Sharing Communion by 2017 between Lutherans and Roman Catholics!?
Munib Younan, LWF President: “Our intention is to arrive at 2017 with a common Roman Catholic-Lutheran declaration on Eucharistic hospitality.”[1]
BUT:
That’s in “…the far and ultimately unreachable distance,” stated Walter Cardinal Kasper in his official capacity as head of the Vatican department, The Pontifical Council For Promoting Christian Unity.
For Rome sharing communion is “unreachable” if a church has women bishops – as Kasper warned the bishops of the Church of England in 2006.
“Ecumenical dialogue in the true sense of the word has as its goal the restoration of full Church Communion. That has been the presupposition of our dialogue until now. That presupposition would realistically no longer exist following the introduction of the ordination of women to episcopal office,” Kasper said.
He added that communing together is also impossible: “The shared partaking of the one Lord’s table, which we long for so earnestly, would disappear into the far and ultimately unreachable distance.”[2]
Was Younan implying the LWF will stop ordaining women bishops? Or is he simply clueless?
You can’t make this stuff up.
[1]Luigi Sandri, “Lutheran Leader seeks Communion agreement with Pope,” The Christian Century, 12/17/2010.
[2] “Unity impossible if Anglican Church ordains women bishops, says Cardinal Kasper,” Catholic News Agency, 6/8/2006; emphasis added.