The 21st Council

Pope John XXIII stepped into his black Cadillac one day last week and rode to the church of St. Paul Outside the Walls. (Along his route, the night before, policemen had painted out life-size posters of Paris-born Cinema Star Marina Vlady in a skintight bathing suit.) In a hall adjoining St. Paul's, before 20 surprised cardinals assembled to celebrate the 1,900th anniversary of the Epistle to the Romans, the Pope announced what may well be the most important 20th century landmark in the history of the Roman Catholic Church; the 21st Ecumenical Council, which will probably meet in 1961.

Convened under the presidency of the Pope or his legate, an ecumenical council brings together the whole world's Roman Catholic hierarchy--cardinals, patriarchs, primates, archbishops and bishops, and the abbots and superiors of certain orders. The decisions of the ecumenical council, subject only to papal confirmation, are binding on all Catholics; it was the last ecumenical council in 1869-70 that declared the dogma of papal infallibility.*

Oligarchy of Patriarchs. Prime objective of the next council will be "to invite the separated religious communities . . . to seek the unity of the church, desired by so many souls all over the world." Said John XXIII: "We ardently desire their return to the house of the common Father . . . they will not enter a strange house but their own." Prime target among the "separated religious communities" is Eastern Orthodoxy. In Pope John's first public speech the day after his election, he went out of his way to beam benevolence toward the estimated 150 million communicants who are spiritual descendants of the church in Constantinople, which in the 4th century easily rivaled the authority of Rome and finally broke with the Roman Pope over a combination of political and doctrinal disagreements.

Unlike Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy has no single head but what has been described as "an oligarchy of patriarchs." There are five major patriarchates: Constantinople (Istanbul), Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem and Moscow, plus lesser patriarchs for the Serbs, Rumanians and Georgians. Most prestigious is the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, called "first among equals," whose present incumbent is Archbishop Athenagoras I, longtime friend of Pope John.

During his 20 years as a Vatican diplomat in Bulgaria and in Greece and Turkey, John is said to have grown optimistic about the possibilities of closer relations with the Eastern church.

Last week one leading Vatican spokesman said that "the chances of healing the rift between the Roman and Orthodox churches are better now than they have been for hundreds of years." A major factor in the new climate has been Vatican support of the Orthodox churches against increasing pressure from Moscow. But one immovable foundation of Roman doctrine seems to stand in the path of reunion: the insistence that the Bishop of Rome is successor of St. Peter, Vicar of Christ and supreme ruler of all Christians.

Insurmountable Barriers. The same ancient obstacle is a roadblock to unity with those other "separated communities"--the Protestants. Pope John is said to be sounding out Protestant leaders on the possibilities of having Protestant representatives at the ecumenical council as "observers." This in itself would be a significant step in Protestant-Catholic relations; Protestants refused to attend the last ecumenical council of 1869-70. Last week Protestant reactions to the Pope's planned council were calculatedly reserved.

General Secretary Willem Visser 't Hooft of the World Council of Churches commented that much would depend on "how ecumenical the council will be, in composition and spirit." There are "enormous" possibilities for cooperation (e.g., joint action against Communist oppression, prevention of atomic warfare, the problems of Christians in non-Christian countries), "provided that the Vatican is willing to admit and accept dogmatic differences." In Britain the Archbishop of Canterbury indicated that the Anglican Church would send an observer, if invited, but a spokesman for the Presbyterian Church of Scotland was dour. "We are very keen on the ecumenical movement," he said, "but not under Roman Catholic sponsorship. We want a union of Christendom, but not on their terms."

Said President Marc Boegner of the Federation of Protestant Churches of France: "There are barriers humanly insurmountable . . . But it is no less true that a radically new climate has developed in the course of the last decades in the relations of the great Christian confessions among themselves." In the U.S., President Edwin T. Dahlberg of the National Council of Churches said: "Anything that would bring together all the churches of Christ would be blessed of God." But, he added, "it would have to be recognized that it was a mutual coming together, not under conditions laid down by one church for all the others."

*Among past councils were Nicaea (325), which formulated the first Nicene Creed; Constantinople (869), which was the beginning of the final schism between the Eastern and Western churches; Trent (1545-63), which condemned Martin Luther as a heretic and tightened up Catholic practice and doctrine.

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