In his Jubilee letter for the year 2000, Pope John Paul said:
By
fixing our gaze on Christ, the Great Jubilee has given us a vivid sense
of the Church as a mystery of unity… The prayer of Jesus in the Upper
Room- “as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in
us” (Jn 17:21) is both revelation and invocation. It reveals to us the
unity of Christ with the Father as the wellspring of the Church’s unity
and as the gift which in him she will constantly receive until its
mysterious fulfilment at the end of time… Christ’s prayer reminds us
that this gift needs to be received and developed ever more profoundly…
It is on Jesus’ prayer and not on our own strength that we base the
hope that even within history we shall be able to reach full and
visible communion with all Christians. (Novo Millennio Ineunte 48)
In
other words, Christian Unity is not only Jesus’ prayer for his
disciples in the Church, it is his plan for the completion of his
creation and the redemption of all humanity. So the barriers between
Christians stand in the way of Christ’s will. The Catholic Church, led
by the ministry of our Pope as the successor to St Peter, the leader of
the Apostles, therefore has a vocation to build ever closer unity and
communion among God’s people. Indeed it has been renewed by the call of
Christ to unity, especially since the Second Vatican Council. To be
Catholic is to be ecumenical.
The Diocese of Westminster takes
this teaching seriously and seeks to foster a spirit of unity and
reconciliation in every part of its life and work. In accordance with
the Directory for the Application of Principles and Norms on Ecumenism
(which was published by the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity at
Rome in 1993), we invite members of other Christian traditions to be
actively involved with us in this task.
The short study version by the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales in 2002 (developed by our own Bishop Bernard Longley), The Search for Christian Unity,
makes our ecumenical commitment very clear. It should be carefully
studied, because the practical details of working, witnessing, praying
and sharing dialogue together with other Christians are essential:
God
is drawing all human beings, and all creation, into union with himself.
To accomplish this, the crucified and risen Christ is calling human
beings into the new People of God, the Church. This Church embraces an
immense variety of women and men. To establish this People, Christ
called the Twelve Apostles, with Peter as head, and gave them the task
of preaching the Gospel, celebrating the sacraments and leading the
People of God in love. The Church continues to be served by the
ordained ministry of bishops, priests and deacons. What holds the
Church together is the bonds of faith and sacrament, and a ministry
which is hierarchical... United in this way, the People of God forms a
communion – or to ‘give its Greek name, koinonia, ‘fellowship’. (Search for Christian Unity 1. Cf Lumen Gentium 2&5 and Directory on Ecumenism 11-12)
From
this we understand that the very structure of the Catholic Church is to
serve the unity of all humanity in Christ through the unity and
communion of the entire people of God. Thus our life as the Diocese of
Westminster consistently reaffirms the call to work for the day when
“together with each and everyone of Christ’s followers we shall be able
to join wholeheartedly in singing ‘How good and how pleasant it is,
when brothers live in unity (Ps 133:1)’ ” (Novo Millennio Adveniente 48)
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