OPEN LETTER TO THE AMERICANS BY VLADIMIR V. PUTIN: A PLEA FOR CAUTION

What Putin Has to Say to Americans About Syria

By VLADIMIR V. PUTIN

Published: September 11, 2013 

MOSCOW — RECENT events surrounding Syria have prompted me to speak directly to the American people and their political leaders. It is important to do so at a time of insufficient communication between our societies.

Relations between us have passed through different stages. We stood against each other during the cold war. But we were also allies once, and defeated the Nazis together. The universal international organization — the United Nations — was then established to prevent such devastation from ever happening again.

The United Nations’ founders understood that decisions affecting war and peace should happen only by consensus, and with America’s consent the veto by Security Council permanent members was enshrined in the United Nations Charter. The profound wisdom of this has underpinned the stability of international relations for decades.

No one wants the United Nations to suffer the fate of the League of Nations, which collapsed because it lacked real leverage. This is possible if influential countries bypass the United Nations and take military action without Security Council authorization.

The potential strike by the United States against Syria, despite strong opposition from many countries and major political and religious leaders, including the pope, will result in more innocent victims and escalation, potentially spreading the conflict far beyond Syria’s borders. A strike would increase violence and unleash a new wave of terrorism. It could undermine multilateral efforts to resolve the Iranian nuclear problem and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and further destabilize the Middle East and North Africa. It could throw the entire system of international law and order out of balance.

Syria is not witnessing a battle for democracy, but an armed conflict between government and opposition in a multireligious country. There are few champions of democracy in Syria. But there are more than enough Qaeda fighters and extremists of all stripes battling the government. The United States State Department has designated Al Nusra Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, fighting with the opposition, as terrorist organizations. This internal conflict, fueled by foreign weapons supplied to the opposition, is one of the bloodiest in the world.

Mercenaries from Arab countries fighting there, and hundreds of militants from Western countries and even Russia, are an issue of our deep concern. Might they not return to our countries with experience acquired in Syria? After all, after fighting in Libya, extremists moved on to Mali. This threatens us all.

From the outset, Russia has advocated peaceful dialogue enabling Syrians to develop a compromise plan for their own future. We are not protecting the Syrian government, but international law. We need to use the United Nations Security Council and believe that preserving law and order in today’s complex and turbulent world is one of the few ways to keep international relations from sliding into chaos. The law is still the law, and we must follow it whether we like it or not. Under current international law, force is permitted only in self-defense or by the decision of the Security Council. Anything else is unacceptable under the United Nations Charter and would constitute an act of aggression.

No one doubts that poison gas was used in Syria. But there is every reason to believe it was used not by the Syrian Army, but by opposition forces, to provoke intervention by their powerful foreign patrons, who would be siding with the fundamentalists. Reports that militants are preparing another attack — this time against Israel — cannot be ignored.

It is alarming that military intervention in internal conflicts in foreign countries has become commonplace for the United States. Is it in America’s long-term interest? I doubt it. Millions around the world increasingly see America not as a model of democracy but as relying solely on brute force, cobbling coalitions together under the slogan “you’re either with us or against us.”

But force has proved ineffective and pointless. Afghanistan is reeling, and no one can say what will happen after international forces withdraw. Libya is divided into tribes and clans. In Iraq the civil war continues, with dozens killed each day. In the United States, many draw an analogy between Iraq and Syria, and ask why their government would want to repeat recent mistakes.

No matter how targeted the strikes or how sophisticated the weapons, civilian casualties are inevitable, including the elderly and children, whom the strikes are meant to protect.

The world reacts by asking: if you cannot count on international law, then you must find other ways to ensure your security. Thus a growing number of countries seek to acquire weapons of mass destruction. This is logical: if you have the bomb, no one will touch you. We are left with talk of the need to strengthen nonproliferation, when in reality this is being eroded.

We must stop using the language of force and return to the path of civilized diplomatic and political settlement.

A new opportunity to avoid military action has emerged in the past few days. The United States, Russia and all members of the international community must take advantage of the Syrian government’s willingness to place its chemical arsenal under international control for subsequent destruction. Judging by the statements of President Obama, the United States sees this as an alternative to military action.

I welcome the president’s interest in continuing the dialogue with Russia on Syria. We must work together to keep this hope alive, as we agreed to at the Group of 8 meeting in Lough Erne in Northern Ireland in June, and steer the discussion back toward negotiations.

If we can avoid force against Syria, this will improve the atmosphere in international affairs and strengthen mutual trust. It will be our shared success and open the door to cooperation on other critical issues.

My working and personal relationship with President Obama is marked by growing trust. I appreciate this. I carefully studied his address to the nation on Tuesday. And I would rather disagree with a case he made on American exceptionalism, stating that the United States’ policy is “what makes America different. It’s what makes us exceptional.” It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation. There are big countries and small countries, rich and poor, those with long democratic traditions and those still finding their way to democracy. Their policies differ, too. We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord’s blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal.

Vladimir V. Putin is the president of Russia.

see: "Putin Is No Tyrant" by Christopher Read of the University of Warwick

POPE FRANCIS AND THE MIRACLE OF THE ICON

my source: Sandro Magister

ROME, September 12, 2013 – With the passing of the days the extraordinary nature of the vigil presided over by Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square on the evening of Saturday, September 7 is becoming ever more perceptible.

First of all, the reason: a day of fasting and prayer to call for peace in Syria, the Middle East, and wherever there is war. With the participation not only of Catholics but of men of every religion and simply “of good will.” Not only in Rome but in many cities of the world.

Then the duration. One cannot recall a public vigil of prayer of four consecutive hours, from sunset to late into the night, in the constant presence of the pope.

Then the silence. Over the entire span of the vigil the recollection of the hundred thousand persons crowding St. Peter's Square and the surrounding areas was intense and emotional. In harmony with the accentuated austerity of the very presence of the pope.

Then, above all, the form that the prayer took on. It began with the rosary, the most evangelical and universal of the “popular” prayers, and with a meditation by Pope Francis. It proceeded with the adoration of the sacrament of the Eucharist. It continued with the office of readings - the nocturnal psalmody of the monks - with the reading of passages from Jeremiah, St. Leo the Great, and the Gospel of John. It concluded with the singing of the “Te Deum” and with Eucharistic benediction imparted by the pope. 

But perhaps what struck those present the most was the entrance into the square, at the beginning of the celebration, of the Marian icon of “Salus Populi Romani," carried by four halberdiers of the Swiss Guards and preceded by two little girls with bouquets of flowers. The icon was enthroned in front of Pope Francis, who venerated it devoutly. It was a point of reference for the entire vigil, beside the altar. 

*

The dating of this icon of the Mother of God, kept at the Basilica of St. Mary Major and called since the 19th century “Salus Populi Romani," is controversial. It varies from the 7th to the 12th century.

Tradition maintains that it is a copy, painted by the evangelist Luke, of an image of Mary with Child that miraculously appeared in Lydda in a church built by the apostles Peter and John.

First preserved in Byzantium, it is told that the icon arrived in Rome by sea, welcomed by Pope Gregory the Great on the banks of the Tiber.

Cardinal Cesare Baronio, a Church historian, wrote that it was Pope Gregory who brought the icon to the Basilica of St. Mary Major in 590, at the end of a procession to invoke the cessation of one of the worst plagues in the city's history. On that occasion the archangel Michael was seen above the Mole Adriana putting his sword back into its sheath. The plague ended, and the Mole was given the name of Castel Sant'Angelo.

Another plague ended in the 16th century thanks to the intercession of the Madonna depicted  on this icon, when St. Pius V carried it in procession to the Basilica of St. Peter.

The Jesuits accompanied their first missions with reproductions of this icon, which they highly venerated.

Pius XII paid homage to it when he proclaimed the dogma of the Assumption in 1950, and again crowned it in St. Peter's in 1954, at the centenary of the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception.

John Paul II associated a copy of this icon with the World Youth Day of 2000, in Rome.

And beginning with the one in Cologne in 2005, celebrated by Benedict XVI, all of the following World Youth Days have carried in pilgrimage a copy of the icon of “Salus Populi Romani," together with the Cross.

Pope Francis also wanted it at World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro last July. After he was elected pope, his first outing was to the Basilica of St. Mary Major, to kneel in prayer in front of this icon.

The image depicted on it is the one called “Odigitria": the Virgin holds in her arms the Child who is looking at her lovingly while with his right hand raised in blessing he seems to be indicating the way whose direction and journey his mother knows well.

What is striking about this icon is the intense gaze of Mary, which invites the viewer to travel the road indicated by the Son. She is looking into the distance, in the direction in which he is pointing. Her right hand, which is holding the Child, repeats the gesture of Jesus and amplifies it.

In the ancient Roman rite, at the feast of the Assumption of Mary into heaven the icon of “Salus Populi Romani" welcomed at the door of the Basilica of St. Mary Major the icon of Christ “acheropita" (not painted by human hands) kept in the “Sancta Sanctorum” of the pope's residence at the Lateran and carried there in procession. In a sort of dance between the two icons, the Son paid homage to the Mother.

*

The decision of Pope Francis to place at the center of the vigil for peace this icon of the Mother of God - not a copy of it, but the original - therefore bears within itself all the power of the significance of its history. In it the pope sees the faith of the people of God who for centuries, in all moments of crisis, have gathered around this icon to implore a sign of grace from heaven, because “that which is impossible for men is not impossible for God.” 

In the commentary that follows, Father Innocenzo Gargano enters deeply into the meaning of the presence of the icon of “Salus Populi Romani" at the vigil proclaimed by Pope Francis.

Father Gargano, a Camaldolese monk, was prior of the Roman monastery of San Gregorio al Celio, founded by the pope from whom it takes its name, and is a great scholar of the Fathers of the Church and in particular of this illustrious pontiff, to whom the history of this icon is particularly linked.

___________

SALVATION NOT ONLY OF THE ROMANS BUT OF THE WHOLE WORLD

by Innocenzo Gargano

The display of the authentic icon of “Salus Populi Romani" at the conclusion of the fast called for by Pope Francis to obtain from the Lord, through the intercession of the Virgin Mary Mother of God, peace in Syria, in the Middle East, and over the whole face of the earth, has sounded out very many of the faithful.

What could be the meaning of the display of this icon, placed beside the altar and beside the Most Holy Sacrament, with a Pope Francis almost constantly in genuflection?

One can respond only by recalling that an icon can never be reduced to a painting, whatever may have been the artistic genius that produced it, because unlike a simple painting, which invites the gaze of the viewer to verify its harmony and beauty, the icon makes present, in its way, the very person who is represented.

Not only that. But since the icon is charged with the energy of faith that has been imparted to it by all those who in front of it, and thanks to it, have turned their hearts to the Lord, it distributes to all those who approach it with faith that which it has received.

In particular the icon, this icon - recognized by the Church as the occasion of particular “mirabilia Dei" that we generally call "miracles" - reflects, reproduces, and pours into the hearts of those who turn to it with simplicity and total openness to the will of God those same graces with which the Virgin Mother of God was fully graced, according to the measure of faith of each one.

The authentic icon of “Salus Populi Romani" - and therefore not just any reproduction, like those we often carry in our wallets - is charged with all of this. In fact, it bears within itself the heritage of faith of the Christian generations that, urged on by the archetype to which the same icon refers, meaning the Virgin Mother of God, have asked for and obtained through faith: peace, safety, and health as a down payment on the salvation promised to all by Jesus her Son, the Savior.

This is the reason for the particular importance on Saturday, September 7 of the presence and display of the icon of “ Salus Populi," which thus became no longer the down payment of salvation only for the Romans, but for the whole world, at the conclusion of the fast called for and obtained by Pope Francis with the participation of millions of Catholics, Christians, believers and men of good will, lovers of harmony in the world and of peace.

Only the basilica of Monreale, with its marvelous mosaics, could have withstood comparison with the paradisiacal vision of St. Peter's Square at this vigil experienced by peoples of the whole world around the altar and the Word of God, with the Most Holy Sacrament, in the company of the icon, in the presence of the pope. 

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The mention of Monreale made by Father Innocenzo Gargano in his last lines refers to an absolute masterpiece of Christian art: the basilica erected in the 12th century by the Norman kings in Monreale, on the hills above Palermo, entirely covered on the inside by mosaics that illustrate the whole plan of God for the world and history.

The mosaics at Monreale that illustrate the creation are an artistic and theological pinnacle of the entire cycle. In the first of these depictions, the Spirit of God is splitting the abyss with startling energy, creating "harmony" where before there was chaos.

And it is precisely the original harmony impressed by the wisdom of God on creation and among human beings - contrasted by the intrusion of sin and the killing of Abel, of which wars are the tragic inheritance - that was the first theme of the meditation developed by Pope Francis at the vigil of September 7:

> “And God saw that it was good”

In twelve evocative episodes created in 2013 for TV 2000, the television channel owned by the Italian bishops, Father Innocenzo Gargano and the art historian Sara Magister thoroughly illustrated the letter and spirit of the entire cycle of the mosaics of Monreale.

The twelve episodes, each lasting half an hour, can be viewed at any time on the YouTube channel of TV 2000: 

PATRIARCH GREGORIOS III SPEAKS ON ECCLESIOLOGY, ECUMENISM AND RELATIONS WITH THE CURIA

  Melkite Greek Catholic 

P  A  T  R  I  A  R  CH  A  TE

of Antioch and All the East

of Alexandria and of Jerusalem

Pope Francis is preparing an overhaul of the Curia.   One area which needs to be revised in favour of collegiality is the relationship between the Vatican and the churches sui juris.  As we await his decisions, the talk given by Patriarch Gregorios III to the Synod in 2010 becomes very relevant.

Speech of H. B. Patriarch Gregorios III

During the Synod of Bishops:

Special Assembly for the Middle East

Rome 10-24 October 2010

Ecclesiology and Ecumenism

The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, promulgated by the Venerable Pope John Paul II, says very p

            As you know, I recently took part in a meeting of Benedictines and Cistercians from all over Latin America in Mexico and have just returned from preaching two retreats to Benedictine nuns in the Philippines. In a way, these visits, although hard work and, at times, quite heavy going, were really a holiday for me in the sense that they gave me some opportunity for rest and have left me relaxed and refreshed. There must have been over 150 sisters, nuns and monks present at the Mexico meeting and in the Philippines I met about 100 sisters and nuns but few monks. One thing is clear: all over the world, even in those countries where there was once an abundance of vocations, monasteries and monastic communities are going through the same difficulties and suffering from the same problems. Yet there is a special solidarity that comes with suffering and that means that the monastic world, particularly the Benedictine world, is more united today than ever before. This has led to more cooperation and collaboration between congregations and orders as well as among individual houses. These visits also brought home the importance of and appreciation for Fr Brendan’s work with the Monastic Formators’ Programme.

            There are times when we feel overwhelmed by the fragility of the Belmont Community and probably wonder where the Lord is leading us. We are fully stretched as far as parish work goes and there is no room for manoeuvre, unless we radically reorganise the way we do things. There are times when the monastery seems half empty and the burden of keeping things going falls to a handful of people. Although we have been blessed in recent years with a number of vocations, not all have persevered and we have been saddened by some of our losses. We are also aware that time stops for no one and that we are all getting older and frailer and so less able to do the things we used to do. We are also aware that Death respects no one and that it’s not always the oldest who dies first. Having said that, few of our works are indispensible and a thriving, vibrant monastic community doesn’t need to be a large one or a young one. What really matters is our obedience to the will of God, our fidelity to the Gospel and to the Holy Rule and the love we have for one another, in other words, that we are truly a Christian community and a Benedictine one. What is really important is our life of prayer and our willingness to work together for the good of the Church, the salvation of souls, including our own, and the building up of the Body of Christ and the Kingdom of God.

            I have already mentioned obedience, without which there can be no vocation to the monastic life and no following of Jesus on the Way of the Cross. I would also like to mention humility, which lies at the very heart of our vocation. St Benedict tells us that, “the first step of humility is unhesitating obedience, which comes naturally to those who cherish Christ above all.” But he also writes that, “this obedience is acceptable to God and agreeable to men only if compliance with what is commanded is not cringing or sluggish or half-hearted, but free from any grumbling or any reaction of unwillingness.” Humility is the antidote to pride, pride that reveals itself in the wilfulness that leads to self-centredness, self-interest, self-absorption and self-determination, the wilfulness that separates us from God and from each other and destroys the life and unity of the community. A happy and fulfilled life in a Benedictine community depends on our understanding and putting into practice of Chapter 7 of the Rule, on Humility. More than ever, we need to read and study that chapter and so discover how we can faithfully live out what we signed up to the day we made our monastic profession. Let us never forget that the goal of humility is “that perfect love of God which casts out fear. Through this love, all that we once performed with dread, we will now begin to observe without effort, as though naturally, from habit, no longer out of fear of hell, but out of love for Christ, good habit and delight in virtue.”

            Through the intercession of our Blessed Lady and of our Holy Father Benedict, may the good Lord help each one of us find peace, love and joy as members of of the Belmont Community as we strive to do God’s will in humility and obedience. May he help us keep our hearts and minds focussed on “the one thing necessary,” that search for God, which alone gives meaning to our lives. It is true that we are coenobites, who “serve under a rule and an abbot,” even so, for much of our life we walk the monastic road very much in the solitude of the hermit. Our vocation is not an easy one, needing to be lived in moderation and with balance: work and prayer, solitude and community, silence and communication, suffering and joy, discipline and humanity, austerity and beauty, freedom and obedience. Such is the rich fabric of the Benedictine life. May we ever give thanks to God for calling us to this life, for calling us to Belmont, “and may he bring us all together to everlasting life”.  Amen.roperly that the Patriarch is Pater et Caput of his Church. The title of Patriarch is a synodal title. We very much regretted the fact that the Pope renounced his title of Patriarch.

Cardinal and Patriarch

Consequently, we want to have a role in the decisions taken about our faithful. We want to be closer to the Pope, without however becoming part of the College of Cardinals. The title of Patriarch is different, from the perspectives of protocol, ecclesiology, pastorate and history, from that of Cardinal. The Patriarch is neither superior nor inferior to the Cardinal: there is a difference of category. The title of Cardinal, which for very special reasons, was conferred on my predecessor Patriarch Maximos IV and more recently on certain of my colleagues, Patriarchs and Major Archbishops here present, confronts us with an ecclesiological problem. So we prefer to remain satisfied with the great inheritance comprised in the title of Patriarch.

Patriarchal Council around the Pope

As a corollary of that, we repeat our previously formulated proposal, which has a pastoral, ecumenical, ecclesiological and even political significance: significance for our presence in the Muslim Arab world, and importance for the dual title of this Synodal Assembly, Communion and Witness.

The proposal is the following: we are keen to request firmly that we form a Patriarchal Council around the Pope to meet according to its own agenda.

We hope that this proposal will be adopted by this Synodal Assembly and accepted by His Holiness as primordial and important fruit of this Synodal Assembly and for a good outcome of its acts and results.

Eastern Catholic Churches

From the rostrum of this Special Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, which is entitled, The Catholic Church in the Middle East: Communion and Witness, we ask for a clarification as far as we are concerned. We are Eastern Catholic Churches. Why are these attributes suppressed?

We do not wish in any way to hide these Eastern titles, because of the minority presence (except in the Apostolic Vicariates of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia) of the Latin Church in the East.

We ask to be treated as Eastern Catholic Patriarchal Churches. We are neither suffragans nor dependent dioceses of some dicastery or other, as is continually stated in some Roman news bulletins.

SYNOD AND EPISCOPAL CONFERENCE 

Our Synods are very different from Latin Episcopal Conferences. It should be noted that the concept of an Episcopal Conference was set out at the Second Vatican Council by our predecessor of blessed memory, Patriarch Maximos IV.

But his idea was very different from what is today the Episcopal Conference of the Latin Church. He wanted it to be an embryo of the patriarchal system.

Retreat on the ecclesiological level

We wish to be taken seriously when we tell you that our tradition, in its fullness, is Eastern and Orthodox, not Latin and Western.

In the measure that you take us seriously as authentically Eastern Churches, to that same degree the Orthodox world will believe in the veracity of the ecumenical activity and dialogue of the Roman Church.

Unfortunately, the decrees of Vatican II Unitiatis Redintegratio and Orientalium Ecclesiarum have not been sufficiently incarnate in the life and ecclesial praxis of the Latin Church nor in that of several Roman Dicasteries, contrary to what was hoped.

The Dies Orientalis instituted by Pius XI practically disappeared after Vatican II.

Interest for the Eastern Churches in general (Catholic and Orthodox) has lessened in the West, both on the official level and on the level of the faithful.

Ecclesiology was more sensitive towards the East before the Council and during its celebration, but it did not progress after the Council.

Election of bishops in the Eastern tradition

For more than two centuries, our Church elected its bishops in the context of our synods, but since the Council, our elections have to be sanctioned by a Roman enquiry.

The late Metropolitan Neophytos Edelby, in his book The Eastern Churches (written in collaboration with Archimandrite Ignace Dick) wrote, “The Melkite Synod, presided over by the Patriarch, has always proceeded freely to the election of bishops, without being required to have any prior authorisation or confirmation from the Holy See.”

From 1817 to 1954, the election of just twenty-three bishops of our Church was confirmed by the Apostolic See of Rome, and that at the express request of the Patriarch or of the bishop concerned.

Canons 251-255 of the Motu Proprio, Cleri Sanctitate of Pope Pius XII (2 June 1957) prescribe that the election of a bishop by the synod must be communicated by the Patriarch to the Roman Pontiff, who, if the elected does not figure in the list of “episcopable” priests previously drawn up (by vote) by the synod and confirmed by the Pope, either confirms or rejects the election. From 1959 to 1962, six hierarchs of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church were confirmed in that way by Rome after their election by the synod.

The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches (1990), on the basis of the Vatican’s decisions, keeps the list of episcopables and replaces the “confirmation” of the episcopal lists by what is called the “consent” of the Pope to the election.

This issue has been the subject of several meetings of the Council of Eastern Catholic Patriarchs, which presented a collective paper on the matter to the Holy Father in October 2001, that was almost completely in agreement with the viewpoint set out on 21 January, 2000 in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith by the then Patriarch of Antioch of the Syrians, now Emeritus, His Most Eminent Beatitude Cardinal Ignatius Moussa Daoud. 

As we did already during the plenary session of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches in November, 2002, we propose a slight modification to canon 182 of the CCEC (CCEO), with a view to introducing a more collegial procedure for gathering information about candidates for the episcopate, without losing the spirit of the legislation.

That means that the Pope and the synod will together exercise their prerogative and duty of vigilance in the choice of the Church’s pastors.

Communion between Rome and the Eastern Catholic Churches: trust and co-ordination

There must be created an atmosphere of complete trust, real collaboration and co-ordination, and effectual communion between Rome and the Eastern sui iuris Churches. The former terms of confirmation, consent or assent should be avoided and replaced by that of joinder, in the sense that the Pope joins in the synodal collegiality and adopts as his the decision of the bishops with their Patriarch.

There remains however the Pope’s right – ius vigilandi – not to join in an election but to reject it for special reasons which should be communicated confidentially to the Patriarch and eventually to the synod.

However this ius vigilandi of the Apostolic See of Rome, always exercised, from the perspective of Vatican II, in harmony with the Eastern Churches sui iuris, which themselves also enjoy this ius vigilandi, should not become the basis for regular interference.

East and West, even in the Catholic Church, must be in continual dialogue to bring about unity. The election of bishops is one of the most important issues in this regard, since it affects the East’s autonomy and furthermore the Orthodox brethren with whom we long to resume communion.

We ask to be treated as real Easterners and even, to speak plainly, as Orthodox in communion with Rome and so Catholic.

We are an Eastern Church in communion with Rome

We are an Eastern Church in communion with Rome and faithfully so, yet which wants to remain faithful to the pure, Orthodox spiritual tradition. I make bold to say that we are an Orthodox Church with the little or big plus of communion with Rome, with the Pope and our Holy Father Benedict XVI who presides in primacy and charity. Treat us as a real Eastern Church, just as you would the Orthodox on the day when the much longed for union takes place!

It is not just a matter of simple terminology or etymology. The great theologian Joseph Ratzinger certainly understands the justification for this account.

I am still referring to what the then Professor Ratzinger wrote in a book (in French) published in 1971, The New People of God: “Unitary ecclesial law, unitary liturgy, one and one and the same centralised model of bishops being nominated by Rome, all those do not necessarily form part of the primacy as such, as may be seen to be true only when both ministries [of Pope and Patriarch] become just one. So, in future, we shall have to distinguish more clearly the actual function of Peter’s successor from the patriarchal function and if need be, create new Patriarchates detached from the Latin Church.” 

These words form a very significant ecclesiological basis which has not yet been taken up and used by the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity, or in the dialogue and work of the Joint Commission for the Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church. 

For all that, we urge that a place be given us on the Joint Commission.

Encouraging local dialogue: Orthodox-Catholic

On that basis, we wish then for more encouragement to develop local dialogue with our sister Orthodox Church and co-operation with her in the fields of pastoral care, catechesis, activities of confraternities, social involvement and matters relating to the personal statute.

It should be recalled that after our synodal initiative of 1996 with the aim of re-establishing communion with the Orthodox Church of Antioch, while remaining in communion with the Catholic Church, Rome, through the agency of Cardinals Joseph Ratzinger, Achille Silvestrini and Edward Idris Cassidy in a letter dated 11 June 1997, opposed no veto on that initiative, as many thought and said, but asked us to consult the Holy See for any decision in which doctrinal questions were involved.

Gregorios III

Patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church

Translation from the French: V. Chamberlain