Preface to Volume III: ecumenism

Professor Emeritus of the 

School of Theology and Religious Studies

The Catholic University of America

Member of the Joint International Commission for 

Theological Dialogue Between the 

Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church

In fidelity to Christ, who desired and prayed for the unity of his disciples, Metropolitan Kallistos was deeply committed to ecumenism. As the talks gathered in this precious volume testify, he brought to this work a huge wealth of scholarship, both historical and theological, and a wonderful wit (I laughed out loud more than once as I read them). Permeating all of that, and very evident here, was the sense he had of the profoundly spiritual nature of dialogue, and his confidence in the power of reason. He was a consummate teacher, and he continues to teach in these pages, with the freshness of the original live lectures.

Created as we are in the image of God, relationship is essential to our personhood, and so is dialogue. “The human animal is dialogical,” he said. As he explains in a masterly chapter here, the real problem between Latins and Greeks that caused the eventual failure of the Council of Ferrara-Florence, was that “love had grown cold” between them, and surely the same is true of many of the divisions between Christians. For that reason, he was very drawn to the saying of Cardinal Suenens: “To unite, we must first love one another; to love one another, we must first get to know one another.” Revealing his own ecumenical heart, Metropolitan Kallistos said: “That to me sums up our whole ecumenical endeavor.”

Also revealing is his recalling, even many years after hearing it, of an exchange involving one of his teachers, who was inclined towards the rather polemical view that “Latin theology is too logical, relies too much on reason.” The telling response his teacher received was: “There’s no such thing as Latin logic; there’s good logic and there’s bad logic.” “I think this is correct,” says Metropolitan Kallistos. In a similar vein, I was struck to discover here how much he admired one of the outstanding teachings of the Second Vatican Council, that was key to its landmark Declaration on Religious Liberty, Dignitatis humanae (DH), namely: “The truth cannot impose itself except by virtue of its own truth, as it makes its entrance into the mind at once quietly and with power” (DH, 2). Commenting on Pope John Paul II repeating that principle in his encyclical letter on ecumenism, Ut unum sint (1995), Metropolitan Kallistos says that those words are “thoroughly reassuring to us Orthodox.” He actually uses them to pose some very thoughtful questions regarding the doctrine of papal infallibility, not polemically but in an honest search for clarity, inviting genuine dialogue.

Some words that Archbishop Rowan Williams used in tribute to Pope Benedict XVI at a Memorial Vespers in Westminster Cathedral, London, on January 24, 2023, seem to me eminently fitting for Metropolitan Kallistos, also. “Remember where Pope Benedict’s theological inspiration comes from. It comes from an era in the life of the Church when ‘reason’ was seen not as a tool of argument, but as a vehicle of vision. It was our capacity to reason that allowed us to behold and wonder at the world together, to see the order of creation and to participate joyfully in it.... As Pope Benedict approached other communities of faith, he did so with this hope and confidence that we could find a way of reasoning together.”

Several chapters here show how Metropolitan Kallistos wrestled not just with papal infallibility, but especially with papal primacy, which he regarded as the major issue separating Catholics and Orthodox. Other issues could be resolved without too much trouble, as he helpfully explains on several occasions, including the Filioque, where, theologically speaking, the approaches of West and East can be seen as “complementary rather than contradictory.” “However, we Orthodox would like you to leave it out of the Creed.” As he posed serious questions to Catholics, particularly regarding a juridical understanding of papal primacy, he was likewise very frank with his fellow Orthodox: “we need to have a stronger doctrine of primacy,” he said. When major disagreements, even confrontations, occur, such as between Moscow and Constantinople over Ukraine, “We Orthodox, in practice, again and again don’t seem to know what to do.”

His own mature view, compellingly presented here, and bearing similarities which he acknowledged to the suggestion of Joseph Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict) at Graz in 1976 that we should return to (non-juridical) ways in which the unique service of the Bishop of Rome was described in the first millennium, was that certain key ideas from the early Church should guide us. He refers to the statement of Father Lev Gillet, in 1947, that two phrases, in particular, have appeal from an Orthodox point of view: first, the idea of the pope having what St Paul said he himself had, namely a care for all the churches, “sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum” (2Cor 11: 28); and second, the pope being “servant of the servants of God,” “servus servorum Dei,” in the famous phrase of Pope Gregory the Great. Along these lines, Metropolitan Kallistos said that he was “willing to ascribe to the Pope an all-embracing pastoral care,” as “peacemaker,” “bridge builder,” especially where there were difficulties between Christians “in any part of the world.” However, he urgently asked: “Is that sufficient from the viewpoint of Roman Catholics?” I think, in essence, it is.

There is much more here besides, including heartfelt reflections on Anglican-Orthodox and (Eastern) Orthodox-Oriental Orthodox relations, two profound talks on eucharistic sacrifice and transformation—also topics of central ecumenical concern—and important, wide-ranging reflections with strong eucharistic resonances on creation, icons, and time itself. Revealing once again the generous, eucharistic spirituality that undergirded all of his reflection, Metropolitan Kallistos recalls a hermit on Mount Athos who every evening watches the glorious sunset in order to collect “fuel for his prayer during the coming night,” and he offers his own spiritual counsel: “Let us also go through the world gathering fuel; let us also seek to find Christ everywhere, to seek to see all things in God and God in all things—also, all persons in God and God in all persons.”   

Having esteemed then-Bishop Kallistos as a teacher at Oxford in the 1980s, it was a great honor and a joy for me to serve with him from 2005/2006 on the reconstituted international Roman Catholic-Orthodox theological dialogue. As well as taking part in plenary discussions, we were often together in drafting committees and working groups. The fairness and care with which he spoke and helped to craft texts were a blessing and an inspiration. In tense or difficult moments, I always felt that if he was there we would find a good way forward in truth and charity. He was a man of dialogue, a man of peace, a man of God. May his memory be eternal!