Toward the end of this week, the Church begins its annual observance of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. As always, it provides an opportunity to evaluate the current state of ecumenical relationships among the various churches and ecclesial communities, with particular reference to those relationships in which the Catholic Church is a major dialogue partner.
Two of the most historically significant of those relationships are with the Anglican Communion and the Orthodox Churches. Within the space of a week in late November, there were official meetings in the Vatican between Pope Benedict XVI and Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, and almost immediately thereafter in Istanbul (formerly Constantinople), Turkey, between the pope and the ecumenical patriarch, Bartholomew I.
Unfortunately, the first set of meetings tended to be overshadowed by the second because of the worldwide concern about the state of Catholic-Muslim relations, fractured to a great extent by Pope Benedict's September lecture at Regensburg University. Originally, the trip to Turkey was to have focused entirely on the centuries-old rift between Catholicism and Orthodoxy, but the Regensburg talk altered those priorities.
The pope and the archbishop of Canterbury met in the Vatican on Nov. 23, marking the 40th anniversary of the meeting between Pope Paul VI and the then-archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey.
Pope Benedict pointed out that there is "much in our relations over the past 40 years for which we must give thanks," citing the theological dialogues and the growing friendship in many places between Catholics and Anglicans. The pope also singled out our "shared witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ" and the visits of various archbishops of Canterbury to the Holy See.
At the same time, the pope was frank to acknowledge the recent developments within the Anglican Communion regarding the ordination to the episcopacy of a partnered gay priest and the stresses this action has imposed on the unity of that Communion and on its relationship with the Catholic Church.
Following their private meeting, the pope and the archbishop signed a Common Declaration in the presence of members of the Anglican delegation and Catholic representatives led by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, archbishop of Westminster.
The statement celebrated the mutual enrichment of our spiritual lives and the undeniable good that has come from these four decades of dialogue. Both sides committed themselves to continuing that dialogue in spite of challenges and obstacles created by the controversial ordination of Canon Gene Robinson in New Hampshire in March of 2004. There are, the statement concludes, "many areas of witness and service in which we can stand together...."
In a subsequent interview with the editor of the London Tablet (Dec. 9, 2005), one of the world's leading religious journals, Archbishop Williams noted the ambivalence many Anglicans, including himself, have felt toward the Church of Rome.
On the one hand, it surely is the "Mother Church" that sent Augustine and other monks to re-Christianize Briton at the end of the sixth century. But the Church of Renaissance Rome and the Counter-Reformation are different entities entirely.
Not unexpectedly, there was no combined eucharistic liturgy during the visit, but Archbishop Williams was invited to celebrate the Eucharist at the papal altar of the Dominican church of Santa Sabina. He remains guardedly optimistic, therefore, about future relations, but realistic at the same time.
The next major ecumenical development at year's end was the pope's visit to Turkey. While attention was focused mainly on his largely successful attempt to reduce the tensions between himself and the Muslim community, significant progress was also achieved in Catholic-Orthodox relations. The latter, after all, have not been the easiest to get along with, notwithstanding the fact that problems have been created by both sides over the centuries.
The pope and the patriarch participated in a prayer service on Nov. 29 in the patriarchal church of St. George in Istanbul, and the next day in the Divine Liturgy itself, but without eucharistic sharing.
The pope declared that there is a "special relationship uniting the Churches of Rome and Constantinople as sister Churches," and he renewed the Catholic Church's commitment to do "everything possible to overcome the obstacles" to the achievement of full communion.
At the conclusion of the Divine Liturgy, the pope and the ecumenical patriarch imparted the final blessing together. Later that day, the two signed a Joint Declaration that repeated their common hopes for full unity.
These two recent meetings --- between Canterbury and Rome, and Constantinople and Rome --- may be only straws in the wind. But they are at least blowing in the right direction.
That is something hopeful to reflect on as we begin another Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. By Father Richard P. McBrien is the Crowley-O'Brien Professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame.
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