7
December 1965 A.D. East
and Western Churches Move Towards Reconciliation
No
author. “East and West Churches Reconcile.”
Christianity.com. Jun 2007.
http://www.christianity.com/church/church-history/timeline/1901-2000/east-and-west-churches-reconcile-11630822.html. Accessed 14 Jun 2014.
"We embraced each other once, then again and
again. We were like brothers meeting after a long separation." That is how
Patriarch Athenagoras of Constantinople described hugging Pope Paul VI in
Jerusalem in January, 1964. It was a historic moment. Nine hundred and ten
years earlier, the leaders of the eastern and western churches had
excommunicated each other. Now the Orthodox and Roman Catholic branches of Christianity had taken a big step toward
reconciliation.
Athenagoras I, born in Greece, became a theologian
and philosopher. He rose through the ranks of the Orthodox church, and drafted
its policy approving ecumenism (Christian denominations drawing together).
While working to keep Orthodoxy from falling under the power of the Russian
Orthodox church, which was manipulated by the Soviet Communists, he sought to
break down barriers between the Orthodox church and the Roman and Protestant
communions.
Italian-born Paul VI was also active in the
ecumenical movement. A key player in the Vatican II Council, he became pope
after the death of John XXIII.
On this day, December 7, 1965, an event of
international importance occurred. At the same time in St. Peter's Basilica,
Rome and in Patriarch Athenagoras' church in Constantinople, spokesmen read the
same prepared statement.
The text expressed gratitude that God had favored
them with a chance to meet in Jerusalem--the site of their hug the year
before--and the place where the Christian faith originated. Since that moment,
they said, they had both wanted to improve brotherly relations between the
churches, "to overcome their differences in order to be again 'one' as the
Lord Jesus asked of His Father.."
Realistically, the statement acknowledged that
there were serious obstacles to reunion. "Among the obstacles along the
road of the development of these fraternal relations of confidence and esteem,
there is the memory of the decisions, actions and painful incidents which in
1054 resulted in the sentence of excommunication leveled against the Patriarch
Michael Cerularius and two other persons by the legate (agent) of the Roman See
under the leadership of Cardinal Humbertus, legates who then became the object
of a similar sentence pronounced by the patriarch and the Synod of
Constantinople.
"One cannot pretend that these events were not
what they were during this very troubled period of history. Today, however,
they have been judged more fairly and serenely. Thus it is important to
recognize the excesses which accompanied them and later led to consequences
which, insofar as we can judge, went much further than their authors had
intended and foreseen.."
They expressed regret for the offensive words
spoken over nine hundred years earlier and the excommunications that followed.
Although mere words could not erase the differences that divided their
denominations, They hoped "that this act will be pleasing to God, who is
prompt to pardon us when we pardon each other." Those differences included
disagreement over the dogma of Purgatory, the pope's claim to be Christ's Vicar
on earth and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. But, as Pope John Paul II would
later say, "the things uniting us are far more fundamental than those
disuniting us."
Bibliography:
1. "Athenagoras
(1948-1972)." The Kiss of Judas. http://
www.russianorthodoxautonomouschurchinamerica.com/
kissofjudas/Athenagoras-latest.htm [showing how bitterly some viewed the
"betrayal"]
2. Cross, F. L. and Livingstone, E.
A. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford, 1997.
3. Gudzyk, Klara. "Champion of
Reconciliation." The Day.
http://www.day.kiev.ua/DIGEST/2002/13/culture/cul9.htm.
4. "Removed from Memory,
Committed to Oblivion!" [The Joint Catholic Orthodox Declaration.]
http://www.melkite.com/mle.html
Last updated June, 2007
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