The joint declaration.
And before everybody starts flipping out over "Black Bart" trying restore communion with Rome, I suggest a glance at this uncommonly realistic assessment from a Roman Catholic source. Bottom line; it aint happening anytime in the foreseeable future.
Honesty of intentions and expectations is always the best start.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2014/11/the-mutually-exclusive-goals-of-pope.html#more
Patriarch Bartholomew and Pope Francis couldn't make it happen by themselves if they wanted to.
ReplyDeleteThese two bishops are aware that this will take time. This is likely a methodology to forward the agenda by Pat. Athenagoras of Constantinople:
ReplyDeleteWhy do we not automatically return to Mysteriological communion? Because it is necessary for us to prepare our peoples for it, both theologically and psychologically. During the nine hundred years that have elapsed since 1054, we, the two worlds of East and West, have come to think that we belong to different Churches and dif- ferent religions. And, as a result, the purpose of dialogues becomes quite evident. It is to prepare our peoples psychologically to understand that there is one Church and one religion, that we all believe in the same God—the Savior Christ. You and we respect all religions and we esteem the place and the time in which we live” (from a homily given by the Patriarch in the chapel of Lambeth Palace, London, November 13, 1967, cited in “Patriarch Athenagoras of Constantinople [1886-1972]: His Statements, Messages, and Activities,” Orthodox Tradition, Vol. XVIII, No. 1 [2001], p. 10).
I read the link that Stephen posted. Speaking as a Roman Catholic of rather triumphalist bent, I have to say that I was heartened to read Pope Francis say that "Jesus wanted this union of all the faithful with the... Pope in the one Church of the Lord Jesus, that is our Hierarchical Holy Mother Church." He is so often portrayed as some crazy left-winger, but clearly the Pope is Catholic, and he is not going to betray the deposit of faith entrusted to him (because he cannot even if he wanted to).
ReplyDeleteWow! A man ceases to have free-will when he becomes the Pope? Thats like "once saved always saved" teaching. Even St. Peter the Chief-Apostle could deny Christ.
ReplyDeleteI would hardly say that "[a] man ceases to have free-will when he becomes the Pope." That is rather a strained reading of my words. I suppose it is fair to say that the Pope's will is every so slightly less free than his brother bishops, but that is not the same as to say that he has no free will. Obviously he can still choose to sin. He can even choose to go into heresy. The only thing he cannot do is to proclaim that heresy as the formal teaching of the Church. Come to that, however, the fathers of an ecumenical council also cannot proclaim heresy as the formal teaching of the Church. Are you particularly concerned about the Nicene fathers' "lack" of free-will?
ReplyDelete"The only thing he cannot do is to proclaim that heresy as the formal teaching of the Church."
ReplyDeleteHe can't? But popes have certainly done this before...