Serbian Orthodox Church consider inviting Pope Benedict XVI to celebrate Constantine’s edict
Although my blog posts charting the warming of relations between the Orthodox and Catholic Church are not widely read, nor particularly popular, I still love to observe and write about this. My last post on this topic can be found here.
I hope to one day witness the reversal of the Great Schism and the establishment of a full communion agreement. For that process to begin in our day and age, it would require an historic meeting between the Pope and Patriarch Kirill.
With all of this in mind, it was interesting to read of Serbian Orthodox Church leaders considering inviting the Pope to the celebration of Constantine’s Edict of Milan.
There is a however a potential problem with the Pope attending, and here is the rub:
As such, the event could provide an opportunity for a meeting between the pope and Kirill, patriarch of Moscow, who will certainly be present. This is why the Russian Orthodox Church wants to stop the Serbs. The Moscow Patriarchate wants in fact to decide when and where the two religious leaders should meet face to face.
“It is an internal matter of the Serbian Patriarchate,” Metropolitan Hilarion said in the interview with Politika. “As far as I know, there is no single position on the papal invitation among Serbian Orthodox bishops, nor a single view about the meaning of the anniversary” as an historical event “for the representatives of the various Christian denominations or as an opportunity to express the brotherly unity of local Orthodox Churches.”
For now, the Patriarchate’s official position is simply one of “non-interference”, at least until the Serbs make their final decision.
Tags: Church Life