| ‘Oceans of Peace’
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
NCR Staff
Lisbon, Portugal
In its relations with other religions, Catholicism today seems
divided into two camps. One, wielding precise theological concepts, takes clear
borders between faiths as its highest value. The other, driven more by a
longing for unity than a need to affirm differences, pursues dialogue and
theological reflection in search of common ground.
Both camps had strong influence on a Sept. 24-26 summit of
religious leaders, held in the Portuguese capital where Christianity, Judaism
and Islam have long shared the historical stage.
At the same time, there was agreement here that struggles against
poverty, war and the death penalty create zones for interreligious cooperation
without tripping anyone’s theological wires.
The meeting, which drew 250 leaders of 10 religions from 52
nations, was sponsored by the Community of Sant’Egidio (see accompanying
story) in tandem with the Catholic Archbishop of Lisbon.
Two deeply polarizing recent Vatican moves -- the Sept. 3
beatification of Pope Pius IX, and a Sept. 5 document asserting that followers
of other religions suffer from “grave deficiencies” -- cast shadows
over the gathering. Some Jewish leaders declined to participate, and
representatives of other religions voiced reactions ranging from disappointment
to dismay.
The Vatican document, titled Dominus Iesus and released by
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the church’s top doctrinal authority, asserted
that only Christians possess a “definitive and complete” revelation,
and that followers of other religions may be saved only through Christ (see
story, NCR, Sept 15).
Yet during the meeting, called “Oceans of Peace,”
Catholic officials took an approach far removed from the insensitivity and
triumphalism many critics felt those early September acts implied.
Archbishop José da Cruz Policarpo of Lisbon warned in his
opening homily Sept. 24 against “fundamentalist intransigence whereby the
defense of our ‘truths’ becomes a focus of disunion.”
“The choice is not between false gods and the one God,”
he said. “The false gods do not exist, and the true God is but one, in
which we all believe, whose face we seek, in the hope of finding that ultimate
light which radiates from harmony and peace.”
At the concluding ceremony Sept. 26, Policarpo acknowledged that
Dominus Iesus had “created a polemic in recent days.” But he
said the purpose was not to question “the beauty of all paths of
justice.”
“In the depth of our heart,” he said, is only this
prayer: “Lord Jesus … give us the power to love all the men and women
of this new world, to respect, as you respect, all the valid paths that lead to
the new Jerusalem.”
Other Catholics were equally positive. “I take the position
that all religions that exist and which are monotheistic and accept one God as
origin, lawgiver, father of all mankind are at heart one religion which has
undergone separations in the course of time,” said Greek Catholic Bishop
Lubomyr Husar of the Ukraine. “Separation is a fact of history, not of
religion.”
Even Pope John Paul II contributed to the conciliatory tone.
“The fact of standing side by side manifests, in a visible way, how deeply
the human family yearns for unity,” his message read. The pope called on
all religions to be “more audacious” in pursuit of dialogue.
The approach surprised some delegates. “They spoke about
self-criticism and humility,” said Dhirka Kurne Das, a Hindu. “I have
always believed that Catholicism could be a bridge among the world religions,
and here that seemed real.”
Despite the good will, aftershocks from Dominus Iesus were
keenly felt.
“Islam is suffering from fundamentalism, and this gives the
extremists an excuse to pounce and say, ‘See, we told you, they do not
respect us,’ ” said Mohammed Sammak, a Muslim who directs a dialogue
with Christianity in Lebanon. “They will ask us moderates, ‘Why are
you making peace with them? Why do you want to dialogue with them?’ It
makes my job much more difficult.”
Sammak told NCR that Dominus Iesus has drawn
extensive coverage in the Arabic-language press and that the Islamic Council,
an organization of 85 leading groups throughout the Islamic world, is
“very unhappy.”
On Sunday, Sept. 24, the opening night of the three-day event, the
Armenian Catholicos of Lebanon, Aram I Keshishian, put concerns about
Dominus Iesus on the table.
“The recent statement by the Congregation for the Doctrine of
the Faith raises serious questions about the future course of dialogue and
ecumenical cooperation,” Keshishian said. “We must confirm ecumenical
relations … on the basis of mutual love, respect, confidence and
understanding.”
Catholic participants attempted to restore calm.
“Our brothers and sisters in other faiths have nothing to
fear,” American Cardinal James Stafford told NCR. “The
document uses precise technical language because it seems to be the only way
these concepts can be brought home to theologians and bishops in a theological,
even canonical way. But underlying it are the key principles of the Trinity and
the Incarnation, and both call us to active receptivity to others.”
Stafford, who runs the Vatican office for laity, took part in a
panel on forgiveness.
Australian Cardinal Edward Cassidy, head of the Vatican office for
ecumenical relations, acknowledged that Dominus Iesus has caused “a
little bit of tension,” but said the church’s commitment to dialogue
remained intact.
Reporters asked Cassidy why the pope approved the document.
“Certainly, he approved it like he approves all the
declarations of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” Cassidy
said. “But the encyclicals Ut Unum Sint or Redemptoris
Missio, which treated these themes with different language, actually carry
his own signature. And this is a beautiful difference.”
Those two papal documents are thought to offer a more positive
vision of ecumenical and interreligious relations than Dominus
Iesus.
Such distinctions were lost on some Jewish leaders. Amos Luzzato,
president of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities, declined to participate.
According to newspaper reports, Rome’s chief Rabbi Elio Toaff also turned
down an invitation.
Their decision came on the heels of news that a day of
Christian-Jewish dialogue set for Oct. 3 in Rome, part of the Catholic
church’s Jubilee Year, has been cancelled because Jewish participants
pulled out, citing Dominus Iesus and the beatification of Pius IX.
The weight of history was always near the surface in Lisbon, where
in 1496 Jews were expelled by a Catholic king. Thousands fled and thousands of
others converted in order to escape persecution. At different points, former
Portuguese President Mário Soares and Policarpo expressed sorrow for the
treatment of the Jews.
Policarpo’s apology came in a ceremony of “purification
of memory” held outside St. Dominic’s Church, a symbol of the
Portuguese Inquisition.
In the face of both tensions and progress, Sant’Egidio
founder Andrea Riccardi called for taking the long view.
“Dialogue requires geologic time,” he said in response
to an NCR question at a news conference. “But we remain convinced
that the path is irreversible.”
Beyond theological disputes, participants urged religious leaders
to work for justice.
“There are diseases in Africa that affect 200,000 people, but
no one is working on a cure because it’s too small a market for the drug
companies to be interested,” said Norwegian Lutheran Bishop Gunnar
Stålsett. “People of faith must critique such moral
failure.”
Sant’Egidio’s work for a global moratorium on the death
penalty drew wide support. In a powerful moment, French Rabbi René
Samuel Sirat, head of the conference of European rabbis, described how his
brother had been killed in a terrorist attack in Algeria in 1962.
“I saw my parents dying of desperation after what they had
seen,” he said. Yet he said that had the killer been found, he would not
have sought capital punishment.
Nigerian Archbishop John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan issued a challenge
to First World Catholic leaders.
“Our dictators got rich and stuck all their money in foreign
banks,” he said. “Now these banks are making it difficult to get the
money back. I wonder if the bishops in those countries agree with me that those
who keep stolen money are themselves thieves?” Onaiyekan asked.
“These bankers probably sit in the front rows of their
churches on Sundays,” Onaiyekan said, who also heads the Symposium of
Episcopal Conferences of Africa. “I wonder what the bishops will do about
it?”
Archbishop Jaime Pedro Gonçalves of Mozambique called for
church leaders to act as mediators in armed conflicts, citing the 1992 peace
accords in his country in which Sant’Egidio and the Catholic hierarchy
played important roles.
Gonçalves said religious figures must be seen as strictly
neutral. He pointed to Angola as a country ripe for such a process, and then
called for a general synod of the Catholic church devoted to peacemaking.
The event’s final declaration underscored the role of
religious leaders in keeping watch on matters of peace and justice. “We
keep in our eyes and in our hearts the suffering of Africa and of the poor
peoples of the world,” it said. “We are aware of the risks of
globalization, if this is without a soul.”
The serious tone in Lisbon lightened briefly when the Coptic
Catholic Archbishop of Egypt, Andraos Salama, spoke. Devoting his animated
comments largely to praising the patrimony of Christianity in Egypt, Salama
included a glowing description of John Paul II’s March visit, citing the
surprise of visiting cardinals at hearing prayers in Greek, Syriac, Arabic and
Coptic as well as Latin.
“They were stupified,” Salama said. “I told them
they should get out of the Vatican more often.”
The e-mail address for John L. Allen Jr. is
jallen@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, October 6,
2000
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