Pope Francis will extend his trip to Sweden for Reformation
commemorations by one day to accommodate a papal Mass for the nations’
Catholics.
Initially, Pope Francis had planned to make a day trip to Sweden on
October 31 to take part in two ecumenical events launching a year of
commemorations of the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.
But at the urging of local Catholics, the Pope decided to spend the
night and celebrate Mass November 1 before returning to Rome.
The Reverend Martin Junge, general secretary of the LWF, told
reporters at the Vatican yesterday that the Lutherans fully understand
the desire of Catholics in Sweden to have Mass with the Pope and the
pastoral responsibility of the Pope to fulfil that request.
“Of course,” he said, “it is also going to reveal that we are not yet
united; it is going to reveal a wound that remains there” since the
divisions between Catholics and Lutherans mean that in general Eucharist
sharing still is not possible.
While Reverend Junge and other Lutheran leaders have accepted an
invitation to attend the Mass, the fact that they will not receive
Communion “is going to be a strong encouragement to continue working
toward unity,” he said.
Both Reverend Junge and Cardinal Kurt Koch, president of the
Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, said the biggest
breakthrough in Lutheran-Catholic relations was the signing in 1999 of a
joint declaration on justification, or how people are made righteous in
the eyes of God and saved.
But before eucharistic sharing and full unity are possible, they
said, further agreement must be found on Catholic and Lutheran
understandings about the church, the Eucharist and ministry.
Cardinal Koch said marriages between a Protestant and a Catholic are a
pastoral concern for both churches, particularly in finding ways to
encourage continued church participation and in dealing with the
question of going to Communion together.
As a pastor in Switzerland, where about half the population is
Catholic and half is Protestant, Cardinal Koch said he began studying
ecumenical theology specifically to understand how to best minister to
such couples. “It’s a most pastoral concern and, I think, very close to
the heart of Pope Francis.”
A year ago, during a visit to a Lutheran church in Rome, a Lutheran
woman married to a Catholic man asked Pope Francis what she and her
husband could do to receive Communion together; the Pope said he could
not issue a general rule on shared Communion, but the couple should
pray, study and then act according to their consciences.
“We sense that our ability to come with relevant responses and
answers to the very complex questions around sharing the Eucharist table
has an urgency in the life of the people,” Reverend Junge told
reporters at the Vatican.
“I really hope the joint commemoration (of the 500th anniversary of
the Reformation) gives us a strong encouragement to be faster, to be
bolder, to be more creative” in addressing remaining differences, “with a
very strong focus on where people feel the lack of unity the heaviest:
around the table.”
Asked if there were any plans for Pope Francis to lift the
excommunication of Martin Luther, Cardinal Koch said no because
“excommunication ends with the death of a person.” It is a penalty
imposed by the church during a person’s lifetime with the hope of
getting the person to return to full communion with the church.
Briefing reporters on the logistics of the trip to Sweden, Greg
Burke, Vatican spokesman, said that because the trip does not include
Stockholm where the nuncio and the only Catholic bishop live, Pope
Francis would be staying at Igelosa, a medical research company near
Lund where the Scandinavian bishops have stayed during their annual
meetings.