Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 15.djvu/177

 UNION

147

UNION

apostate Church from which it was a blcssinp to be separated, and they anticipated the speedy advent of the time when, its members converted by the Protes- tant preachers, it would dissolve away, and their own purified Churches take its place everywhere. But, as new generations grew up which were not responsible for the schism, devout minds were inevitably led to contrast the sectarianism they had inherited with the beautiful ideal of religious unity praised by St. Paul and realized in their own lands in days i)revious to the Reformation. That there were many such minds is evidenced by the stream of converts to the Catholic Church, which from the days of the Reformers onward has never ceased to flow — of converts who invariably ascribe their first discontent with their previous Protestantism to the scandal of its divisions. The same deep sense of scandal motived the attempts to bring about reunion, whether among the Protestant sects themselves, or between these and the Catholic Church, which were made at various times during the succeeding centuries. All of these attempts failed because set on a false foimdation, but some of them were certainly inspired by a genuine spirit of concord. We cannot indeed regard as so inspired the grouji of German Lutherans, represented by .Tames .\ndrea; and Martin Crusius, who, in the last quarter of the sixteenth century, proposed to the Patriarch Jeremias II of Constant inoole a plan for the union of the Lu- therans with the Greeks on the basis of the Lutheran Creed, a plan promptly rejected by the patriarch; nor the Dutch Calvinists and Anghcan divines who, a generation later, negotiated for a similar union with the semi-Calvinist Patriarch Cyril Lucaris, but were finally repulsed by the Synod of Jerusalem (1672), which condemned their doctrines together with the memory of the patriarch who had coquetted with them; nor again the Galhcan priest, Ellies du Pin, and the Anglican archbishop, Wake, who in the first quarter of the eighteenth century negotiated a reunion between the Anglican and Gallican Churches. In each of these cases the predominant motive was not to heal division, but to aid the cause of separation by strengthening the opposition to the Holy See.

Very different, however, and in every way com- mendable, was the spirit in which the party led by George Callixtus in the second quarter of the seven- teenth century, and that in which Molanvis and Leib- niz in their negotiations with Bishop Spinola of Neu- stadt and the great Bossuet, half a century later, worked for the elaboration of a reunion scheme which the Catholic Church and the Protestant bodies might both be able to accept. The last -mentioned episode, of which a full account may be read in ^L Reaumes' "Histoire de Bossuet", is of peculiar interest, sup- ported as it wa.s by the Court of Hanover, with the approbation of many Protestant princes, and watched with sympathy by Clement IX and Innocent XI. But, though political reasons were the immediate cause of the discontinuance of these negotiations, they were doomed to failure for theological reasons also. Of attempts to unite the Lutherans and Calvinists who formed the two main varieties of Protestantism, several were made in Germany from the time of Melancthon downwards; but all failed until the occurrence of the tercentenary of the Reformation in 1817, when the scheme recommended by Frederick William III of Pru.ssia achieved a partial success which .still endures. By this scheme the two sides were to retain each its own doctrine, but they were to coalesce into one "Evangelical Church" and worship together according to a common liturgy, or agenda, which was drawn up on lines .sufficiently vague to leave untouchc<l the jjoints as to which they were at variance among themselves. Even this modus Vivendi, external and superficial as it was, would not have been able to establish itself had it not been for the pressure applied by royal authority, which in

some districts had to resort to iihysical force; nor has it been able to embrace all the Lutherans in its fold, tending as it did to fa\'our their side less than that of their traditional adversaries.

V. ReCNION JMoVEMEXTS IN TBE PRESENT AgE.

In the present age the divisions of Christendom not only furnish its assailants with their most, effective taunt, but constitute the most serious hindrance in the way of Christian work. Hence, among those who have inherited the condition of separation, the value of Christian unity has come to be much more deeply appreciated than ever before, and many active move- ments ha\e been set on foot, and schemes devised, for its restoration.

A. In the East. — So fiir as the Orthodo.x Churches are concerned it does not appear that the solicitude for reimion is very marked, at least among the rulers and the great mass of the populations. During the last half-century some members of the High Church section of the Anghcan party, and likewise some members of the Old Catholic party in Germany and Switzerland, have approached the adherents of Ru.^sian and Greek Orthodoxy, in hopes of inducing them to promote intercommunion between their respective Churches; but these negotiations, though they have led to occasional interchanges of ecclesias- tical courtesies and concessions, such as the more rigidly consistent Roman Church would deem to be compromising, have not yet attained, and are not Hkcly to attain, their object; for the simple reason that the Orthodox Churches have no intention of uniting with Churches which permit the most funda- mental heresies to be held and taught by prelates and men of .standing in their communions, and yet they are perfectly aware that this is the case in the Angli- can Church, and are likewise aware that the Old Catholics, since they broke away from the Holy See in 1870, have come under Protestant influence and ha\'e lost their hold on much Catholic doctrine. As for negotiations with the Holy See or even an inter- change of ideas with it, the rulers of these Eastern Churches are as ill-disposed as ever, and when invited to do so by recent popes — as by Pius IX, on his accession and when convoking the Vatican Council, and by Leo XIII on his accession and in his "Pra-clara Gratulationis" of 1894 — they have always opposed either scornful silence or words of studied offensive- ncss to the affectionate language of the popes.

A pleasant exception to this rule is the present (1912) Patriarch of Con.stantinoi)le, .Joachim III, who, contrary to the prevailing custom, has been left in office .since 1902 — an unusually long lime. It is known that he is personally inclined towards reunion, l>ut he is only one and when, in 1902, shortly after his accession, he addressed a letter (o the heads of the autocephalous Churches of his patriarchate, proposing to them that they should all agree to enter into nego- tiations both with the Protestant bodies and also with the Churches in union with the Holy See, they were unanimous in refusing even to discuss the idea, so far as Rome was concerned ("Reunion Magazine", Sept., 1910, p. 375, .and Feb., 1911, p. 281). The only basis, they declared, on which the Orthodox Churches could entertain the thought of reunion with the Holy See was that of an acceptance of them.selves as, by rca.son of their fidelity to the teaching of the seven (ecumenical councils, "alone composing the one Holy Catholic and .\postolic Church"; .and hence of a renunciation by the pope of all his innovations on this doctrinal standard, parlioilarly of that worst innovation of all. the pap.al despoli.sm. As there was no present likelihooil of the pope's .a.ssenting to that basis, what room was there for negotiations?

Such was the answer to this important invitation returned so recently by the highest authorities of these Eastern Churches, and, if it represents their real mind we must agree with them that negotiations