Az ökumenikus lépések fontosságát hangsúlyozták a lutheránus vezetők és a pápa is közös megbeszélésükön

„Számunkra öröm van az evangélium felszabadító erejében, amelyet a reformátorok felfrissítettek és úgy hirdették a világban. 2017-ben mi ezt szeretnénk megünnepelni” – mondta Younan a hétfős lutheránus delegáció élén, a pápai audiencián tartott beszédében. Az elnök hangsúlyozta, hogy fel kell ismernünk a reformáció szétzúzó aspektusát és az ökumenikus folyamatokat is.

„Ezt az ökumenikus felelősséget nem tudjuk teljesíteni az Önök segítsége nélkül. Ezért felkérjük Önt arra, dolgozzon együtt velünk az évforduló előkészítésében, hogy 2017-ben közelebb legyünk az Élet Kenyerének megosztásában, mint jelenleg.”

Younan elnök nyilatkozatában kifejtette, hogy mennyire fontosak azok a kis lépések, amelyek a két egyházat közelebb vihetik egymáshoz és erősen reméli,  hogy az úrvacsorai illetve eucharisztiai közösségben is láthatóvá lehet nemsokára Krisztus Egyházának egysége.

Younan a pápának egy Betlehemből hozott ajándékot adott át, egy fafaragást, amely az utolsó vacsorát ábrázolja, ezzel is utalva az Úr által szerzett vacsorának a szentségi jelentőségére.

Az elnök kitért arra a cselekedetre is, amely a Lutheránus Világszövetség 11. Stuttgarti Nagygyűlésén történt, méghozzá arra, hogy a XVI. században, a lutheránusok által keményen üldözött anabaptisták utódaitól, a mennonitáktól nyíltan bocsánatot kértek. „reméljük, hogy ez a bocsánatkérési aktus az egész krisztusi egyháztest gyógyulására fog válni” – tette hozzá az elnök.

Younan, aki maga a Jordániai és Szentföldi Evangélikus-Lutheránus Egyház püspöke, a pápa támogatását kérte a közel-keleti béke megteremtéséért és megköszönte azokat a lépéseit is, amelyeket már eddig ennek érdekében tett.

A pápa a delegáció üdvözlésekor háláját fejezte ki azért, hogy a kétoldalú tárgyalások a lutheránusok és a katolikusok között már eddig is „számos szignifikáns gyümölcsöt hoztak” és elmondta, hogy véleménye szerint „lehetséges, hogy lassan és türelmesen elmozdítsuk a korlátokat és előmozdítsuk az egység látható kötelékeit, a teológiai párbeszéd és a gyakorlati kooperáció, valamint a helyi közösségek szintjén.”

A reformáció megünneplésének évfordulójával kapcsolatban elmondta, hogy a „katolikusok és a lutheránusok együtt folytathatják útjukat, az Úr vezetéséért és a jövőbeli segítségéért könyörögve”.

A pápa rámutatott arra, hogy a Megigazulástanról szóló közös nyilatkozat aláírásának tavaly, azaz 2009-ben volt a tízéves évfordulója és ez a nyilatkozat fontos lépés volt a keresztények közötti egység elérésében és stimuláló erő a további ökumenikus párbeszédhez.

Younan elnök mellett az LVSZ főtitkára, Martin Junge és a 2010 júliusában, az LVSZ Nagygyűlésen, Stuttgartban megválasztott következő alelnökök is tiszteletüket tették: Alex G. Malasusa (Tanzánia), az afrikai régió alelnöke, Tamás Fabiny (Magyarország), a közép- és kelet európai régió alelnöke, Helga Haugland Byfuglien (Norvégia), az északi régió alelnöke.

A megbeszéléseken részt vett Kurt Koch bíboros, a Keresztény Egység Elősegítésének Pápai Tanácsának vezetője, valamint számos vatikáni képviselő. 

Younan elnök beszéde itt olvasható el angol és német nyelven: 

http://www.lutheranworld.org/lwf/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Message-from-LWF-President-Bishop-Younan-to-Pope-Benedict-XVI.pdf 

http://www.lutheranworld.org/lwf/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Botschaft-von-Bischof-Younan-an-Papst-Benedikt-XVI.pdf  

Your Holiness:

On behalf of The Lutheran World Federation, I greet you in the Name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We thank you for receiving us this morning, in this holy season of Advent. Advent is both earnest and festive; it holds together memory and hope. Thus it is a fitting time for us to meet together and to hold one another in our prayers.

In this season of renewal and beginning, we are here today as the new leadership of our LWF communion of churches. I was elected President in July at our Eleventh Assembly in Stuttgart, Germany. With me are the Vice Presidents from Africa, Central Eastern Europe, and the Nordic countries, and also our new General Secretary, Rev. Martin Junge, who began his term of office last month. Our delegation represents each region of our global communion.

As we begin our new roles, we welcome the opportunity for this audience. It is for us a sign which honors the remarkable developments between our churches during recent years, and a sign of our hope for what lies ahead. Within our own lifetimes, the climate of relations between Lutherans and Catholics has warmed dramatically – and this climate change has been for the good! Around the world our churches live in a new ecology of relationship. We too celebrated last month, when the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity observed its fiftieth anniversary. Today we want to assure you of the strength of our commitment to continue deepening our life together.

We rejoice because of the ways in which we have reached new levels of theological understanding and agreement, notably in the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification. This is a landmark ecumenical accomplishment: its implications are still being explored in many local contexts around the world and in our international theological dialogue.

We rejoice also because of the many ways in which we can work together in diakonia and advocacy. I would mention especially two: First, we are united in commitment to address the injustices and idolatries exposed by the continuing global financial crisis. Your Holiness, we are grateful for the moral leadership you have provided consistently on these challenges. For our General Secretary also, this is a signature issue, with special attention to addressing the unfair burdens of illegitimate debt.

Our witness will be stronger if we will work together on these problems. Thus we look forward to forging multiple cooperations with our Catholic sisters and brothers at all levels, locally as well as globally.

Second, an issue especially dear to my own heart, of course, is our common vision for a just peace in the Holy Land. Like you, we Lutherans have supported a two-state solution and a shared Jerusalem. Even when outward signs are discouraging, both of us will continue to work toward resolution of conflicts, which have persisted too long and extracted too great a cost. A just peace is possible in the Middle East. This fall I was pleased to participate in the Synod of Bishops devoted to the Christians in the Middle East. It is vital to have a coordinated effort for Christians in the Middle East. What is the Holy Land without indigenous Christians?

Our Stuttgart Assembly this past summer gave The Lutheran World Federation other directions which also are promising for our common witness to the gospel.

Prominent among these was movement toward reconciliation. At this Assembly, our Communion took a memorable action to ask forgiveness from Anabaptists for the legacies of persecutions in the sixteenth century. In preparing for this act, we were especially mindful of those traditions, including Catholics, who also had been persecutors. As Cardinal Kasper said to us, healing of memories with Mennonites is a common task for our communities. Then, with other ecumenical guests, he stood in solemn solidarity with the action. This was a moment when the Spirit of God could be felt in the Assembly. We believe that we took this action on behalf of the whole body of Christ. We pray that this spirit of repentance, reconciliation and renewal will continue to grow among us.

Above all, this was a praying Assembly. The theme itself was a prayer, “Give us today our daily bread.” The theme of bread unfolded to embrace the dimensions of care for the hungry; hunger for justice; and hunger for the Bread of Life.

This Bread of Life appears in this small gift, which I have brought from the Holy Land for Your Holiness. It depicts a meal shared with the One who taught us to pray for daily bread.

But of course first of all it calls to mind that Eucharistic meal at which the host is himself the Bread offered to us. Each of us can bear witness to the importance of this sacramental meal in nurturing our own Christian lives. Each of us also knows the yearning for the time when we will be able to celebrate this feast together.

Today we want to reaffirm our commitment to moving closer toward one another around this Table of the Lord, which Luther saw as the “summa evangelii.” This is a commitment of our prayers, and also of our actions. While we rejoice in each small step which brings us closer together, we do not want to be content with these steps. We remain strong in hope – both for the full visible unity of Christ’s Church and for the Eucharistic communion which is so crucial a manifestation of that unity.

I emphasize this hope especially because we Lutherans already look toward 2017, the 500th anniversary of the Reformation movement. We recognize that this will be a test case for ecumenical relations. For us there is joy in the liberating power of the gospel proclaimed afresh by the Reformers, and we will celebrate that. At the same time, we intend our anniversary to be ecumenically accountable: to recognize both damaging aspects of the Reformation and ecumenical progress since the last major Reformation anniversary. But we cannot achieve this ecumenical accountability on our own, without your help. We are called, both Lutherans and Catholics, to our common vocation of witnessing to the world for the sake of Christ’s kingdom. Thus we invite you to work together with us in preparing this anniversary, so that in 2017 we are closer to sharing in the Bread of Life than we are today.

In love, we ask God to bless your distinctive ministry, and the entire Catholic Church. We ask that you remember in your prayers The Lutheran World Federation and our 145 member churches, even as we continue to remember you in our petitions to the God who comes to us anew this Advent. As we approach Christmas, I would greet you with the words from John, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

A pápa a lutheránus küldöttségnek a következőket mondta angol nyelven:

Dear Bishop Younan, dear Lutheran Friends,
I am happy to greet the representatives of the Lutheran World Federation on the occasion of your official visit to Rome. I offer my cordial best wishes to Bishop Munib Younan and the Reverend Martin Junge on their respective elections as President and General Secretary, together with my prayers for their term of service. 
Five years ago, at the beginning of my pontificate, I had the joy of receiving your predecessors and expressing my hope that the close contacts and intensive dialogue which have characterized ecumenical relations between Catholics and Lutherans would continue to bear rich fruit. With gratitude we can take stock of the many significant fruits produced by these decades of bilateral discussions. With God's help it has been possible slowly and patiently to remove barriers and to foster visible bonds of unity by means of theological dialogue and practical cooperation, especially at the level of local communities.
Last year marked the tenth anniversary of the signing of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, which has proved a significant step along the difficult path towards re-establishing full unity among Christians and a stimulus to further ecumenical discussion. In these years leading up to the five-hundredth anniversary of the events of fifteen seventeen, Catholics and Lutherans are called to reflect anew on where our journey towards unity has led us and to implore the Lord's guidance and help for the future. I am pleased to note that, for the occasion, the International Lutheran - Roman Catholic Commission on Unity is preparing a joint text which will document what Lutherans and Catholics are able to say together at this point regarding our closer relations after almost five centuries of separation. In order to clarify further the understanding of the Church, which is the main focus of ecumenical dialogue today, the Commission is studying the theme:  Baptism and Growing Church Communion. It is my hope that these ecumenical activities will provide fresh opportunities for Catholics and Lutherans to grow closer in their lives, their witness to the Gospel, and their efforts to bring the light of Christ to all dimensions of society.
In these days of joyful preparation for the celebration of Christmas, let us entrust one another, and our common quest for Christian unity to the Lord, who is himself the genuine newness which surpasses all our human expectations (cf. Irenaeus, Adv. Haer., IV, 34, 1).
May the peace and joy of this Christmas season be with you all!