Christian Unity

The Solemnity of Ss. Peter and Paul has occasioned exchange of delegations to and from the sister sees of Rome and Constantinople. The pandemic precluded that this year, yet Francis still feels “close.” Gerard O’Connell reported on the blessing of pallia and the mass.

#PopeFrancis expresses his spiritual closeness with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, as the Covid-19 pandemic keeps his delegation from making a traditional visit to Rome. #coronavirus https://t.co/0AjzqRJwpH

— Vatican News (@VaticanNews) June 29, 2020

Civility Is Part of Spiritual Maturity

Francis has mentioned this previously.

"What would happen if we prayed more and complained less? Giving our tongues a rest."https://t.co/aj3BZPSBBP

— Catholic News Service (@CatholicNewsSvc) June 29, 2020

Ecumenism: Renewed Call

Twenty-five years ago Pope St. John Paul II noted in an encyclical letter that “the Catholic Church committed herself irrevocably to following the path of the ecumenical venture.” Pope Francis remembered that in a letter written Sunday. “Unity comes about in journeying; the Holy Spirit does this on the journey,” Francis wrote. 

#PopeFrancis sends a letter to mark the 25th anniversary of Saint #JohnPaulII’s encyclical “Ut unum sint”, and calls for a renewed commitment to ecumenism.https://t.co/L7z7Lxzi0r

— Vatican News (@VaticanNews) May 25, 2020

Prayer, Blessing, Encouragement, Call

The days of Christmas and Easter have been the occasions for popes to bless the city of Rome and the world (Latin: urbi et orbi). Yesterday Pope Francis blessed the world from Rome. It followed three-quarters of an hour of prayer. Francis’ reflection on the occasion spoke to our current fear and noted an invitation resides in the pandemic: “to reawaken and [enact] solidarity and hope.”   

[The previous link includes the YouTube video of the event.]

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Wiki-image Basilica of St. Peter by “Siyatalebi  | CC BY-SA 3.0"

Talk, Tenderness, Trip

Pope Francis is the first pope to have offered a TED talk. The talk is a first, but its focus was all Francis: he “called for more tenderness in the world.”

His visit tomorrow to Egypt is his tender care for the Christians living there and experiencing persecution. The Copts experienced it as Holy Week began.

Eager To “Go, Walk Together!”

The phrase quoted above closed an interview Pope Francis had before his trip to Lund and Malmlö, Sweden, yesterday and today. Jesuit Frs. Ulf Jonsson, director of Signum, and Antonio Spadaro, editor of La Civiltà Cattolica, enjoyed a warm conversation with Francis “On the Occasion of His Apostolic Trip in Sweden.” La Civiltà Cattolica has provided this English working translation.

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Wiki-image by Sven Rosborn of textile art CC BY-SA 3.0

Fast Approaching

Next week in Lund, Sweden, Pope Francis will be present at a “joint Catholic-Lutheran commemoration of the five-hundredth anniversary of the Reformation.” The occasion is the opportunity for which both churches have longed. English bishop William Kenney summarized it: “the Reformation was a great misunderstanding, we all got it wrong, on both sides, and we’ve lifted excommunications and condemnations and apologized.” The event will help more Catholics and Lutherans know it.

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Wiki-image of pillars in Lund crypt CC BY-SA 4.0

Conversion and Healing

January 25 is the Feast of the Conversion of the Apostle Paul. In a repost for the occasion Jesuit “Marcel Uwineza…looks closely at how Paul and Luke portray the change affected in Paul on the Damascus Road.” The feast also closes the annual Prayer for Christian Unity. In Rome Pope Francis will preside at an ecumenical Evening Prayer to close the week. It “has been exploring the theme, taken from St Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, ‘Has Christ been divided?’” At Vatican Radio “Philippa Hitchen spoke with Rev Mary Styles, an assistant curate at All Saints Anglican parish to find out more about the ministry of healing people and communities.”

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Wiki-mage by Alexander P Kapp of St. Martin’s Chapel CC BY-SA 2.0

Annual Visit

The Solemnity of the Apostles Peter and Paul is the occasion for the Patriarch of Constantinople to visit or send a delegation to visit the Bishop of Rome. The former leads the See of St. Andrew, “the first one to be called” and the latter the See of St. Peter, “the first one among the Apostles.”

Patriarch Bartholomew visited Rome earlier this year to attend the installation of Pope Francis. That may have been the first time a Patriarch of Constantinople attended that event since 1054, when the churches of East and West separated.

Until that time unity persisted despite differences between East and West. The restoration of unity is the goal of the annual meeting on the Solemnity of the Apostles Peter and Paul. They were united and very different. Unity is possible.

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Wiki-image of icon of Ss. Peter and Paul public domain in the U.S.

Jesuit Superior’s Statement on Papal Election

On the election of Pope Francis on 13 March 2013 Fr. Adolfo Nicolas, General Superior of the Society of Jesus, issued this statement. Bartholomew, Archbishop of Constantinople-New Rome and Ecumenical Patriarch [Orthodox], congratulated the new Bishop of Rome.

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Wiki-image by Gagorski of coat of arms of Pope Francis when Cardinal used by CC BY-SA 3.0.

Preferred

People prefer seeing true Christians over hearing about Christianity. Many notice when they see those who embody their beliefs and enact them. Dr. Paul Farmer noticed in his early days in medical school.

He spoke last month at the Divinity School, Yale University, about the corporal works of mercy. He knows them well. Jamie L. Manson wrote about Dr. Farmer’s visit in the NCR. It was an ecumenical event requiring two overflow-rooms to accommodate those who came. The YouTube video of his lecture is embedded below.

Return to Roots

Pope Gregory the Great sent monks to the land of the Angles. The monk, Augustine, led the mission and became the first Archbishop of Canterbury.

Over the weekend the current archbishop returned to Rome and visited the pope. He gave an address Sunday in Rome at the church of San Gregorio al Celio.  

“One of the hardest yet most important lessons the different Christian communities today must learn is that they cannot live without each other: no single one of them in isolation possesses the entirety of the Gospel” of Christ. That was how the Anglican leader Dr. Rowan Williams introduced his reflection on how the witness of monastic life can offer a key to overcoming the divisions between Christians today.

Read more, as well as his address and listen to him interviewed at the Vatican Radio site.

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Wiki-image considered to be St. Augustine of Canterbury is in the public domain.

Nothing New

From the beginning unity among Christians has eluded many. Jesuit Father Nicholas King, University of Oxford tutor in Biblical Studies, put it, “[D]iversity is difficult.”

Using the letter St. Paul wrote to the fractious community in Corinth, Father King lists, in contemporary English, the getting-it-right solutions the Apostle offered: 

‘get Jesus’ cross right’...‘get their apostles right’...‘getting your head right’...‘getting the Lord’s Supper right’...‘getting the body right’...‘getting your heart right.’

Father King distilled this article from his a lecture at the close of the Week of Christian Unity. He considered the problem of Christian disunity and St. Paul’s attempt to solve it. The video of his 60-minute lecture is below.

Christian Unity Week Closes

Pope Benedict: 

While experiencing these days the painful situation of our divisions, we Christians can and must look to the future with hope, because Christ’s victory means to overcome everything that keeps us from sharing the fullness of life with Him and with others.

The pope spoke during Evening Prayer at the close of the Week of Christian Unity.

St. Paul sensed a personal share in that “fullness of life.” 

Dominican Father Jerome Murphy O’Connor is one of the world’s most renowned scholars on St. Paul...spoke to Susy Hodges about why St. Paul is such an important figure when it comes to the issue of Christian unity and also examines the apostle's character, his achievements and his legacy.

Link to their conversation.