EUROPEAN CHRISTIAN CHURCHES " "
After its document on Mary, published in 1999, the ecumenical group of Dombes will shortly present a document on the question of authority, one of the most important problems for the process of communion between the Catholic and Protestant Churches. The text, with the title “One Master Alone. Doctrinal authority in the Church” is the result of a six-year project: apart from analysing divergences of view, Protestant and Catholic theologians will also present a series of specific proposals that may contribute to unity. The French daily “La Croix” recently published news of the forthcoming ecumenical document and dedicated a feature to it. The subject chosen this time by the theologians of Dombes is far from simple. The question of the infallibility of the pope is also tackled. “With the question of authority explains Jesuit Father Bernard Sesboué, member of the ecumenical group we find ourselves at the foot of a wall”. The group’s theologians have tried to tackle the differences between the two Churches: on the one hand, the Catholic Church, with a pyramidal structure in which bishops and especially the pope seem to play almost a monopoly role; on the other, the Reformation Churches, whose autonomy leads to a doctrinal dispersal. Two Churches, two different ways of conceiving authority. Yet continues Father Sesboué “basically, Protestants and Catholics are not after all so far apart. Both recognize the same sources of authority”. Above all the authority of texts: Scriptures, confession of faith, ecumenical councils, but also the fathers and doctors of the Church, theologians and ministers. There is also a kind of “convergence” in the way of articulating authority at the “community” (People of God), collegial (ministry) and personal (conscience) levels. But while the origins of authority are the same, deep differences have arisen in practice. “For example explains the Jesuit to La Croix Catholics and Protestants are agreed in recognizing their fundamental reference in Holy Scripture, but are very far apart in their way of reading it. The former attach great value to the magisterium, the latter to personal faith”. Two different ways of conceiving salvation and the teaching of the Church also weigh heavily on these two conceptions. In their chapter of recommendations, the theologians of Dombes ask Protestants to consider the personal dimension of authority, affirming that authority cannot be exclusively collegial. Yet attaching an exaggerated importance to the individual rather than to the community dimension is criticized. Criticisms are also levelled against the Catholic Church, from which the Dombes group asks for a more up-to-date interpretation of ancient doctrinal tests and a greater “synodality”. Not even the way that the Synod of bishops is regulated is found convincing: the Synod says the group “has now become so rigid as to preclude any real debate”. Lastly, a request is made that the infallibility of the pope which has in practice been little used should only be used in exceptional cases.
