Ecumenism: Bridges instead of barriers

Ecumenism is one of the focal points of the first part of our pilgrimage.  Ecumenism and inter-religious dialogue have certainly been major areas of focus for the religious community since 9/11 and it’s necessary for us to understand the areas where Christian and non-Christian faiths agree and disagree.  One of the things our course on ecumenism has made very clear is that, while intellectual and theological disagreements exist between Christian religions, these differences are not insurmountable and that, as ministers, we can make headway on these questions by taking seriously Pope Francis’ instructions to go out and engage with people of different faiths and to meet people where they are at.

Speaking of the differences between Christian faiths, one of the things we experienced was the Armenian Christmas Eve, which the Armenians and the leader of their church celebrated at the Church of the Nativity yesterday.  It was a very moving experience to be part of a Christmas celebration in the city of Bethlehem, where Jesus was born.  However, one of the things that struck me while observing these ceremonies was a desire to really get at an understanding of the roots of the differences between Latin and Armenian Christianity, to use this example, and to really reaffirm my desire to follow the teaching of St. Ignatius of Loyola, namely that one needs to go and encounter and understand different cultures and groups from their perspective.

We were given an almost immediate opportunity to follow the Pope and Ignatius’ instructions when we went to visit the Latin Patriarchate Seminary in the afternoon.  This seminary forms men to serve as priests in Israel, Palestine and Jordan, with the majority of those in the seminary coming from Jordan.  We were given a tour of the seminary, which was founded in 1854 and has a very beautiful view of the city of Bethlehem by a seminarian that had lived in the United States for some time.  However, something one cannot ignore about this seminary is that it is located in the Palestinian territory and enrolls a number of seminarians who are from that territory.  This presented us with an excellent opportunity to dialogue with people there about ongoing situation between Israel and Palestine and to make progress in developing a fuller understanding of what is certainly an enormously complex issue.  All in all, it was a very interesting and enjoyable day and we are all very grateful to those who have made this experience possible.