Catholics and Anglicans presented a document with the title “Mary: grace and hope in Christ” at Seattle in the USA on Monday 16 May. The text is the result of five years’ work (from 1999 to 2004) and was drawn up by ARCIC, the international Commission of dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Churches of the Anglican Communion. The document (in English) was presented by the two co-chairmen of ARCIC, Msgr. Alexander J. Brunett, Catholic archbishop of Seattle, and by Peter F. Carnley, archbishop of Perth and Primate of the Anglican Church in Australia. Drafted by a commission composed of 18 members, the Seattle document is the first bilateral international dialogue focused entirely on the role of Mary in the Church. It is subdivided into 80 paragraphs: the first two sections define the role of Mary in Holy Scripture, in the first Church Councils, in the Fathers of the Church and in the theologians of the early centuries of Christianity. The convergence found in the first two sections of the text helps to address the more controversial questions tackled in the third part of the document, i.e. those relating to the two Marian dogmas of the Immaculate Conception (defined by Pope Pius IX in 1854) and of the Assumption of Mary into Heaven (defined by Pope XII in 1950). In the conclusions, Anglicans and Catholics make a series of common affirmations in which they declare that “any interpretation of the role of Mary must not obscure the unique mediation of Christ” and reaffirm that “it is impossible to be faithful to Scripture without paying due attention to the person of Mary”.
