How badly do you beleive the current pope has set back relations between Protestant, Orthodox, and Catholic?

Question

LORENZAGO DI CADORE, Italy - Pope Benedict XVI has reasserted the universal primacy of the Roman Catholic Church, approving a document released Tuesday that says Orthodox churches were defective and that other Christian denominations were not true churches.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070710/ap_on_re_eu/pope_other_christians

Answer 1

Not to mention he just approved an old mass that prays for the Jews to give up their afflicted minds--basically giving the Church the okay to go out converting Jews again. This Pope is sadly undoing all the good that John Paul II (may he rest in peace) did.

Answer 2

*Is Catholic*

Pope Benedict XVI is actually moving ecumenism forward. Perhaps it is hard to believe for you but it is true.

Vatican II talked a lot about ecumenism. The first and primary rule that was laid down, the rule that everyone ignores, is that in ecumenism Catholics are called to constantly turn to Christ and live out Catholicism in even greater fidelity. They are to go out and meet other communities in the vibrant and full expression of living the Catholic Faith. Only then, when Catholics are truly being Catholic can ecumenism start.

In the last 40-50 or so years there has been a lot of false ecumenism, a sort of Barneyism a "I love you you love me" candy coated experience that never really gets to the heart of the issues involved.

From the reactions that I have heard, the Orthodox appreciate what has been said because one of the modern gripes of the Orthodox with the Catholic Church has been all this false ecumenism that certain Catholics have done with Protestants. Of course Protestants are not happy but that is just because they nether understand Catholicism nor their own Protestantism.

Look folks, if you reject Bishops, if you reject the Eucharist you cannot be a Church. If you would like to have a Bishop, if you would like to have the Eucharist, then lets talk. But it really is a bit much to say that you want to be Church when you cannot stand what the Church is.

Answer 3

This is not anything new. This has always been Catholic position. Protestant ecclesial communities are not churches in ancient sense of the meaning. They are groups of Christian who worship together. Tied into the very earliest Christian writings outside the scriptures are core concepts of what it means to be a church. Some protestant communities have similar forms, but lack the substance of these early writings. The idea that Orthodox Churches are "defective," is a unbelievably poor choice of wording.

There are far better ways to phrase that idea and they chose none of them.

It is painful to be a Protestant and be told that what you experience is not "church," and likely insulting. Technically, it is true though. But that idea is incomplete too. The Pope's phrasing could be mistaken to imply that where two or three are gathered in Jesus' name, he is not. The pope is NOT trying to convey that idea. It is important to remember that his audience for this is internal. He isn't being politically correct and is not concerned about sparing feelings.

Protestants broke with the apostolic succession. It is clear from the writings of those who were trained by the apostles that this is strictly unacceptable. In fact, 1 Clement, which was long considered a part of the bible, clearly condemns what could be the first Protestant ministry in Corinth.

In Corinth, they held an election for a new leadership and deposed the leadership installed by the apostles. Clement points out that Christians do not have the right to select their leaders. Jesus called the Twelve, they in turn called their successors. Clement was writing while some of the apostles were alive and was the third Pope of Rome. People cannot choose to lead a church, they are called by Jesus' designated leadership and their successors to lead.

Protestant Churches by explicitly and deliberately breaking the apostolic succession have broken their wholeness as a Church. Rather they are bodies of like minded individuals who pray to God. Rather like Israel being the promised society, but Judah refusing to reunite. This does not forgive Catholic foolishness either nor does it place the blame upon Protestants. It rather states that they must first return to the ancient practices to be considered churches rather than doing what they like.

It is somewhat disingenuous to call the Orthodox defective. It is correct to call Orthodox churches as structurally defective in the same sense it is proper to call Catholic Churches as unneighborly and unbrotherly by making reunion uninviting. A full document would also look at the defects of the Catholic Church in a lack of cheek turning itself.

No early Christian Church would have considered the Protestant communities churches. The pope is clearly correct in this. They broke very strongly with the ideas left by the apostles, not out of malice but out of an ability to know what to do. The Church's leadership failed them in profound and fundamental ways. The leadership failure was probably necessary however. Reform could not have happened until sin went so far as to shake the house down.

It is unpleasant to be told you are defective, but the communication is technically accurate. What it fails to do is point out what Catholics should be doing in their penitential journey toward Life and toward being open and brotherly.

Answer 4

None. All the dialogues will continue without interruption. All Benedict did was restate Catholic theology which the Orthodox know is in error and the Protestants could care less.

Answer 5

And further down in the article was this, which explains:

"Christ 'established here on earth' only one church," the document said. The other communities "cannot be called 'churches' in the proper sense" because they do not have apostolic succession — the ability to trace their bishops back to Christ's original apostles.

It is not a new doctrine, nor a new document.

Further:

"Despite the harsh tone of the document, it stresses that Benedict remains committed to ecumenical dialogue. 'However, if such dialogue is to be truly constructive, it must involve not just the mutual openness of the participants but also fidelity to the identity of the Catholic faith,' the commentary said."

Answer 6

Hard to tell.

Most Christian denominations believe that each of them is the fullest version of the Church of Christ.

While the Catholic Church also believes that she is "the highest exemplar" of the mystery that is the Church of Christ.

But She does not claim that non-Catholic Churches are not truly Christian Churches. The Catholic Church teaches:

Furthermore, many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church: the written Word of God; the life of grace; faith, hope, and charity, with the other interior gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as visible elements.

Christ's Spirit uses these Churches and ecclesial communities as means of salvation, whose power derives from the fullness of grace and truth that Christ has entrusted to the Catholic Church.

All these blessings come from Christ and lead to him.

With love in Christ.

Answer 7

A lot of this is semantics. It is how you define the word "church". This comes from the words of Jesus , "You are Peter and upon this foundation I will build my church." One way to look at this is that you can only call yourself a "church" if you are part of the religious community tied to Peter or his sucessors, the Popes.

Since other religious communities do not see the Pope as the person called by God to lead His people, they are not called "churches", but "religious communities"

I do think that this will lead to a lot of hard feelings. I think the Pope should be more careful in what words he uses.

Answer 8

One can have an ecumenical spirit, without wimping out and being all wishy-washy about the differences in the world's religions. JPII is proof of that.

In addition, this isn't a new teaching. Benedict is only reiterating what has always been. People just don't want to hear it and be reminded of it. The truth hurts.

Answer 9

This has not set back anything. These three Christian groups have always made competing claims to be to only real Christian church. I belong to one of these Christian groups and I feel sad that this is happening. But that's the way it is.

Answer 10

I can't see them coming together anyway in the near future. In Christ we are one though. Through the Holy Spirit, Jesus the Anointed One is present with us and is rightfully true head of the true Church, i.e. all true believers whether catholic, orthodox, protestant or other grouping holding to the faith established by Christ and the apostles. No human is ever going to be perfect as He is, as they have limited life experience, as well as being on the path of sanctification themselves.

Answer 11

You must remember at all times that this Benedict character is the former head of the office formerly known as that of the "INQUISITION". The Vatican may have changed its name, but the attitude and mandate remains THE SAME.Thus this serves to illustrate exactly what kind of attitude can be expected from him, so no surprises there!