Vatican Ecumenical Conference on Catholic, Orthodox views on Papal Primacy

Catholic World News reports here about an ecumenical conference being organized under the auspices of the Holy See to engage Catholic and Orthodox scholars in a dialogue on the primacy of the Bishop of Rome.

The meeting will be a closed-door session, at which the participants will be scholars drawn from the Catholic and Orthodox traditions... representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church are expected to participate. Vatican officials have been pleased with the recent progress in relations with the Eastern churches. And many officials in Rome are convinced that-- as one official put it-- "the example of an eventual reconciliation with the Orthodox will certainly promote reconciliation with the other Christian denominations."

CWN summarizes the key issue at stake:

Pope John Paul II has made it clear that he has no desire to govern the Orthodox churches in the same way that he governs the Roman Catholic Church. Discussions about Church governance could boil down to questions about the respective powers of the Pope and the patriarchs of the Eastern churches. Before the schism of 1054, one Vatican official notes, the governance of the Church was divided among "the five great patriarchates, managed by five patriarchs who had full authority over their own churches." That historical example might furnish one possible model for the future, in which the Pope-- the Patriarch of Rome-- would be recognized as the "first among equals," with the power to curb the actions of any other patriarch who exceeded his own proper authority. "The question, then," the Vatican official concludes, "is which rights and duties are reserved for the Pope, and which can be left to the other patriarchs." ... Another key question is whether the Pope's primacy should be understood as a primary of honor or a primacy of jurisdiction. The noted French Orthodox theologian Olivier Clement, author of a key work on Catholic-Orthodox dialogue, points out that the two possibilities cannot be entirely separated. He observes: "The primacy of honor-- which, we should note, is granted to the Pope by all the Orthodox churches-- must inevitably convey to the Patriarch of Rome some measure of power as well, even if it is only the power of presiding."

In recent years, I have been priviledged to know many Eastern Catholics in union with Rome. In discussing the issue of papal primacy with them, they demonstrate to me that this issue is definitely not irreconcilable, even though historically this issue is probably one of the most difficult and most sensitive of issues to deal with. Unity among the apostolic churches is my solemn prayer.