GREETING at the International Conference
“Eastern Catholics’ Ecumenical Vision in Dialogue
with the Orthodox”
Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 15 November 2023
Your Beatitude,
Eminences and Excellencies,
Distinguished speakers and students,
Dear sisters and brothers,
I would like to warmly welcome you to the International Conference “Eastern Catholics’ Ecumenical Vision in Dialogue with the Orthodox” and thank you for participating in this initiative. From an ecumenical perspective, this Conference is an important sign of hope and trust in today's world, which is stigmatized by terrible wars, and in the ecumenical situation, which is painfully affected by these wars. It is also a hopeful sign because the Orthodox Churches, among all Christian Churches and Communities, are the closest to the Catholic Church. Both have preserved and continue to live the fundamental Eucharistic and episcopal structure of the en urgent need to be able to overcome the mutual estrangement that has developed in the Church between East and West and to be able to restore Eucharistic communion.
The Catholic Churches of the East have a special responsibility in this ecumenical process of reconciliation. The Second Vatican Council expected the Eastern Churches living in communion with the Bishop of Rome to work for the restoration of the unity of Christians, especially with the Eastern Orthodox and Orthodox Churches, as stated in the conciliar decree on the Eastern Catholic Churches “Orientalium Ecclesiarum”: “The Eastern Churches in communion with the Apostolic See of Rome have a special duty of promoting the unity of all Christians, especially Eastern Christians, in accordance with the principles of the decree, ‘About Ecumenism’, of this Sacred Council.”[1]
St. Pope John Paul II, in particular, gave additional weight to this ecumenically important concern with his Apostolic Exhortation “Orientale Lumen”, and previously with the promulgation of a specific Code of Canon Law for the Eastern Catholic Churches, with which he expressed a special appreciation for these Churches and established an explicit ecclesiological legal obligation for the participation of the Catholic Church in the ecumenical movement. And in his Apostolic Exhortation “Pastores Gregis” the Pope again recalled the specific ecumenical responsibility of the Eastern Catholic Churches: “There can be no doubt that the Catholic Churches of the East, due to their spiritual, historical, theological, liturgical and disciplinary closeness to the Orthodox Churches and the other Eastern Churches not yet fully in communion with the Catholic Church, are especially entitled to contribute to the promotion of Christian unity, especially in the East.”[2]
To give a concrete example, this concern has been taken to heart above all by the Greek Catholic Church in Ukraine, which is fulfilling its special ecumenical responsibility and has developed its own fundamental program in this regard. I am therefore pleased and grateful that the Institute of Ecumenical Studies of the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv, together with the Pontificio Istituto Orientale, is co-sponsoring today's International Conference.
The 5th and 6th of January 2024 will mark the 60th anniversary of the encounter between the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras and Pope Paul VI, who met and embraced in Jerusalem. This fraternal kiss was the starting point for the historic act of 7 December 1965, when the representatives of the two Church communities removed the mutual anathemas of 1054 “from the memory and center of the Church,” “so that they may no longer hinder the rapprochement in love”[3]. On one of the anniversaries of this event, Patriarch Athenagoras expressed this goal in the following emphatic words: “The hour of Christian courage has come. We love each other; we profess the same common faith; let us walk together towards the glory of the common holy Altar to fulfill the will of the Lord, so that the Church may shine, so that the world may believe and the peace of God may come to all.”[4]
The Orthodox-Catholic dialogue must always keep this prophetic vision in mind. I hope and pray that the International Conference which begins today can be another important step towards this goal. With this hope, I wish the Conference every success and all participants a rich insight into the truth and beauty of our common faith. May the Bishop and Martyr Jehoshaphat and the Bishop and Doctor of the Church Albert the Great accompany you all through their intercession.
[1] Orientalium ecclesiarum, n. 24.
[2] John Paul II, Pastores gregis, N. 60.
[3] Déclaration commune du pape Paul VI et du patriarche Athenagoras esprimant leur décision d´enlever de la mémoire et du milieu de l´Eglise les sentences d´excommunication de l´année 1054, dans: Tomos Agapis. Vatican-Phanar (1958-1970) (Rome – Istanbul 1971), N. 127.
[4] Télégramme du patriarche Athénagoras au pape Paul VI, à l’occasion de l’anniversaire de la levée des anathèmes le 7 décembre 1969, dans : Tomos Agapis. Vatican-Phanar (1958-1970) (Rome – Istanbul 1971) Nr. 277.