I hope Father Elijah doesn’t mind, but I’m pulling this great comment from the East-West thread below, because I know not everyone reads comments – but a lot of you might find this helpful. Thank you, Father, for taking the time to write it.

While the relationship between the "East and West" is extremely complex due to many significant factors and issues, I believe that both Catholic and Orthodox Churches would consider this meeting between the Pope, the Bishop of Rome and the Archbishop of Athens and Primate of all Greece as highly highly significant and yes indeed, even a thaw.

The various issues and factors are very complex not only historically and theologically [for example the famous ‘Filioque issue’ in the Western Nicene Creed] but also in the ecclesiology (faith understanding of Church) in the West and the East. Let me see if I can explain this…..

In the West, even among Anglicans and Protestants, there is no question that one speaks for the Roman Catholic Church and that is the Pope [all might not like this or agree with what he says but it is an ‘accepted axiom’]. This has developed slowly over two thousand years of both acceptance and development and non-acceptance, as well as various struggles within the Church and with exterior forces-mostly emperors and kings etc trying to control the Church

In the East, however, the emphasis is fundamentally on the local church [diocese] based as it is on Eucharistic Communion with the local bishop as ‘sign of unity’. In the Orthodox Church [not in the so called Monophysite or Nestorian churches] the relationship between Church and Empreror [in Constantinople until 1453, then between the Church and the Russian Czar until 1917] was less struggle. The "Emperor/Czar was seen to be a unifying force of the "Orthodox World".

What I am getting at is this-the Church in the East lived a very different historical experience which raised far different questions and thus answers, than the Church in the West-even while both remained rooted in and transmitted the Apostolic Faith and that of the Fathers of the Church.

What we just witnessed within the last month was the Pope  meeting with:

a) the Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate (leading Church figure) of the Church of England and leader [not sure if he could be called head] of the Anglican Communion in the world

b)the Patriarch of Constantinople, also known as the Ecumenical Patriarch. He has the honor of being considered ‘the first among equals’ of Orthodox Bishops throughuot the world-but does not have within Orthodoxy the ability to speak with the same authority as the Pope. For example if he got up tomorrow morning and said "All the Orthodox are going to unite with the Catholic Church" some would follow but not all. If you read back in history, this has already happened at two Ecemenical Councils before the Reformation: Lyons and Florence. Actual unity was ‘forged’ [that’s a main reason we now have Eastern Catholic churches united with us-also called Uniate] but the two councils were not generally accepted by the Orthodox so we won’t repeat their mistakes.

c)Today’s wonderful meeting with the Archbishop of Athens and primate of all Greece. This is a significant Church within Orthodoxy [with tremendous influence in the West-America etc] At one time great ‘tensions’ could be felt between Rome and Greece but Pope John Paul’s Pilgrimage and warm welcome in Greece and especially Athens began and this continues the ‘thaw’

Now another significant encounter needs to take place-how and where exactly it will first take place we are all awaiting. This is between the Pope and the Patriarch of Moscow. Remember that until 1917, the Czar (Caesar) played a very significant role in the life of the Church in Russia. Moscow was considered the Third Rome (and successor to Constantinople after it fell to the Moslem Turks). The present Patriarch of Moscow, now liberated from atheistic Soviet constraints has reasserted himself within the whole Church world. Great tensions arose between the Catholic Church and Moscow because of the reemergence of the Catholic Church in the Ukraine etc that had been forced by Stalin into the Russian Orthodox Church-these are somewhat subsiding thanks to a great deal of work on the part of the Vatican and openess of the Patrichate in Moscow. However tensions also exist between the Patriarch of Moscow and the "Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople about who really leads Orthodoxy……..

I know this went long Mark-but I hope I have given you some insight and understanding into the complexities yet the very present thaw and progress that has ecumenically taken place 🙂

UT UNUM SINT    THAT THEY MAY BE ONE