Last month, on Pentecost Sunday, I was privileged to participate in an ecumenical gathering at St. John's Lutheran Church wherein we recalled the birth of the Christian community 2,000 years ago when the risen Christ sent forth the promised Holy Spirit to His frightened apostles and disciples to enliven and empower them to go forth and preach the Good News to the ends of the world.
It was truly encouraging that people came together from our respective Christian denominations to celebrate jointly this seminal event in the life of the Christian community. Such togetherness among those who glory in the name "Christian" would have been inconceivable as recently as a half-century ago. Indeed, the flowering of ecumenism constitutes one of the great manifestations of the presence of the Spirit in our age, breaking down the walls of division, fear and hatred that we have inherited from centuries of separation, mistrust, denunciations and mutual hostility, and forging new paths for dialogue, understanding, healing and reconciliation.
Evidence of Spirit
Hence, the presence of people from varying Christian denominations on that Pentecost feast was a tangible evidence that the Spirit is alive among us, seeking to bring about that unity that Christ desires for His followers.
On the night before He suffered and died, Jesus prayed "May all be one, Father, as you are in me and I am in you: may they be one in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me" (John 17:21).
What a magnificent vision! What a powerful prayer, and yet what a stark reminder of how far short we fall of this unity Christ wants for the members of His flock. For, over the centuries, we Christians have seen so many schisms and ruptures that a flow-chart of our history would look like a process of cellular division. The common Christian family that Jesus intends remains badly broken. In this sense, every Christian is a child of divorce.
Sorrow for past
In this Jubilee Year 2000, then, I would suggest that we in the Christian community humbly and sincerely express our sorrow for the tragic scandal of Christian disunity:
* for the divisions created by the doctrinal disputes at Nicaea and Chalcedon;
* for schism with the Orthodox churches in the 11th century;
* for the abuses and stubbornness which led to the Reformation; and
* for the many and varied ways we and our forebears in the Christian family have allowed political, national, cultural and ethnic bonds, and the plague of religious prejudice and bigotry to perpetuate those historical hurts, grudges and resentments.
Our sorrow should include also those fears and anxieties, both real and imagined, which continue to inhibit that unity which is so dear to the heart of Christ and which, as John's Gospel tells us, is the very condition the world needs to see for belief in Christ.
Repentance
I would also suggest that we acknowledge and repent of the sins we have committed in our efforts to spread the Gospel message:
* for the ways we trampled upon the Muslim community in the Crusades;
* for the witch-hunts perpetrated in the name of orthodoxy during the Inquisition or the Salem trials;
* for the exploitation of indigenous people during the heyday of colonialism;
* for the tolerance of slavery and apartheid;
* for the anti-Semitism which has festered in the Christian community since the early centuries and which, over the years, prepared the poisonous soil that yielded its most disastrous results in the horrendous Holocaust.
For these and so many other failures over the past two millennia, we in the Christian community during this Jubilee Year must cry out: "We are sorry; we apologize; we beg forgiveness."
Jubilee call
In addition to acknowledging our failures, I hope that this Jubilee Year can be an occasion for us to recall the foundation of the ecumenical pursuit to which we are called.
For while denominational creeds, moral codes, liturgical practices, governing structures, and ecclesial histories and traditions are important and must be an integral part of the ecumenical dialogue, we must never forget that first and foremost ecumenism is about a relationship: a relationship with the person of Jesus Christ and the Father He revealed and the Spirit He promised.
If ecumenism is not rooted in a deep, intimate relationship with Jesus Christ, who is the source of all unity, peace, healing and reconciliation, then our efforts -- as well-motivated and well-intentioned as they may be -- will count for naught.
Jesus at center
Therefore, while it is important that we seek to resolve differences, heal wounds and foster mutual understanding, respect and tolerance, it is even more important that we spend time praying together and listening to one another. For unless we know who Jesus is for us and how we experience Jesus in our respective Christian traditions, then we will not have that solid foundation necessary to achieve the unity which Christ so urgently wants for the members of His flock.
In other words, Jesus Christ must be the center and focal point of our ecumenical endeavors. It is His mission we must be about; it is His message we must communicate to others; and it is His ministry we must extend to our world.
And if this is not the case, if Jesus is not the motivating, animating and sustaining influence in all our ecumenical activities, then our efforts, successful as they may be from a fiscal, social, ecclesial and humanitarian point of view, will be as the proverbial sounding brass and tinkling cymbal.
Working together
However, when we keep the focus on Jesus, then I believe we will continue to reap the spiritual fruits of ecumenical dialogues, such as we have experienced in recent years with the agreement between Lutherans and Episcopalians; and the full accord between the reformed churches (that is, the United Church of Christ, the Reformed Church in America and the Presbyterian Church) here in our own country; and internationally with the joint Declaration on Justification issued by the leaders of the Lutheran and Roman Catholic communities this past fall, thus putting to rest that divisive doctrinal issue which precipitated the Reformation.
Furthermore, when we keep our focus on Jesus, we can learn from each other, without watering down our convictions:
* from the fundamentalist churches, we can learn reverence for the sacred Scriptures;
* From the evangelicals, we can learn a love for Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior;
* from the Orthodox churches, we can be moved by the splendor of their liturgy, with its focus on the transcendent;
* from the Mormons, we can be inspired by their missionary zeal;
* from the conservative branch of the so-called mainline churches, we can begin to appreciate the value of tradition;
* from the liberal branch, we can learn the importance of social change and social action;
* from the small storefront churches, we can learn the need for intimacy and the value of belonging; and
* from our own Roman Catholic community, we can learn the significance of the communion of saints.
This awareness serves to underscore that, even in our divisions, we are together in our love for Jesus Christ.
So I hope that during this Jubilee Year, we will rejoice in the ecumenical strides that have been made toward putting aside our crippling historical resentments, petty competitiveness and theological differences, and that we will go forward with a renewed sense of commitment to responding to the urgent call for Christian unity, ever mindful of the fact, as the mission statement of the ecumenical St. Egidio community in Rome states so well: "Charity requests this unity, the suffering of the world begs for it and the truth of the Gospel demands it."
May this be our vision and mission in the days ahead.