What Divides and What Unites Orthodox and Catholics: The Path to Christian Unity

Orthodox-Catholic dialog and the way toward deeper understanding. Credit: flickr / Steven Zucker / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Over the past sixty years, Orthodox-Catholic dialog has continued to deepen adjacent arsenic important theological concerns stay unresolved.

According to Rev. Protopresbyter Dr. Nicolas Kazarian, Director of the Department of Inter-Orthodox, Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations astatine the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, who spoke with Greek Reporter, the narration betwixt the Orthodox and Catholic Churches should beryllium viewed not lone done the lens of what inactive separates them but besides done the important ecumenical advancement of the past six decades.

Reflecting connected the astir cardinal differences betwixt the 2 Churches today, Kazarian said the modern signifier of rapprochement began with the historical gathering betwixt Pope Paul VI and Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras successful Jerusalem successful 1964. That encounter, helium maintains, renewed relations betwixt the Churches of Rome and Constantinople and established a model for addressing longstanding differences “with honesty and charity.”

The relation of the Bishop of Rome remains cardinal successful Orthodox-Catholic dialogue

It is wrong this discourse of restored fraternity, said Kazarian successful speaking with Greek Reporter, that the Churches tin attack existent challenges much constructively. Foremost among them is the question of the relation and spot of the Bishop of Rome successful the beingness of the Church.

He noted that the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue, established successful 1979, has focused connected this contented done ongoing reflection and said that effort reflects increasing spot and maturity betwixt the 2 sides. He besides pointed to the Commission’s willingness to revisit the longstanding question of the Filioque, describing it arsenic grounds that some Churches are prepared to prosecute earnestly adjacent successful the astir delicate theological issues.

Kazarian besides identified the quality successful the date of Easter arsenic a pressing concern, arsenic the contented goes beyond doctrine since it affects the communal Christian witnesser of Orthodox and Catholics alike. The division, helium noted, becomes astir evident successful the solemnisation of the Resurrection, “the precise bosom of our faith.”

Shared religion and contented proceed to unite East and West

Even with those unresolved questions, Kazarian emphasized that indispensable elements of religion and contented proceed to unite the Orthodox and Catholic Churches. To exemplify the point, helium referred to a idiosyncratic acquisition from the summertime of past year, erstwhile Archbishop Elpidophoros of America and Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark led a associated pilgrimage to Rome, Constantinople, and Nicaea.

Kazarian said the pilgrimage offered a tangible accidental to admit the profound commonalities that proceed to unite Christians of the East and West. It reminded participants, helium said, that religion is not an abstract conception but “a sacramental world lived wrong the beingness of the Church.”

He emphasized that the 2 traditions stock a communal knowing of the sacraments arsenic the means done which believers are transformed by the grace of God. He besides highlighted an authentic veneration of the saints, the centrality of the Holy Eucharist successful spiritual life, a surviving contented of monasticism, and a heavy committedness to spiritual and theological education.

A communal apostolic inheritance

What moved participants astir during the pilgrimage, Kazarian said, was the mode each contented illuminated the other, as Archbishop Elpidophoros reflected with extent connected the Byzantine practice of Rome, portion Cardinal Tobin offered affluent insights into the value of the First Ecumenical Council during the travel toward Nicaea.

Beyond humanities divisions, Kazarian said, determination remains “a genuine and communal designation of the apostolicity of the Church,” lived and expressed done religion and tradition.

Dialogue arsenic the way toward deeper understanding

Looking astatine the aboriginal of Orthodox-Catholic relations, Kazarian said successful speaking to Greek Reporter that for overmuch of the past 1 1000 years, relations betwixt Orthodox and Catholics were marked by competition, confrontation, and occasional controversy, yet the past sixty years person brought a singular displacement successful paradigm.

Dialogue, Kazarian stated, has go a cardinal way toward communal understanding. However, helium made wide that helium does not presumption this arsenic a diplomatic hunt for the lowest communal denominator oregon arsenic a compromise connected matters of faith. Instead, Kazarian described authentic dialog arsenic “an workout successful truth” successful which each broadside offers the fullness of its individuality and “the richness of his irreducible otherness.”

In that sense, helium maintained, dialog is not simply applicable but “a theological principle,” 1 that places Christ astatine the halfway of the communal travel toward reconciliation and restored communion. It is intrinsic, helium added, to the beingness of the Church.

Personal encounters substance alongside Orthodox-Catholic dialogue

In speaking with Greek Reporter, Kazarian besides emphasized that this dialog takes galore forms due to the fact that it is rooted successful relationship. The enactment of the International Theological Commission remains essential, helium said, but idiosyncratic encounters betwixt Church leaders complement it and transportation adjacent significance.

As an example, helium pointed to the caller gathering betwixt Pope Leo XIV and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew successful Constantinople and Nicaea successful November 2025, during the 1,700th day of the First Ecumenical Council, arsenic an illustration of that dynamic. Ultimately, Kazarian stressed, the ecumenical travel is fundamentally dialogical, grounded successful truth, sustained by emotion and oriented toward unity, and, arsenic Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew reminds us, “truth does not fearfulness dialogue.”