COMMUNION IN GROWTH[1]
Kurt Cardinal Koch
Dear Bishops Tapio Luoma, Simo Peura and Teemu Sippo,
Dear Director Professor James Puglisi,
Dear members of the Lutheran-Catholic Dialogue Commission for Finland,
Dear members of the ecumenical delegation to Rome on the occasion of the feast day of St. Henrik, Patron of Finland,
Dear professors and students from the Ecumenical Institute of the World Council of Churches in Bossey,
Dear ladies and gentlemen,
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you all today on the occasion of the presentation of the new dialogue report between Lutheran and Catholic Christians in Finland entitled: Communion in Growth. Declaration on the Church, Eucharist and Ministry. I am pleased to congratulate you on the recent publication of this new important document of ecumenical consensus. I would like to extend a special word of thanks to the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Finland and to the Catholic Diocese of Helsinki, namely the two Co-Presidents of the Commission, Bishop Simo Peura and Bishop Teemu Sippo, together with the secretary of the Commission, Rev. Dr Tomi Karttunen and General vicar Mons. Raimo Goyarrola, without whose special commitment the drafting of this consensus document would not have been possible.
Our own Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity has also enjoyed a long and fruitful collaboration with the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Church. Already some years ago, a Lutheran-Catholic Dialogue Commission of Finland and Sweden presented to Pope Benedict XVI its final report which builds upon the substantial accomplishment of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification. In the specific context of the Nordic countries, the Commission studied the possibilities of reception of the achievements and implications of the Joint Declaration. Under the theme Justification in the Life of the Church, the dialogue reflected on important questions, such as our understanding that the Church is not just a congregation of believers or an institution with different functions, but the sign and instrument of the salvation brought about in Jesus Christ. The Church is the Body of Christ in many parts, being continuously guided by the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son. Saint Paul reminds us of the marvellous grace we have received in becoming members of Christ’s body through baptism (cf. 1 Cor 12:12-31). It is only based on this reality of incarnation within its Trinitarian framework that the sacramental character of the Church as communion in Christ can be understood. Having been able to formulate such an ecclesiological consensus was an important step on the way towards full, visible unity between Catholics and Lutherans.
During the past year, Lutherans and Catholics have been able to commemorate together with their ecumenical partners on a worldwide level the Reformation inaugurated by Martin Luther in Germany 500 years ago. The commemoration year 2017 recalled the time when it had not yet come to a breach between the Catholic Church and the Reformer, the unity of the Church had not yet been broken and Martin Luther was still living within the communion of the Catholic Church. This also meant that the begin of the Reformation in the year 1517 could not have been commemorated other than in ecumenical fellowship. In looking back historically not only to the 500 years since the beginning of the Reformation, but also to the past 50 years of ecumenical dialogue between Catholics and Lutherans, it also has become obvious that the Reformation commemoration today could also no longer be celebrated in the way that it had been in previous Reformation anniversaries. The Catholic Church has been grateful for this ecumenical sensitivity and was pleased to accept the invitation to a common Reformation commemoration. Pope Francis stressed that Lutherans and Catholics had for the first time the possibility to share one ecumenical commemoration throughout the world, at the heart of which is common prayer and the intimate request for forgiveness of mutual faults addressed to the Lord Jesus Christ, together with the joy of undertaking a shared ecumenical journey. In Lund, the place of foundation of the Lutheran World Federation, Pope Francis together with the President of the Lutheran World Federation, Bishop Munib Younan, General Secretary Martin Junge, and all of their ecumenical partners shared at the threshold of the joint commemoration year on the 31st October 2016 a great moment of joint worship and witness of faith to today’s world. During the ecumenical liturgy at Lund Cathedral, repentance in view of the historical suffering, and joy over what has been achieved so far towards ecumenical communion between Lutherans and Catholics, were followed by the hope that a common Reformation commemoration will grant us the possibility to take further steps towards the unity we hope and long for, and not let us rest content with what has been achieved so far.
Forming the theological background of the Lund commemoration, the ecumenical document From Conflict to Communion had already made an important contribution because it makes statements in ecumenical collaboration on central aspects of Martin Luther’s theology, principally on the disputed controversial theological issues of the doctrine of justification, the relationship between Scripture and tradition, the Eucharist, and ecclesial ministry. The particular value of this document consists in the fact that it collects and gathers what past ecumenical dialogues have demonstrated to be commonalities in our understanding of the faith.
A first decisive step has been the particular significance of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, which was agreed between the Lutheran World Federation and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity on 31 October 1999 in Augsburg, and which Saint Pope John Paul II acclaimed as representing a milestone in the ecumenical encounter between Lutheranism and the Catholic Church. With that declaration a wide-ranging consensus was reached on a central question which had in the 16th century led to the Reformation: nevertheless, unity was not achieved thereby. As the formula “consensus in fundamental truths of the doctrine of justification” used in the Joint Declaration expresses, no full consensus has yet been reached on the doctrine of justification itself, much less on the consequences of this doctrine for the understanding of the Church and the question of ministry above all. Here the starting point from which ecumenical dialogue can and must proceed becomes evident. Following the accord which has become possible between Lutherans and Catholics on fundamental issues of the doctrine of justification, the ecclesiological implications of this consensus must be placed on the agenda of ecumenical conversations. They will form a further important step on the path towards ecumenical agreement between Lutherans and Catholics, which could ultimately issue in the drafting of a future Joint Declaration, analogous to the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, on Church, Eucharist and Ministry. With such a declaration there is no doubt that a decisive step would be taken towards visible church communion, which is the goal of our ecumenical efforts. To raise awareness of this goal anew must be an essential task of the follow–up process after the Reformation commemoration.
We need to orientate ourselves anew on the foundational ecclesiological structure that developed from the second century onwards and that the Catholic Church shares with all Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches, namely the sacramental-Eucharistic and episcopal basic structure of the Church.[2] According to this Early Church understanding the Church exists there where the episcopal ministry in the sacramental succession of the Apostles and the Eucharist as a sacrament presided over by the bishop and the priest are found. From the orientation to this foundation of ecclesial life depends how the ecumenical dialogue of the Catholic Church with the ecclesial communities deriving from the Reformation is to continue. That leads in turn to the even more fundamental ecumenical question of the relationship between Reformation and tradition, or more precisely, the question of how the Reformation relates to the entire tradition of the Church, of which 1500 years are shared by Catholics and Lutherans alike.
In this sense, I am again very grateful, especially in the name of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, for the precious work that has been undertaken by the Lutheran-Catholic Dialogue Commission for Finland and that has been presented to us today. It may be a fruitful further step towards our common aim of full, visible unity in our Lord Jesus Christ.
We should always intensify our efforts to understand more deeply what we have in common and what divides us, as well as the gifts we have to offer each other. It is my hope and prayer that our journey together in the work for Christian unity in Finland and on the worldwide level will continue. May God bless you in all your ecumenical commitment.
[1] Ansprache bei der Vorstellung des Dokumentes „Communion in Growth. Declaration on the Church, Eucharist and Ministry“ im Centro Pro Unione am 23. Januar 2018.
[2] Vgl. K. Koch, Die apostolische Dimension der Kirche im ökumenischen Gespräch, in: Communio. Internationale katholische Zeitschrift 40 (2011) 234-252.