Lutheran World Federation

Tenth Assembly

Theme "For the Healing of the World" Has Great Relevance

ROME, Italy/GENEVA, 14 July 2003 (LWI) - The division of Christian churches is "increasingly turning into a scandal before the world, not to mention the fact that it is also contrary to the will of Jesus Christ," said Walter Cardinal Kasper, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity (PCPCU) in an interview with Lutheran World Information (LWI).

Everything possible must be done to find full community but also to demonstrate more clearly the community that already exists. "We have more things in common than things that separate us", emphasized Kasper, who will lead the Roman Catholic Church delegation to Tenth Assembly of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) in Winnipeg, Canada, 21-31 July 2003.

According to Kasper the theme of the Assembly "For the Healing of the World" has great relevance. The world is not whole but rife with war, violence, injustice and the North-South divide. But even in the West "new chasms are opening up, and I believe that it is the basic task of the Church to bring the message of reconciliation and therefore of healing and peace to all people," stressed the PCPCU president.

Kasper said he was looking forward with great anticipation to the Assembly in Winnipeg because, since the signing of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (JDDJ) relations between the Roman Catholic Church and the LWF as well as with Lutheran churches have gained a new quality and intensity. "Many friendly relations exist already," he stressed. He noted that the signing of the Joint Declaration has substantially solved the most important problem of the Reformation but there still remains "a lot to do by way of reconciliation and healing between the churches."

The PCPCU president considered it as extremely important that the LWF and Roman Catholic Church had recently spoken with one voice and strongly advocated peace in the world in the context of the conflict in Iraq. "This seems to me to be an important common witness. I hope that it will be a precedent and example for the future," said Kasper. Joint actions strengthen the credibility of the witness of the Christian churches.

Kasper spoke of joint action and joint witness in common issues such as the quest for justice in the world and assistance to people living with HIV/AIDS. There is probably also far-reaching agreement in inter-religious dialogue. This kind of cooperation also strengthens mutual trust and leads to a deeper understanding of the questions "where sadly we are not yet fully united," he said.

For the PCPCU president, the most important result following the JDDJ signing on 31 October 1999 in Augsburg, Germany, was that the Roman Catholic Church and the Lutheran communion were now substantially in agreement about the essential content of the Gospel. "This means that we can witness together in a world that has become increasingly secularized, especially here in the West." If possible the LWF Assembly in Winnipeg should be such a joint witness, a common word to a largely secularized world which is increasingly losing the human and Christian values, he noted. Another positive consequence of the JDDJ signing is the fact that Catholic majority churches, for example in Latin America, are beginning to take the Lutheran minority churches seriously in quite a new way.

Concerning the joint celebration of Holy Communion, or at least the offer of eucharistic hospitality, Kasper stressed that the JDDJ was a mile-stone but not yet the end of the road. For the Roman Catholic Church the Joint Declaration was not a sufficient reason yet to have joint Eucharist. He explained that there are different understandings of ecclesiology and the ministry, apart from some questions of eucharistic doctrine that have not yet been sufficiently clarified although there was a growing agreement about them between Lutherans and Catholics.

"For us Catholics, church fellowship and eucharistic communion are one. We cannot meet in closest inner communion, which is the meaning of the Eucharist, and then part again to go our different ways into different churches. I can also put it differently: for eucharistic fellowship, it is essential for us to be able to say ‘Amen’ at the end of the great eucharistic prayer. In the Catholic liturgy the congregation answers with ‘Amen,’ which means that they agree with what has happened and with what has been said in the great prayer. And only those who can say ‘Amen’ can also come up afterwards and put out their hands, otherwise communion is not honest," said Kasper.

The PCPCU president said it is different according to Roman Catholic understanding when in limited individual cases or under certain circumstances of a secular or spiritual emergency, non-Catholic Christians can be admitted to Holy Communion, to the Eucharist. "In genuine cases of spiritual emergency, individual pastoral solutions can be found, but unlike for Lutherans, a general invitation does not seem possible yet for the Roman Catholic Church." But this, said Kasper, "is no reason to sit back and rest but rather a challenge to do our utmost to make further progress."