Rome and Constantinople

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

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NY Sun
NEW YORK SUN CONTRIBUTOR

All eyes were on President Bush and Prime Minister Maliki yesterday, but if one takes the longer view, the more important meeting of the day — and even of the year — in the Middle East may well turn out to be the one between Pope Benedict XVI and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I. They issued a joint statement that spoke of preparing for “the great day of the re-establishment of full unity” between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church. Such a “re-establishment of full unity” would heal the Great Schism between the churches of Rome and Constantinople that dates to 1054.

The joint statement yesterday from the pontiff and the patriarch spoke of “the increase of secularization, relativism, even nihilism, especially in the Western world.” It spoke of the need to preserve religious freedom in Europe. Benedict, in his own comments, went even further, reportedly saying, “The divisions which exist among Christians are a scandal to the world.” Days before traveling to Turkey, Benedict XVI had welcomed to the Vatican the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, the leader of the Church of England, which made its own break with Rome in 1534.

Much of the focus on Benedict’s visit to Turkey has been on the conflict between Islam and Christianity. The focus is natural given the Islamic protests that greeted the pope in Anatolia and also given the reaction to the pontiff’s remarks at Regensburg cautioning Muslims about the relation between their religion and violence. A nun was killed as part of the angry Muslim reaction. The violent outbursts against the pope’s words shocked the world and only underscored the truth of what he spoke, though the leader of a billion Catholics was more than gracious in trying to explain that he meant not provocation but dialogue.

Yesterday the pope visited a mosque and met with the chief imam of Istanbul, suggesting he might see Islam not necessarily as an enemy but perhaps as an ally against the aforementioned “secularization, relativism, even nihilism.” Benedict XVI’s predecessor, John Paul II, identified his adversary as communism, helped vanquish it, and when he died last year was mourned as a hero by Catholics and non-Catholics alike. He is on the road to sainthood. It remains to see whether it is extremist Islam or extremist secularism that Benedict XVI will choose to challenge — maybe it will be both.

The editors who conduct these columns have never had, and do not now have, an interest in what is called these days interfaith dialogue. But we admire the pope’s physical courage. He is, after all, in a climate in which, as our London columnist, Daniel Johnson, put it yesterday, the question is not Stalin’s “How many divisions does the pope have?” but “How many divisions does it take to protect the pope?” John Paul II set an extraordinary example in his leadership against the Soviet communist empire. Cardinal Ratzinger assumed the papacy at a much older age than did Karol Wojtyla and so probably has less time to win a victory. No doubt that helps explain the speed with which he’s moving. Seeking unity in Christendom would be a great cause for a pontiff who comprehends that purely secular societies that oppress religion are inherently unstable and that the challenges of radical Islamism are directed not only at Catholicism but at the West itself.

NY Sun
NEW YORK SUN CONTRIBUTOR

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.


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