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About The Georgia bulletin (Atlanta) 1963-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 21, 1985)
Supplement to The Georgia Bulletin, November 21, 1985 □ Faith Toda A supplement to Catholic newspapers, published with grant assistance from Cath olic Church Extension Society, by the Na tional Catholic News Seivice, 1312 Massa chusetts Ave. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20005. All contents copyright ® 1985 by NC News Service. Ecumenism* What’s It to You? By Joe Michael Feist NC News Service When Tuesday afternoon rolls around and it’s time for religious education class, my children head for the Jewish synagogue. I think they get a fine grounding in religion there. No, it’s not what you think. We’re not Jewish. It’s just that our parish facilities don’t yet include classrooms. Since the synagogue is next door, pastor and rabbi work ed out an agreement to use synagogue rooms for Catholic religious instruction. It’s a pragmatic arrangement, of course. But it is also an outgrowth of the ecumenical atmosphere prompted by Vatican II. Catholic involvement in the ecumenical movement snowballed after Vatican II documents refer red to other Christians as “our separated brethren” and also said the church “rejects nothing of what is true and holy” in other world religions. Since the mid-1960s the Catholic Church has set up an ever-increasing number of dialogue commissions with other churches. In recent months and years: •Roman Catholic representatives have reached substantial theological agreements with Anglicans on such issues as the nature of the eucharist, ministry and ordination, and salvation. •Talks between Roman Catholics and Orthodox churches have clarified disagreements on Christ’s human nature. •Catholic and Lutheran representatives in the United States have agreed that'any dif ferences over how people are sav ed, differences that contributed to the Reformation, “need not be church-dividing. ’ ’ •Dialogue continues between Catholics and members of Baptist, Reformed, Methodist and Pentecostal churches, and various accords have been reached. •Pope John Paul II has prayed with the Anglican archbishop of Canterbury; praised the “reverence for life and nature, the quest for truth and harmony” of Buddhism and Confucianism; and told Moslem youth that Moslems and Christians “have many things in common as believers and as human beings.” •And the pope has met often with Jewish groups and leaders. To the Jewish community in Mainz, West Germany, in 1980, the pope said that “Jewish- Christian dialogue can be a sign to the world of belief in the one in effable God who calls to us.” But is ecumenism a subject for church leaders only? Is it a strictly theological and intellectual exercise? Not at all. Though seemingly hidden at times, practical effects and examples of ecumenism at the grass-roots level abound today. Most apparent, perhaps, is in the whole area of “mixed mar riages,” the numbers of which continue to rise. About 40 percent of Catholics who married in the 1970s married non-Catholics. The younger a couple is, the greater the chance that their religious af filiation differs. Among the several reasons given by sociologists for this phenomenon: the post-Vatican II appreciation for other Christian bodies and local parish ecumenism. While the Catholic Church, in deed, all churches, still prefers in trafaith marriages, there is a grow ing pastoral response to “mixed marriages.” For example, some churches are cooperating in in terdenominational marriage preparation and in the celebration of weddings. Another indication of an active ecumenism is in joint social action efforts. Men and women of dif ferent religious communities are joining together to operate soup kitchens, shelters for the homeless and programs for the elderly. Interfaith services of one kind or another, rare before Vatican II, are common today. Many parishes celebrate a Passover Seder meal during Holy Week to remember the Jewish roots of Christianity. But perhaps the true impact of the ecumenical movement can best be seen in terms of people who change, allowing respect for traditions that differ from their own. That’s the kind of development that allows Catholic children from my parish to attend religious education classes in the neighbor ing synagogue. (Feist is associate editor of Faith Today.) An active ecumenical movement is one of the legacies of Vatican Council II, writes Joe Michael Feist. And participation in that movement is not limited to church leaders, he odds. In many or dinary ways, ecumenism comes to life.
