Posted on 01/18/2012 3:19:15 PM PST by NYer
.- Pope Benedict XVI said today that achieving Christian unity requires more than “cordiality and cooperation” and that it must be accompanied by interior conversion.
“Faith in Christ and interior conversion, both individual and communal, must constantly accompany our prayer for Christian unity,” said the Pope to over 8,000 pilgrims gathered in the Vatican’s Paul VI Audience Hall on Jan. 18.
The Pope’s comments mark the start of the 2012 Week of Prayer for Christian Unity that runs until Jan. 25. It will be observed by over 300 Christian churches and ecclesial communities around the globe.
The Pope asked for “the Lord in a particular way to strengthen the faith of all Christians, to change our hearts and to enable us to bear united witness to the Gospel.”
In this way, he said, they “will contribute to the new evangelization and respond ever more fully to the spiritual hunger of the men and women of our time.”
The Pope explained that the concept of a week of prayer for Christian unity was initiated in 1908 by Paul Wattson, an Episcopalian minister from Maryland. One year later, he became a Catholic and was subsequently ordained to the priesthood.
Pope Benedict recalled how the initiative was supported by his predecessors Pope St. Pius X and Pope Benedict XV. It was then “developed and perfected” in the 1930s by the Frenchman Abbé Paul Couturier, who promoted prayer “for the unity of the Church as Christ wishes and according to the means he wills.”
The mandate for the week of prayer, the Pope underscored, comes from the wish of Christ himself at the Last Supper “that they may all be one.” He observed that this mission was given a particular impetus by the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) but added that “the unity we strive for cannot result merely from our own efforts.” Rather, “it is a gift we receive and must constantly invoke from on high.”
The theme for 2012 Week of Prayer – “All shall be changed by the victory of Jesus Christ our Lord” – was crafted by the Polish Ecumenical Council. Pope Benedict said it reflects “their own experience as a nation,” which stayed faithful to Christ “in the midst of trials and upheavals,” including years of occupation by the Nazis and later the Communists.
The Pope tied the victory the Polish people experienced over their oppressors to overcoming the disunity that marks Christians.
He said that the “unity for which we pray requires inner conversion, both shared and individual,” and it cannot be “limited to cordiality and cooperation.” Instead, Christians must accept “all the elements of unity which God has conserved for us.”
Ecumenism, the Pope stated, is not an optional extra for Catholics but is “the responsibility of the entire Church and of all the baptized.” Christians, he said, must make praying for unity an “integral part” of their prayer life, “especially when people from different traditions come together to work for victory in Christ over sin, evil, injustice and the violation of human dignity.”
Pope Benedict then touched on the lack of unity in the Christian community, which he said “hinders the effective announcement of the Gospel and endangers our credibility.” Evangelizing formerly Christian countries and spreading the Gospel to new places will be “more fruitful if all Christians together announce the truth of the Gospel and Jesus Christ, and give a joint response to the spiritual thirst of our times,” he explained.
The Pope concluded his comments with the hope that this year’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity will lead to “increased shared witness, solidarity and collaboration among Christians, in expectation of that glorious day when together we will all be able to celebrate the Sacraments and profess the faith transmitted by the Apostles.”
The general audience finished with Pope Benedict addressing pilgrims in various languages, including greeting a group of men and women from the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, before leading the crowd in the Our Father and imparting his apostolic blessing.
Maybe you might like BBQ sauce. You might need it for your soul.
I believe that the Catholic Church was founded by Christ. The apostles were the first Bishops and priests.
Your loss.....
The Catholic Church was founded by pharisees, over 300 years after Christ ascended.
>>Prove it! Just more uneducated trash written by professional bigots.
The next thing we are going to see is how the Jews are trying to take over the world.
Or about black helicopters.
Where do you get this history; source? I'm trying to help you out here, FRiend.
You keep on swinging, but it's just air if it's only you coming up with this.
So, help yourself out, appeal to some authority here; cite somebody, anybody, who supports the view that the NT Church was Baptist or Methodist or Anything But Catholic. A link will do...
Thats not what I meant. We are his instruments is what I was getting at.
Light gray choppers can operate during the day...
I just can’t take people like this seriously. They aren’t interested in dialog or in learning anything.
The NT church was Jews that followed Christ for the first 35 years or so. The early church was indiscernable from any other synogogue for two centuries.
4 When arguing with fools, don’t answer their foolish arguments, or you will become as foolish as they are. 5 When arguing with fools, be sure to answer their foolish arguments, or they will become wise in their own estimation.
Proverbs 26:4
OK, I’ll stop answering your foolish arguments then.
The NT church was Jews that followed Christ for the first 35 years or so. The early church was indiscernable from any other synogogue for two centuries
>>Where is your evidence? Prove it using Catholic scholars.
OK, I’ll stop answering your foolish arguments then.
>>You have lost the debate. Congratulations!
Source for that, FRiend? We really need some authoritative back up for this. I posted Justin Martyr on the Church earlier, that was within the first 200 years. And there's a lot more.
So we need sourcing for the synagogue theory to help you out here.
Also need some sourcing for after 233 AD. Need to support that the Church was Baptist or whatever in 250.
It's not just you saying this, is it? Let's get out there and support these arguments!
The early church was indiscernable from any other synogogue for two centuries.
Amen!
Small-minded bigots base their prejudices on fear, not on facts.
People like us are the worst of them all because we used to be Protestant “Bible-believers”.
If facts mattered, they would consider all of the facts. But maybe they are just afraid of what they would find at the other end of the tunnel.
Nope, no dialogue, brick wall. All attack against straw men, no defense.
But it doesn’t take long to shine a light and see there’s nothing there anyway.
But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law. For they are unprofitable and vain. 10 A man that is a heretic, after the first and second admonition, avoid: 11 Knowing that he, that is such an one, is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned by his own judgment.
Titus 3:9-11
Ignore the heretic.
This was written by Apostles. It is about the Authority of the priest reading it to the Church. The authority handed down by the Apostles.
If you ever want to enlighten yourself from stereotypes go to ordination of a priest in the Church. When you go the Priests of every stature lay hands on each other. It is explained this has been for two thousand years. Those hands go back to the apostles from older priest to younger priest then to the next generation.
Acts 6
The Choosing of the Seven
1 In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews[a] among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.
2 So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables.
3 Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them 4 and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.” 5 This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. 6 They presented these men to the Apostles, who prayed and Laid Their Hands on them.
7 So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.
ACTS: 6 They presented these men to the Apostles, "who prayed and Laid Their Hands on them".....And a large number of PRIESTS became obedient to the faith.
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