Benedict on the East

In The Pope of Rome and the Christian East , an Eastern Catholic scholar surveys Benedict’s Light of the World for his statements about or of relevance to Eastern Christianity, Catholic and Orthodox. For example, on the the nature of the unity between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches:

He [Benedict] notes that unity between Orthodoxy and Catholicism needs to happen in order to spread the gospel and help the world believe, but that we must “truly relearn to see and understand our inner spiritual kinship with each other.” He is not, he says, concerned firstly with “tactical, political progress, but rapprochement on the level of our interior affinity” (87).

He expands on this later, rightly noting that “beyond the doctrinal issues, there are still many steps to be taken at the level of the heart. God still needs to do some work on us here. For the same reason, I would also be shy about making any predictions about when reunion will happen. The important thing is that we truly love each other, that we have an interior unity, that we draw as close together and collaborate as much as we can—while trying to work through the remaining areas of open questions” (89-90).This, of course, clearly echos John Paul II’s oft-stated call for the “healing of memories,” on which I’ve commented previously with reference to Orthodoxy (“The Healing of Memories : a Suggestion for Liturgical Enactment,”  Ecumenical Trends 34 [2005]: 9-12), including  here .

It’s a very helpful survey, with the writer’s own commentary, for those interested in this matter.