Archbishop Elias on Double Communion (Part IV)

Note: The following has been edited slightly for grammar and syntax.  The report from the Roman Congregations, to which Archbishop Elias responds here, can be found in Part III of this series.

Archbishop Elias Zoghby, We Are All Schismatics, trans. Philip Khairallah (Newton, MA: Educational Services, 1996), pp. 99-102.

Reflections on the Roman Response

Point I

In the first paragraph, the three Roman Congregations focussed their observations on the question of ecclesial communion as related to the nature of the privileges of the Roman See, their origin, their nature and their dimension.  In other words, the differences in understandings of Roman primacy between the East and the West constitute, according to these three Roman Congregations, the major, almost unique obstacle to the rebuilding of communion between Rome and Orthodoxy.  Such a statement would be inconceivable to the Latin Fathers as well as to the Eastern Fathers during the millenium of union and throughout the Seven Great Ecumenical Councils.  It has never been invoked in the past that these privileges constitute an important point of faith and an obstacle to the ecclesial communion which was the principle object of the prayer of Jesus Christ on the night of His death.  “This is an important point of faith that touches the very nature of the Church herself.”  So stated the three Roman Congregations.  However, the Roman and Orthodox Churches lived in communion during the first millenium and held ecumenical councils together in spite of the difference conceptions they had concerning the struture of the Church and the role of the Bishop of Rome.  Nothing has changed relating to this point in Orthodoxy.  The latter, in its totality, is willing to accept the status quo that existed before the Great Schism as it relates to Roman primacy.  And Vatican II, in spite of texts from Vatican I, has recommended in its decree, Unitatis Redintegratio, that one should place an emphasis on the nature of the relationship that existed between the Eastern Churches and the See of Rome before the separation. [6]

It is this same theme that Pope Paul VI evoked in his message that was read at the commemoration of the seven hundredth anniversay of the Council of Lyons. [7]

Thus we cannot accept that communion between Rome and Orthodox must be conditioned by ecclesial differences that occurred before the Schism and yet did not prevent the Churches from remaining united for a whole millenium.  These differences had never been considered as being an essential part of the deposit of faith.  The unilateral definitions of Vatican I can add nothing to this essential deposit of the common faith that is now being required for ecclesial communion.  Otherwise, we cannot understand why Vatican II and Pope Paul VI have recommended that we go back to the relations that existed between Rome and Orthodox before the Schism.

As to the statements mentioned in the second paragraph, according to which documents from Vatican II permit a certain communicatio in sacris under well-defined conditions and for individuals only—concessions which cannot be extended to a collective whole—, one cannot find any theological justification for such a position.  Please allow me to remind you here that the Church is not a purely temporal society where one can delineate two separate lines of conduct, one for individuals and one for groups.  In the practice of the sacraments, and more particularly of the Eucharist, all the faithful act in communion with the Church, and the Church is present to each faithful and in each faithful who takes part in the liturgical sacrifice and receives communion from the Eucharistic Christ.  Thus, one cannot state that communicatio in sacris, permitted to the faithful, is forbidden for his Church, his bishop, or any ecclesial group with whom that faithful is in communion.  I feel tha the basis for this distinction is a lack of theological understanding.

Point II

“This is a task of a long duration,” says the report of the three Congregations.  We have already stated in these pages that numerous generations can be born, live and die in schism before unity is realized.  The report confirms our observations, and thus Roman primacy, instead of being a source of benediction for the people of God, continues to remain a source of sadness, perpetuating, in effect, the disaster of the Schism.

In its report, the three Congregations added: “[E]ach side of this dialogue must carry it out in constant agreement with their higher authorities…. This enterprise thus has a global character…. Local unity cannot be realized except as part of a scheme for world-wide unity.”  In a few words, this statement says that we must wait until the Roman and Orthodox Churches united before we, as Eastern Catholics, can rejoin Orthodoxy, which by then will have re-established communion with Rome.

However, if this principle can be applied to the Latin Churches on the Catholic side, it cannot be applied to us Eastern Catholics for numerous reasons:

1) Because Eastern Catholics are not of the Latin rite, did not unite themselves to the Bishop of Rome in the same way as the Latins did who were part of the Western Patriarchate, and for whom the pope is also patriarch and hierarchical head.  The Latins are subject to the Bishop of Rome; the Eastern Catholics are in communion with him.  Thus one cannot establish common rules for both groups.

2) Because the Latin Church separated en bloc from a sister Church distinct from it which is now known as the Orthodox Church.  Thus it would be normal for them to re-enter communion en bloc.  However, we Uniate Christians have detached ourselves from our own Church, the Orthodox Church, to rejoin the Roman communion.  Our return to the Orthodox communion, as we have conceived of it and proposed it, must not necessarily be linked to that of the Latin Church.

3) Because the Latin and Orthodox Churches pre-dated the Schism, while for us Eastern Christians, our Churches were born of the Schism that created Uniatism.  It is thus natural that we feel the need to put an end to this situation, more so and more acutely than do the Latins or the Orthodox.  In this ecumenical age, we ahave already seen that the ecumenists and theologians of both the East and the West regret the creation of the uniate Churches as an irrational act, not an ecumenical one.  We thus have a right to look for a solution to our problems, a solution such as double communion, that will permit us not to wait indefinitely until full communion is restored between Rome and Orthodoxy, understanding fully that this return to communion requires work “of a long duration”.  God only knows what “long duration” means in the language of Rome.

[To be continued.  Responses to Points III and IV in the report to follow.]

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NOTES

6. Unitatis Redintegratio, No. 14.

7. Unité chrétienne, February 1975, p. 18.