that the differences were of language and emphasis not of substance. Nowadays these Christians are known as the ‘Oriental Orthodox’. They are to be found in India, Syria, Ethiopia, Armenia and the Coptic Church of Egypt. As far as the doctrine about Christ is concerned therefore, both they and the Holy See have recognised that there is no issue that need divide the Churches. There are still other matters, of course, such as the papal primacy and the so called ‘uniate’ Churches so we are still separated. The ‘Great Schism’ between East and West Now we turn to a split in the Christian world which is more significant, in the sense that the numbers involved are so much greater. Many will not have heard of the Churches mentioned above, but everyone has heard of, and possibly encountered, the ‘Eastern Orthodox Church’. The ancient Church divided itself into five large areas, or ‘Patriarchates’, each under the jurisdiction of a senior bishop, the Patriarch: Rome (the Church of the West, led by the Bishop of Rome, its Patriarch); Constantinople (calling itself ‘the new Rome’, capital of the Empire from Constantine onwards); Jerusalem; Antioch; Alexandria. The two divisions mentioned above were in the two Patriarchates of Antioch and Alexandria – the other three supported the first four Councils, and remained united (though with increasing tension between the West and the others) for the first thousand years. What was later called the ‘Great Schism’ was between Rome and the other two: i.e. Constantinople and Jerusalem. The Balkans, which were the dividing line between East and West, also marked the religious fault-line, as indeed they still do today (with the presence of Islam nowadays thrown in for good measure). The usual neat date given for this major break is 1054. It was then that the Papal Legate, the Norman Cardinal Humbert, a learned but undiplomatic man, laid a Bull of Excommunication on the altar of the Patriarch’s cathedral in Constantinople. The Patriarch Michael, a hot-tempered man himself, responded in kind and excommunicated the Western delegation. Thus was born the Great Schism. These mutual exclusions remained on the table until 1965, when Pope Paul VI and the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras symbolically embraced each other and mutually lifted the anathemas. In fact, like any marriage breakdown, 1054 had a long history behind it. The East was Greek in culture, thought and language. The West was Latin. At that time, and in the centuries before, the East was far more advanced culturally and theologically, and regarded the West with some disdain. They certainly did not take kindly to the West trying to lecture them on the Christian faith. There was a long-standing communication problem and, as always in earlier times, the mutual ignorance that comes from geographical distance. East-West difficulties still alive today In addition, there were particular difficulties, still very much alive in the Eastern Church today, and affecting Catholic- Orthodox dialogue. In summary form, these are the principal ones: 1. The Western Church had altered the Nicene Creed, agreed between the Churches during the period of the first four Councils. Without consulting the East, the Western Church began to add to the words ‘We believe in the Holy Spirit who proceeeds from the Father’ the additional words ‘and the Son’ (in Latin, ... qui ex Patre Filioque procedit). The East objected to this unilateral tampering with the Creed, and objected still more to the doctrine implied: that in the inner life of God, the Holy Spirit originates from Father and Son together, seeming to make the Son a source of the Holy Spirit in the same way as the Father. This issue became known as the Filioque dispute. Your reaction at this point, I imagine, will be to say with impatience, ‘What on earth does it matter to us? How irrelevant can you get ! Can’t we leave the inner life of God to God himself? ‘ Unfortunately the Eastern Church does not see it that way. They will say vehemently that it does matter, and that it has led to a serious neglect of the Holy Spirit by the Western Church for century after century, leading to de-personalising of the Church, and far too great an emphasis on law, structure and institution. Many will feel today that the Catholic Church has over-emphasised law, structure and institution, and if this is indeed linked to the doctrine of the Spirit, perhaps the Filioque is not as minor as it seems to us Westerners! 2. The other really major obstacle has been the increasingly insistent claim of the Western Patriarch, the Pope, to a primacy over the whole Church, not just of honour but of jurisdiction and power. This is most certainly a live issue today. 3. One of the most disastrous issues, from the ecumenical point of view, was not theological but historical. The Fourth Crusade, on its way from the West to the Holy Land in 1204, laid siege to Constantinople, sacked the city with extreme cruelty, and imposed Latin bishops and a Latin church governance for sixty years. This sacrilegious act, deplored even at the time by the Pope himself, has left a legacy of bitterness that has never been forgotten, and a deep hatred of Rome. When Pope John Paul II visited Athens in 2001, the Greek Orthodox clergy angrily objected, and brought up 1204 as a reason against the visit. In the West, few would know the significance of 1204. In the Greek Church they can never forget it. 4. Much later, from the Sixteenth Century onwards, there came another cause of bitterness: ‘Uniate Churches’. This is the pejorative term the Eastern Orthodox give to Churches in Eastern Europe which have entered into full communion with Rome, while keeping their Eastern liturgy and discipline (e.g. married clergy). In the Sixteenth Century and afterwards Catholic missionaries went into Orthodox parts of Europe and encouraged them to re-unite with Rome, while some parts of the Eastern Church sought this of their own accord. There are about 15 million altogether. The Orthodox Church has never recognised ‘uniatism’ as a legitimate process, and it is a massive bone of contention in ecumenical dialogue today. Since Vatican II there has been a Catholic-Orthodox dialogue in progress, but in spite of the Catholic Church’s recognition of their closeness to us in doctrine and in sacraments, to the Orthodox these are very serious barriers. Pope John Paul II has reunion with the East very close to his heart: he has spoken often of the Church needing to breathe once again ‘with two lungs’. He is notably more concerned about this than about union with Anglicans and Protestants in the West, though he certainly seeks that too, but this East-West division is much more ancient and stirs up deep feelings. Ecumenism from the Reformation to 1900 The second major division in Christianity, the Sixteenth Century Reformation, was within the Western Church. The issues here were partly political, as European nation-states began to emerge; partly social, as the laity became better educated and the ‘new learning’ of the Renaissance began to take hold; and partly from a general awareness that the Church was in serious need of reform, spiritually, theologically and in its structures. The fundamental doctrinal issue was over the relationship between God and God’s human creatures: in the work of our salvation, what part do we play, if any? What of human freedom over against God’s sovereignty? Stemming from that fundamental question were the differences over the significance of the Church, and the Church’s human, visible realities: Papacy, priesthood, saints and sacraments. These doctrinal matters and the criticisms of the way the Church was operating obviously intertwined. The Reformers The most influential Reformers, each with his own distinct theological stance, and each resulting in traditions that exist to this day, were: Martin Luther in Germany, and John Calvin in Switzerland (Geneva). Luther’s movement eventually led to the ‘Churches of the Augsburg Confession’, above all in Germany and Scandinavia. These were eventually called ‘Lutheran’ Churches, and are found today not only in Germany and the Nordic-Baltic countries, but strongly in the U.S.A., and also in Africa, especially in Tanzania, Namibia and Madagascar, where their numbers are growing. They are present in other countries too, such as England, though in smaller numbers. Calvin’s more radical (i.e. less ‘Catholic’) kind of Protestantism led to Churches of the ‘Reformed’ traditions, above all in Switzerland, France, the Low Countries and of course the Church of Scotland where, as in England, they are called ‘Presbyterian’. The Congregationalists too came out of the Reformed tradition.2 The Reformation in England England had a different story. In 1534 Henry VIII finally separated from Rome, for political and dynastic reasons, not theological ones. Indeed in sacramental doctrine he remained very Catholic, and persecuted the Protestants. But then under Edward VI continental Protestantism, especially that of the Frenchman John Calvin and the Swiss Ulrich Zwingli, began to exert a very strong influence. Mary Tudor’s short reign failed to reverse the trend, and under Elizabeth I the Church of England was launched on its way with both Catholic and Protestant elements – the ‘Church of England, Catholic and Reformed’ – and an episcopal church order. This of course remains with us today, with its Catholic and Evangelical strands, together with the ‘Liberal’ or ‘Modern’ strand coming in later. The Church of England is proud of its ‘comprehensiveness’, though the stresses and strains of it are always present. Ecumenically, one of the problems of dialogue with the Anglican Church is precisely this ‘comprehensiveness’: an agreement with one ‘wing’ does not always suit another. The Moravian Church In an important sense this is one of the oldest ‘Protestant’ Churches (though not as old as the Waldensians), because it originates in the mediaeval reforming movement of the Czech John Huss, who himself was influenced by the Englishman John Wycliffe. The Moravians were formed in the Eighteenth Century from what were left of the ‘Bohemian Brethren’, a mediaeval group influenced by Huss. Later Protestants After the Sixteenth Century Protestantism experienced further divisions: the Baptist movement,which traces its history back to the Sixteenth Century and was strongly influenced by Calvinism, the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and the Methodists are perhaps the best known. The ‘Methodists’ (a name given later) were originally a group or movement within the Church of England. John Wesley did not want to break with the Church but to ‘reform the nation, more particularly the Church; to spread scriptural holiness over the land’. However as time went on Wesley’s movement and the Church of England grew to be more and more at variance, and eventually they found themselves to be distinct Christian communities. The Catholic Church What of the Catholic Church in the years after the Reformation ? To begin with there were conversations between Catholics and Lutherans, but nothing came of them. What efforts there were came to an end with the Council of Trent (1545-63), when the Catholic Church at last began to reform itself. Unfortunately by this time the Catholic reform was unavoidably against the background of Protestantism, and was inevitably in conscious opposition to it. Thus began what is called the ‘Church of the Counter-Reformation’, a Church which lasted with very little change for almost exactly four hundred years – to the opening of the Second Vatican Council in 1962. What little ecumenism there was in these post-Reformation years was mainly between Anglican, Protestant and Orthodox traditions, but we cannot go into the details here. What there was, however, deep down in the faith-consciousness of every part of Christianity, was a realisation that Christian divisions impeded the mission and work of Christ. This insight, which we already saw in Acts 2, was still there. It was this conviction that led to the birth of the modern Ecumenical Movement. From ‘Edinburgh 1910’ to ‘Amsterdam 1948’ Beginnings in the Nineteenth Century The conventional date for the beginning of the modern ecumenical movement is 1910, the date of the World Missionary Conference at Edinburgh, but the modern spirit of ecumenism began to develop a little earlier, during the Nineteenth Century among Protestant and Anglican Churches, and especially among British and American Churches. For instance, in 1888 the Anglican Churches of Britain and the USA drew up a short list of doctrinal points they regarded as absolutely essential for a re-united Church. This list, the Lambeth Quadrilateral, insisted on these points of agreement: 1. Acceptance of the Old and New Testaments; 2. Acceptance of the Apostles’ Creed and Nicene Creed; 3. The two sacraments of Baptism and Holy Eucharist; 4. The Historic Episcopate, adapted to local needs. This famous ‘Quadrilateral’ is often used as a benchmark today – e.g. in the negotiations for unity between the Anglicans and Methodists at the present time. The Missionary Experience The ‘Evangelical Revival’ or ‘Great Awakening’ that occurred in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries had crossed Protestant and Anglican denominational lines, and was strongly mission-minded. Colonialism was opening the world up to missionaries from Europe and America, and they found that in the far-flung places where they preached they were getting in each other’s way and impeding the Gospel by their rivalries. ‘What are we doing’, they said, ‘importing the divisions born of our European history into a world where that history is irrelevant? ‘ This led to a whole series of Missionary Conferences in Britain and America, culminating in a mega-conference 1500 strong in Edinburgh in the year 1910. It was overwhelmingly British and American, Protestant and Anglican. No Catholics or Eastern Orthodox were present. Their agenda was mainly evangelism, but the issue of Church unity, and the scandal of disunity, loomed very large and was to have a decisive effect for the future. Between the Wars After the First World War came the League of Nations, and a general desire for a united, reconciled world: they called the war that had just ended ‘The War to end all Wars’. It was in that atmosphere that Edinburgh 1910 began to bear fruit. Various movements developed which would, after the Second World War, eventually join together to form the World Council of Churches. There was a movement that was concerned with practical matters such as peace and social justice, entitled the ‘Life and Work Movement’; there was also the ‘Faith and Order Movement’ for studying doctrinal and theological questions; and there continued to be the ‘International Missionary Council’, with its evangelising agenda so close to the heart of Edinburgh 1910. The fact that the modern ecumenical movement had its beginnings in Anglicanism and Protestantism, and in the evangelising zeal of these Churches, has profoundly influenced the course and character of the movement. As we noted at the beginning, the ultimate purpose of ecumenism is mission, the mission of bringing Christ to the world. That priority was most certainly and impressively present, coming from the instinctive concerns of Protestantism and evangelical Anglicanism. The Church-centred Catholic instinct, which of course also gives mission the highest priority, would relate it much more closely to the Church as such. What of the Eastern Orthodox, and what of the Catholic Church itself? The Orthodox were certainly interested in the new movement. In 1920 the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul sent an encyclical ‘Unto all the Churches of Christ Wheresoever they Be’, urging the establishment of a permanent and worldwide fellowship of Churches. In the same year the Lambeth Conference also issued a letter in the same spirit, ‘To all Christian People’. These two ecumenical appeals were also sent to Rome. An Anglican Bishop actually went to see Pope Benedict XV in 1920. The Pope received him warmly, and indeed praised the ecumenical movement; but he had to decline the invitation to join in because he knew that the Catholic understanding of the Church could not allow it. Nevertheless, he was friendly. This could hardly be said of his successor, Pius XI, as we saw in his reaction to Malines and his Mortalium Animos. Amsterdam 1948 and the World Council of Churches Then came the Second World War, which had the effect (certainly on the Nazi-dominated European mainland) of encouraging collaboration between the Churches. After the War, once again amid new resolves for peace and harmony and the founding of the United Nations, the ‘Life and Work’ and ‘Faith and Order’ movements combined to form the World Council of Churches. The Missionary Council joined somewhat later. The W.C.C. was inaugurated at a General Assembly at Amsterdam in 1948. Since then the W.C.C. has had eight General Assemblies, the most recent being at Harare in 1998. Some of the Eastern Churches were in the W.C.C. from the start, and from 1961 the Communist regime in Moscow allowed the great Russian Orthodox Church to join, followed by the other Orthodox Churches behind the Iron Curtain. At Amsterdam the Catholic Church was not represented, even on an observer footing, although they were invited. The only Catholics present were journalists!
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
The Second Vatican Council 1962-1965 In the Introductory part of this work, I referred to the change in Catholic teaching in the mid 1960s using the contrast of the two Malines events as an example. So what had happened between the chilly atmosphere of the 1920s and the warmth of the 1960s and beyond? The Catholic Church of the Counter-Reformation was very clear about itself and about ecumenism. The one true Church of Christ was simply the Roman Catholic Church. No other Christian community had significance as ‘Church’ – they were not ‘Churches’ in the strict sense at all: they had no ‘ecclesial’ or ‘churchly’ character. Non-Catholic Christians could be (and surely were) in Christ and his grace as individuals, but this was because they were linked spiritually to the Roman Catholic Church. Indeed, outside the Catholic Church there was no salvation, so this invisible link was essential. The communities they actually visibly belonged to were simply Christian associations, more (or less) worthy, and teaching doctrines that were nearer to, or further from, Catholic truth. In this understanding of Church, ecumenism was a matter of other Christians renouncing their errors and coming back to Rome – ‘The Ecumenism of Return’, as it is called. All this was spelt out with utter clarity by Pius XI in his reaction to the Malines Conversations in Mortalium Animos 1928, echoed by Cardinal Bourne in his Foreword to the English translation, and firmly repeated by Pius XII in his encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi in 1943. Then, after World War II, there came the event that has marked the Catholic Church more strongly than anything since the Council of Trent, and perhaps even since the time of Constantine: the Second Vatican Council, 1962-65. As far as ecumenism is concerned the key statements of the Council are to be found in the Constitution on the Church Lumen Gentium, and the specific Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio. One might also mention the Declaration on Religious Liberty Dignitatis Humanae, a real breakthrough in Catholic attitudes, deeply shocking to the more conservative. It was a feature of the Council that other Christian observers (Anglican, Orthodox, Protestant) were present throughout its sessions. This assuredly had an effect on the debates and the voting, even though they themselves had no vote and no voice (except in the coffee-bars between the sessions! ) At Vatican II Mortalium Animos and the whole attitude it represented was simply reversed. This was surely one of the biggest changes in the long history of the Catholic Church. The Decree Unitatis Redintegratio in 1964 calls the Ecumenical Movement ‘a movement fostered by the grace of the Holy Spirit’ , and says it wants ‘to set before all Catholics guidelines, aids and methods by which they too can respond to the grace of this divine call’. Quite a change from 1928, when it wasn’t far from being called the work of the Devil! There has indeed been a real conversion here, though the conversion has yet thoroughly to permeate the Church as a whole. Since Vatican II other major documents have reinforced the Council, such as the 1993 Directory on Ecumenism.3 Pope John Paul II also does this, very strongly indeed, in his remarkable encyclical Ut Unum Sint. Throughout this letter he pleads for the conversion of Catholics, and does not exempt himself from this need. Origins of this Change This volte face of course did not come out of the blue. To begin with, a more scientific approach to the study of texts and their historical con texts was leading to a new understanding of the Bible, of the early Church and its liturgy and doctrine, and indeed of historical documents generally. Secondly, experiences during the second World War under Nazi domination had often brought Catholics and Protestants together, leading to barriers of ignorance being removed. Thirdly, improved communications were leading to the need and the desire to know ‘the other’ properly, not just through one’s own particular lens. By the 1950s even the Vatican itself was speaking in a somewhat gentler tone about the other Christian traditions and about ecumenism. A Fuller Understanding of the Church All this was leading, among other things, to a much richer understanding of the Church. The Church was not only an institution, a ‘perfect society’ as the customary understanding had it, but was a divine mystery of Communion, koinonia, fellowship. This opened the way to a much greater flexibility than the clear-cut ‘either-or’ of the Institutional ‘Model’.4 This richer understanding of Church as Communion meant that the Catholic Church could develop a different understanding of the place of other Christian communities. If we recognised the Baptism of a given denomination, we were in a position to recognise that this denomination as such could be partly in communion with the Catholic Church, sharing in the mystery of the one Church of Christ with some, perhaps many, of what in the Catholic view are essential characteristics of this one Church. So while we could not yet, at least as regards the Reformation Churches, give a full recognition to their liturgy, ministry and sacraments, the Council did recognise them as ‘truly engendering the life of grace’, and not as more or less empty signs. As the Decree on Ecumenism declares:
‘A change, yet not a change’ Yet, said the Council, this one Church exists in its completeness only in the Catholic Church. We cannot recognise this fullness even in the Eastern Orthodox, whom we acknowledge as the most fully ‘Church’ outside the Catholic Church because we fully recognise their priesthood and Eucharist. Nevertheless, even they lack what is in the Catholic view an essential characteristic, communion with the Bishop of Rome, successor of St Peter. This is what they meant by saying famously that the one Church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church alone. So while the Council certainly opened the way to a real ecumenism, it had to confess honestly that there is in the fundamental Catholic understanding something which is inevitably a painful cause of division, but also an invitation to a deeper exploration, mutually, of the mystery of the one Church of Christ. Nevertheless, our recognition of some other Churches’ baptism was a very significant step: in baptism we are already profoundly united in the one Christ and the one Church. By saying that, we are saying that what unites us is far greater than what divides us. After Vatican II The World Council of Churches Since the Vatican Council the Catholic Church has played a fuller and fuller part in the ecumenical movement, both internationally and in Britain. Catholics have been encouraged to play their part, not as an optional extra but as a consequence of their Christian and Catholic faith. At the World Council of Churches the Catholic Church has sent observers to the General Assemblies since 1961, and we have been full voting members of the Faith and Order Commission since 1968. In the same year a Joint Working Group of the W.C.C. and the Catholic Church was set up, and still meets regularly. However, the Church is not a full member of the W.C.C. because the Holy See believes that this would compromise the Church’s independence, and how we understand the Church and its authority. On a more pragmatic level, too, the sheer size of the Catholic Church would be a problem, being about the same size as all the other Churches put together. How could representation and voting be organised in such a body? Week of Prayer for Christian Unity The ‘Octave of Prayer for Christian Unity’ began a long time before Vatican II, and has its origins in the nineteenth Century, arising from a common realisation that such unity can only be the gift and grace of God and that persevering prayer is essential. To re-emphasise this, the Vatican II Decree on Ecumenism calls prayer for the unity of Christians, together with change of heart and holiness of life, ‘the soul of the whole ecumenical movement’. It invites Catholics to join with their fellow Christians in prayer for that intention. Ever since 1966 the Vatican and the W.C.C. have worked together to prepare texts for each year’s Octave of Prayer. Dialogues Since the 1960s the Catholic Church internationally has been in dialogue bilaterally with a large number of Christian traditions, and over the years these dialogues have resulted in joint Statements on a variety of doctrinal and moral issues: the Church and its authority, Sacraments, Justification, Moral questions, to name but a few. There has been a quiet but remarkable breakthrough in our dialogue with the Lutherans, for example, on the topic of ‘Justification’, or how the work of Christ puts us to rights in the sight of God. This was, theologically speaking, the fundamental dividing issue at the Reformation, yet now there has been a Joint Declaration of agreement on all essentials of this doctrine. Perhaps the subject of Justification is not a matter of general interest nowadays, but its fundamental importance remains. There are also continuing conversations internationally with Methodists, the Reformed Churches, the Orthodox and the Oriental Orthodox, and with the Pentecostals. Best known in this country is the international dialogue with the Anglican Communion, the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (A.R.C.I.C). This has produced some eight statements since the 1960s. Over the last ten years or so relations between our two traditions, though still friendly, have become more problematic. There are several difficult issues here: the ordination of women, our continuing inability to give an unqualified recognition to Anglican orders and Eucharist, and our restrictive discipline on sharing Holy Communion. The 1998 statement of the British and Irish Bishops One Bread One Body, though very ecumenical in tone and intent, still had to be faithful to the basic restrictions, and so was still a cause of hurt. To try to ease relations between the two Communions, the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury called for a joint meeting of Anglican and Catholic Bishops. This took place in Canada in mid-2000. They produced a joint statement, Communion in Mission, and a plan of action. The Bishops are now beginning to implement this plan, and we must hope and pray that something comes of it. Documents Since the Council many documents have come from Rome on ecumenical matters. The two most important are the ones already mentioned: The 1993 Directory for the Application of Principles and Norms on Ecumenism, and the 1995 encyclical Ut Unum Sint. Other, more cautious voices have been coming from Rome, as well – especially from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. In 2000 they published the Declaration Dominus Jesus on both inter-faith and ecumenical issues. Many felt that although it had very important things to say it was expressed in an insensitive way and that the same points could have been made with equal honesty but more ecumenical charity and awareness. Certainly this has been the reaction of many, both inside and outside the Catholic Church. Further, the C.D.F’s Response to the earlier Statements of A.R.C.I.C, though containing much that needed to be thought about, was criticised for ignoring the views of Catholic Bishops across the world, for being far too tardy in being produced, and for ignoring the method which (with papal approval) A.R.C.I.C. was using. Dominus Jesus was issued a few months after the Anglican and Catholic Bishops’ meeting in Canada. This latter was full of hope and warmth, but Dominus Jesus had the effect of totally overshadowing it.
THE ECUMENICAL JOURNEY IN ENGLAND
Between the two World Wars the Christian Churches in Britain, apart from the Catholic Church, and especially those in England, began to relate to each other more closely. Well before the W.C.C. was founded in 1948 local Councils of Churches began to spring up in this country – the first was in Lancashire in 1917. The national British Council of Churches was set up in 1942, six years before the W.C.C. Schemes of Union After the War the Churches became more ambitious – though in retrospect perhaps over-ambitious. They embarked on schemes for denominations to unite nationally which by and large did not work, and sometimes left a legacy of bitterness. The most painful was the attempted reunion of the British Methodists and the Church of England in 1972. This failed at the last hurdle, having been passed by the Methodist Conference, but just failing to get sufficient votes in the Anglican General Synod.6 Another failed attempt was in 1982, when there was a proposed ‘Covenant of Churches’ between Anglican, Methodist, United Reformed Church, and Moravian. One effort that did succeed was the formation of the United Reformed Church (U.R.C.) in 1972. This was a union originally of the Presbyterian Church of England and Congregational Church of England and Wales. A denomination called The Churches of Christ joined them in 1981. The U.R.C’s commitment from the beginning has been the search for unity among all Christians, and at the top of every agenda in their meetings is the question: What are the ecumenical implications of this agenda? But even the founding of the U.R.C caused a fall-out: some Congregational Churches stayed out, to form the Congregational Federation; so did some of the Churches of Christ.7 ‘L.E.P.s’ There have also been forms of structural union on the purely local level. In 1964 the British Council of Churches called for their members to set up ‘Areas of Ecumenical Experiment’. In the new towns and housing estates that were being built, or simply at the request of local congregations, it was hoped that these congregations would cross denominational boundaries in various ways, and that their Church authorities would allow them to go beyond the normal rules. But what started as merely ‘Experiments’ began to have a permanent life of their own. In 1973 the word ‘experiment’ was dropped, and they were called ‘Local Ecumenical Projects’ (L.E.P.s in the jargon). Eventually in 1995 even the word ‘Project’ was changed because it still sounded too provisional: they became ‘Local Ecumenical Partnerships’, thus conveniently still keeping the L.E.P. name. These L.E.P.s come in all shapes and sizes: fully united congregations sharing the same ministers across the denominations involved; merely sharing a building; a local covenant between churches or chaplaincies; or taking part permanently in some joint on-going venture. In the country as a whole there are a number of examples of Catholics being partners in shared chaplaincies or church-buildings, with a close working relationship with the ministers and laity of the other Churches involved. There are also local covenants with Catholics taking part. On the whole, though, Catholic parishes are not much involved in L.E.P.s. In some cases there are good reasons, such as sheer practicality or some issue of Catholic belief; other reasons are not so good, such as apathy or antipathy towards ecumenism in principle. The End of the B.C.C and the Birth of ‘Churches Together’ In the early 1980s there was a general sense among the Churches that ecumenism in Britain was not getting anywhere. The various national schemes had not worked, the courageous lead of the U.R.C had not been imitated elsewhere, the Black-Majority Churches that were springing up everywhere were not really part of on-going ecumenical life – and above all there was still a problem regarding the Catholic Church. British Catholics were still not members of the British Council of Churches, but only observers. This was not from lack of good will or for want of trying, but our Bishops decided with regret, on two separate occasions since Vatican II, that our membership of the B.C.C would not be consistent with our understanding of what the Catholic Church is. The B.C.C was too independent of the Churches that made it up, and had too much of a separate life of its own. Policies and statements could be adopted that militated against Catholic principles. Something much more answerable to the Churches would have to be devised before the Catholic Church could be a full member. Actually, this feeling about the excessive independence of the B.C.C was shared by several member Churches, including the Church of England, while recognising the excellent work that the B.C.C had done over the years since its inception in 1942. So the feeling was already around that some successor to the B.C.C. should be created, more answerable to the Churches, and involving the Catholic Church and the Black-Majority Churches. The Pope’s visit to Britain in 1982 gave a real boost to ecumenical endeavour and morale, especially his visit to Canterbury, where he prayed with Archbishop Runcie in the cathedral. There was a renewed determination to get British ecumenism going again. As a result of this and the other factors already mentioned, an ‘Inter-Church Process’ was started in the early 1980s with the title Not Strangers but Pilgrims, in England, Scotland and Wales. There were several years of consultation and discussion, right down to local parish level, tackling the question, What on Earth is the Church For? This was followed by separate conferences in the three nations, culminating in a combined British conference at Swanwick, Derbyshire, in 1987. The result of all this was that a new phase of ecumenical life began in these islands. On September 1st 1990 the B.C.C. formally came to an end, and new ecumenical structures began to function. For all the islands together there was formed The Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland (later changed to Churches Together in Britain and Ireland)8 while for each nation separately there were Churches Together in England (C.T.E) – Action for Churches Together in Scotland (A.C.T.S.) – and Churches Together in Wales, known as CYTUN (the Welsh for ‘Together’). The Principle behind ‘Churches Together’: Commitment These four new bodies are called in ecu-speak ‘Ecumenical Instruments’ because unlike the B.C.C. they are meant to be simply instruments for the Churches, enabling the Churches themselves to live ecumenically and to make ecumenical decisions and statements. This marks a new approach and a new understanding of how to run ecumenical affairs. With the B.C.C. and indeed with most local Councils of Churches across the country, ecumenism tended too often to be something the Council got on with as its speciality, leaving the Churches to get on with their own distinct lives. It was a stage of ecumenism when you were far more friendly than you used to be, but it did not cost very much. It was ‘Cooperation’ rather than ‘Commitment’. The new Instruments were meant to be a symbol of the Churches’ actual Commitment. The new Instruments were not there to get on with ‘doing ecumenical things’ on behalf of the Churches, but to enable the Churches themselves to ‘do things ecumenically’. This new principle was in fact spelt out over thirty years earlier at a Faith and Order meeting of the W.C.C. at Lund in Sweden, in 1952. It is called ‘The Lund Principle’, and it encourages all Churches to act together in all matters, except where deep differences of conviction compel them to act separately. In other words, we do not only share special ecumenical events (Good Friday walks, collections for the Third World etc) but we share our ordinary Church life right across the board, except where genuine matters of principle compel us to remain separate. That was the principle behind the new Instruments, the ‘Churches Together principle’ as distinct from the ‘Council of Churches principle’. The Catholic Church could, and did, join this kind of ‘Instrument’ – not surprisingly, because the Church was involved from the beginning in the discussions that led to it. Nevertheless all could have come to nothing, even at the last hurdle. Matters reached an impasse half way through the final 1987 Swanwick Conference, and morale was at its lowest. Then Cardinal Hume got together over lunch with his fellow Catholic Bishops from Britain and Ireland, and was able in the afternoon to make an intervention on behalf of the whole Catholic Church in these islands. What he said was quite electrifying, and the whole speech states very clearly the spirit of ‘Churches Together’. This is an excerpt from his speech:
After this the Swanwick conference was able to agree on a Declaration, which was read in all the Christian churches on the following Sunday in September 1987. That was the moment when the Instruments were decided in principle, though it took three more years to work out the precise details. Below the national level, in England at least, there are not only the local Churches Together groups as well as some remaining Councils of Churches and the many L.E.P.s, but also structures at the intermediate (county or large city) level. The typical membership of these is of bishops, and church leaders in similar positions, meeting together regularly to pray, discuss, and where appropriate act together. Called to be One Since then, one initiative in particular should be mentioned. In the mid-90s the English ‘Called to be One’ process was launched. All the members of C.T.E. were invited to formulate and discuss with each other their distinct understanding of the Church and its visible unity. The result of these first discussions was published in 1996, in a very informative booklet with the title Called to be One. For anyone who wants to learn more about the recent history of ecumenism in our country, and about the fundamental ecumenical attitudes of all the denominations comprising C.T.E, this would be an excellent resource now that it is once more available (2002). There now follows a quotation from this booklet Called to be One, because it summarises very usefully the Catholic understanding of the doctrine and the practice of ecumenism. It is from the Catholic submission on how the Catholic Church understands Unity and the ecumenical venture.
Conclusion: Reflection on the recent English experience How has ecumenism thrived in our country, since that ‘shot in the arm’ in 1987-90? The story of the ecumenical movement has so often been one of ‘highs’ followed by ‘lows’. The excitement of the 1960s, the time of Vatican II and the Catholic Church’s first entry into serious ecumenism, has never been quite equalled, perhaps inevitably so; but since then there have been lesser peaks, 1987-90 being one of them. Since then I think it fair to say that many feel a sense of anti-climax. We have already mentioned that between the Catholic and Anglican communions there has been a certain official distancing, and the cautious and sometimes loud hostile voices of conservatism have been making themselves heard, expressing the conviction that ecumenism can slip too easily into betrayal of principle and a loss of identity. Many would also say that they detect a greater apathy regarding ecumenical matters among many Christians. This may be partly because the novelty of Catholic involvement has long since worn off and nothing very remarkable seems to have happened, and partly due to the feeling that now that we are friendly we do not need to go any further. In a consumer-age, where choice is everything, what is wrong with having many traditions to choose from? That is not the whole story, thankfully. There has been the Canada meeting of Catholic and Anglican leaders referred to earlier and the work that is beginning to flow from it. In addition, the Vatican’s Council for Promoting Christian Unity, through its President Cardinal Kasper, has in July 2002 published a progress report on replies that have come in from other Churches in response to the Pope’s request in Ut Unum Sint and Kasper’s first reflections on those responses. These reflections of Kasper’s show how seriously the Vatican is taking the responses, and how the Anglican response in particular is having an effect on its thinking, at least in the Unity Council. All these are signs of hope. Indeed, the growth in friendly relations over the last fifty years, and the development of ecumenical life that is now taken for granted, is a precious gift of God. But it is human to want ‘quick fixes’, and to fall into apathy if we do not get them. Emphatically, true Christian Unity will not come by a ‘quick fix’, but by patient and unrelenting prayer and effort. Hence there is the need of a genuine commitment to the search for unity, and a deep spiritual conversion, metanoia, a change of heart and of mind-set, on the part of the mass of believing Christian people. The Pope spoke of this repeatedly in Ut Unum Sint, and this is what Cardinal Hume was referring to when he spoke of the need for Catholics to move from ‘cooperation to commitment’. But this, like all conversion, is beyond our powers to bring about, and can only be by the graciousness of God. It is because of the abiding graciousness of God that we must never lose hope. That would indeed be betrayal. God is always greater, and his gifts can always surprise us. On that note perhaps the most fitting conclusion to this short sketch is from the Joint Statement of the Anglican and Catholic Bishops at the end of their meeting in Canada in May 2000:
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Notes
1. A shorter, more user-friendly version of the Directory, entitled
The Search for Christian Unity, has been published by the Bishops’
Conference of England and Wales in 2002.
2. In England the Presbyterians and the Congregationalists and
later the Churches of Christ, came together in the 1970s to form
the ‘United Reformed Church’ (See below pp. 19-20.)
3. See Popular Version, The Search for Christian
Unity pp.10-14.
4. A very useful book in this regard is Avery Dulles’ short but
influential classic Models of the Church, 1976.
5. Unitatis Redintegratio 3.
6. In more recent years the Methodist Church of Great Britain and
the Church of England have once again made serious, but much more
cautious efforts to reunite, and in January 2002 a proposed Anglican-Methodist
Covenant was published, the fruit of some four or five years of
formal Conversations. This was not a full scheme of union, but
a suggested step on the way. This proposed Covenant was debated
in the summer of 2002 by the General Synod of the Church of England
and by the Methodist Conference. It was formally accepted at Westminster
Central Hall, London, in November 2003 and can be seen as an important
first step towards reunion.
7. The Scottish Congregationalists have now also united with the
U.R.C.
8. The Catholic Church in Ireland
is an Associate member.
9. Called to be One, p.18, from paras. 3.7 & 3.8.
This booklet is based on talks the author has given as part of
the education programme for the Catholic Certificate in Religious
Studies. This text is taken from the 6th edition, 2003
About the author
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