Protestant churches this week reacted with dismay to a new declaration approved by Pope Benedict XVI insisting they are mere ”ecclesial communities” and their ministers effectively phonies with no right to give communion.
Coming just days after the reinstatement of the Latin mass, this week’s document left no doubt about Benedict’s eagerness to back traditional Roman Catholic practices and attitudes, even at the expense of causing offence.
The view that Protestants cannot have churches was first set out by Benedict seven years ago when, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he headed the Vatican ”ministry” for doctrine. A commentary attached to the latest text acknowledged that his 2000 document, Dominus Iesus, had caused ”no little distress”.
But, it added, ”it is nevertheless difficult to see how the title of ‘Church’ could possibly be attributed to [Protestant communities], given that they do not accept the theological notion of the Church in the Catholic sense and that they lack elements considered essential to the Catholic Church.”
The pope’s old department, which issued the document, said its aim was to correct ”erroneous or ambiguous” interpretations of the Second Vatican Council, which ended in 1965. Quoting a text approved by the Council it said Protestant churches, ”because of the absence of the sacramental priesthood”, had not ”preserved the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic Mystery”.
Other Christians saw the latest document as another retreat from the spirit of openness generated by the Council, which laid the basis for talks on Christian unity. Bishop Wolfgang Huber, head of the Protestant umbrella group Evangelical Church in Germany, said: ”The hope for a change in the ecumenical situation has been pushed further away by the document published today.”
He said the new pronouncement repeated ”offensive statements” from the 2000 document and was a ”missed opportunity” to improve relations with Protestants.
The president of the Federation of Evangelical Churches in Italy, pastor Domenico Maselli, called it a ”huge step backwards in relations between the Roman Catholic Church and other Christian communities.” A statement from the French Protestant Federation warned that the internal document would have ”external repercussions”.
The Church of England reacted more cautiously than seven years ago when Dominus Iesus was issued and the then Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, denounced it as unacceptable. The spokesperson for the current archbishop, Rowan Williams, said: ”This is a serious document, teaching on important ecclesiological matters and of significance to the churches’ commitment to the full, visible unity to the one church of Jesus Christ.”
The Vatican’s statement had fewer misgivings about the Orthodox Church, which had ”true sacraments” and a genuine priesthood. But their failure to acknowledge the pope’s authority meant they suffered from a defectus, politely translated from Latin as ”a wound”. — Â