VATICAN CITY – A Lutheran observer at a synod of Roman Catholic bishops told his hosts they were out of touch with trends in their own Church, where he said priests ignored a Vatican ban on sharing communion with Protestants.
An Anglican observer touched on the same issue, asking why Pope Benedict – who upholds the ban – made a surprise exception by giving communion to the Protestant founder of the ecumenical Taize community at Pope John Paul's funeral in April.
The two observers spoke on Tuesday and their remarks were distributed by the official Vatican press office on Wednesday.
Initially encouraged by his stated commitment to fostering Christian unity, Protestant leaders have recently been asking why Benedict blocks one of their most urgent requests – that Catholics be allowed to share communion with Protestants.
Norwegian Bishop Per Lonning, the World Lutheran Federation observer at the synod, said he was saddened to see that discussion documents for the meeting ruled out joint communion.
'Conclusions are presented and logically championed with no reference to what has been and is going on in your own Church,' he told the meeting.
Lonning said he had seen Catholics sharing communion with Protestants in the United States three decades ago and at a cathedral 'in the Southern Hemisphere' – with the explicit approval of the local archbishop – in the mid-1990s.
The Catholic Church bars sharing communion with Protestants, arguing they do not agree about its nature and significance, but most Protestant churches invite all Christians to take part.
The issue causes tensions among believers in countries with large Catholic and Protestant populations – such as the United States, Britain and Germany – and many mixed-faith marriages.
John Hind, the Anglican bishop of Chichester in England, echoed a persistent question among Protestants when he asked why Benedict, while he was still the top Vatican doctrinal authority, made an exception for Taize's Protestant founder.
'How should we interpret the public giving of communion to Brother Roger Schutz?' he said, according to the official summary of his speech released by the Vatican.
Vatican aides have said Benedict knew that Schutz – who was murdered by a deranged woman in August – shared the Catholic view of communion.
According to a Vatican briefer at least one Catholic participant in open discussions at the synod on Tuesday night said there should be more ecumenical dialogue among Christians of various denominations at the local level.
On Wednesday, Cardinal George Pell of Sydney defended the tradition of priestly celibacy, rejecting suggestions that allowing priests to marry would help ease a shortage in many parts of the world.
'To loosen this tradition now would be a serious error,' he said, adding that it would cause confusion and 'practical disadvantages' to the work of the Church.
Pell said he believed the recent sexual abuse scandals that have rocked the Church did not invalidate what he said were enormous gains made for the Church
I am a bit confused about this.
Is the article for or against joint Anglican/Lutheran and RCC communion?
I don't get this. Imagine Catholics lecturing Protestants how to celebrate the Eucharist. These Protestants seem incredibly arrogant. Ecumenism means unification based on truth, not compromise for the sake of compromise. To the extent that there is not shared doctrine, the ecumenical modus operandi should be mutual respect. These Protestants certainly are not respecting the Catholic Church's right to her own beliefs on the nature of the Eucharist here. Again, the arrogance is just rank.