Each of the above statements is the result of intensive
prayer, study, and uncompromisingly candid discussion among
the Evangelicals and Catholics involved. In each statement we
carefully note that we have not resolved all our differences
on the subjects addressed, and it should be evident that we
resolutely reject any thought of evading such differences. We
believe, however, that these statements go a long way toward
creating greater mutual understanding and recasting old
disputes in new and promising ways.
We understand Evangelicals and Catholics Together as a work
in progress. We are convinced that this is a work of the Holy
Spirit. This work was underway long before ECT was begun. In
recent decades, Evangelicals and Catholics have encountered
one another as brothers and sisters in Christ in many forums,
and especially as they contend together for a culture of life
that will protect the unborn, the aged, the handicapped, and
others who are often deemed to be expendable. These encounters
and the patterns of cooperation they have produced are aptly
described as “the ecumenism of the trenches.” ECT can be
understood as making explicit what was implicit: that our
unity in action is the fruit of our unity in faith. Our unity
in action and in faith is by no means perfect. If this is the
work of the Holy Spirit, as we firmly believe, it will
continue long after the present participants in ECT have
departed this life. We do not know how or when, but we do
believe that the prayer of our Lord in John 17 will be
answered, that his disciples will be one in a way that the
world will see and will
believe that he was sent by the Father.
Moreover, our historical circumstance makes our common
witness increasingly urgent. Our circumstance is one of
unremitting conflict between distinct and antithetical
worldviews, or understandings of reality. Evangelicals and
Catholics together share, and must together contend for, the
Christian worldview. Whatever differences there have been
between us in the past, and whatever differences persist still
today, we stand side by side in contending for the truth of
that understanding of reality. Such solidarity in opposition
to the forces of unbelief is aptly called cobelligerency, and
such cobelligerency is the more solid as it is more firmly
grounded in the Bible, the creeds, and our confession and
worship of Jesus Christ as Lord. With this statement and
related undertakings, we seek to deepen our understanding of
the common faith that binds us so that we might more
effectively address the common tasks that claim us.
A century ago, the noted Protestant leader Abraham Kuyper
recognized that the common defense of a Christian worldview
made necessary precisely the kind of effort in which we are
today engaged. Kuyper argued that, when we understand
Christianity also as a worldview, we “might be enabled once
more to take our stand by the side of Romanism in opposition
to modern pantheism.” In a similar way, Catholic teaching
today, as notably set forth by John Paul II, strongly
encourages the fullest possible cooperation among Christians
in contending for a culture of life and of truth against the
encroaching culture of death and deceit. If then anyone asks
about the purpose of this statement and of the ongoing project
of which it is part, the answer is clear: it is to evangelize
more effectively, to bear witness to the world that Jesus is
the Lord and Savior sent by the Father, and to bring that
truth to bear on every dimension of life—just as we are
commanded to do.
It must be added that ECT is an unofficial initiative. We
speak from and to the communities of which we are part, but we
do not presume to speak for them. We wholeheartedly support
the several official theological dialogues between
Evangelicals and Catholics. ECT is an ancillary initiative,
serving as a kind of advance scouting party to explore
possibilities, and, as such, has received much appreciated
encouragement from many sources, both Evangelical and
Catholic. We have no illusions that the centuries–long wounds
of our divisions will be quickly or easily healed. We are
convinced that ECT is part of a project that is God’s before
it is ours, and is only ours because it is God’s. We offer
this statement on the communio sanctorum in the spirit
of the concluding words of our first statement in 1994: “This
is a time of opportunity—and, if of opportunity then of
responsibility—for Evangelicals and Catholics to be Christians
together in a way that helps prepare the world for the coming
of Him to whom belongs the kingdom, the power, and the glory
forever. Amen.”
Introduction
There is, as we have noted, a definite sequence in the
continuing conversation that is Evangelicals and Catholics
Together. In the first round of conversation, we affirmed
that, despite serious disagreements, we who recognize one
another as brothers and sisters in Christ are called to the
missionary task of proclaiming his lordship to the world.
Acknowledging that we are together in Christ, we then turned
in the second round to address justification as the way in
which we come to share in the life of Christ. In the third
round, we explored our understanding of the word of God and
found ourselves in agreement that Holy Scripture, faithfully
interpreted in the community of believers, is the divinely
given rule by which we are to understand our life and mission
in obedience to Christ. In the present statement, we examine
more closely the nature of our life together. Our life
together is communion in the communio of the
life of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Evangelicals and Catholics both confess the Apostles’
Creed, which speaks of the communio sanctorum. In this
statement, we address four aspects of that article of faith.
First, we look to God as the one who is holy in Himself and in
whose trinitarian communion we must participate in order to be
holy. Second, we examine the relationship of communion among
all those to whom God has imparted a share in His holiness.
Third, we discuss our participation in sacraments or holy
ordinances, which are means of manifesting and fostering the
communion that we share. Finally, we reflect on the communion
that we now share with those Christians who have gone before
us, including those who have exemplified to an exceptional
degree the fidelity to which we are all called, whom many
Christians honor with the special title of “saint.”
I
God declared to Israel and declares to us, “I am the Lord
who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God;
you shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:45).
The theme of God’s holiness permeates the entire Bible. The
holiness of God is the mystery of His ineffable being
manifested to us as His glory, which includes His righteous
and merciful acts to which we are to conform our own lives.
The holiness of God is given classic expression in the
trisagion of Isaiah 6 where the seraphim cry out,
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is
full of His glory.” The threefold holiness of God expressed in
this passage is understood by Christians as reflecting the
life of the Holy Trinity.
All human beings are called to participate in the holiness
of God. The life of Christians who, by the grace of God, have
responded to that call is to be a life of holiness, which is
to say a life of sanctification. Paul writes to his converts
in Thessalonica and to us, “This is the will of God, your
sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). Although our communion
with God is impeded by sin, which repeatedly alienates us from
Him, we are able to be reconciled through Jesus Christ who
prayed to the Father, “For their sake I sanctify myself, that
they may be sanctified in truth” (John 17:19). To be holy is
to participate in the holiness of Jesus who is “the way, the
truth, and the life” (John 14:6). The communion of saints
signifies, first of all, communion, through Christ and in the
power of the Spirit, with God the all–holy.
II
Holiness necessarily entails relationships. In the
communio sanctorum, one cannot be in communion alone.
Holiness is, first of all, a relationship with God in Jesus
Christ, the mediator of all holiness. Such a relationship is
necessarily communal, for God’s own holiness is being in
communion, namely, the communion of Father, Son, and Spirit
dwelling together in love. To enter into fellowship with God
is to enter into fellowship with all who share in the
fellowship of God (1 John 1:3). To be in Christ is to be one
with all who are in Christ. Our Lord prayed that those who
believe in him “may all be one, even as you, Father, are in me
and I in you, . . . so that the world may believe that you
have sent me” (John 17:21). Jesus speaks of the union between
himself and the Father as a mutual indwelling that is to be
extended by his and the Father’s indwelling in the community
of believers. So intimate is the union and so inseparable is
the bond between Jesus and his disciples that those who
persecute them are persecuting him, as is evident in his words
to Saul on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:4). Similarly, those
who are merciful to his disciples will be rewarded for having
shown mercy to Christ himself (Matthew 10:42, 25:34–40).
We Evangelicals and Catholics do not now live out together
the fullness of the unity for which Christ prayed. Yet we do
not lack blessings of unity in the body of Christ, which
includes the vast company of believers of all times and
places, from Abel the righteous one until our Lord’s return in
glory (Hebrews 11). Our task is not to create unity in Christ,
but to give full and faithful expression to the unity that is
his present gift. Our union with Christ and with one another
is never complete in this life, but it can be intensified and
strengthened as we together draw closer to him and to one
another. In the body of Christ, we strengthen one another by
our strengths, even as we weaken one another by our
weaknesses. “If one member suffers, all suffer together; if
one member is honored, all rejoice together” (1 Corinthians
12:26).
To give expression to and thus to strengthen the fellowship
that is already ours, we can and should, despite our different
ecclesial allegiances, do many things together. We can gather
to listen to the word of God, responding in prayer, worship,
and thanksgiving, together with the whole company of heaven.
We can together pray for the many good things that God moves
us to desire, and for protection against the evils we rightly
fear. Thus do we fulfill the prayer of Paul: “May the God of
steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in such
harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that
together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 15:5–6). More particularly,
together and in our separate gatherings, we should pray for
one another. As Paul relied on the prayers of his fellow
Christians (2 Corinthians 1:10–11), so we benefit from our
prayers for one another.
Through common study of the Bible we have gained a better
understanding of God’s word in the tradition of the great
preachers and theologians of earlier centuries, and thus we
have learned to read the Bible more faithfully in and with the
Church. We can together learn to interpret the Scriptures in
faithful attentiveness to the Holy Spirit who inspired the
Scriptures, the same Spirit who Christ promised would lead the
Church into all truth (John 16:3). In recent decades, this
pneumatological and ecclesial way of reading the Scriptures is
being widely recovered, thus protecting the sacred text from
individualistic exegesis and those critical methodologies that
are indifferent, or even hostile, to God’s saving and
sanctifying truth.
In communal worship, Evangelicals and other Protestants
have helped Catholics to value more highly the effective
proclamation of the word of God. At the same time,
Evangelicals have learned from Catholics and Orthodox to
appreciate more fully the importance of ordered liturgy,
including a lectionary based on the seasons of the Christian
year. Noteworthy also is the greater use of one another’s
legacy of hymnody. Patristic and medieval hymns are finding
greater currency among some Evangelicals, while Catholics
today praise God in the songs of Isaac Watts, Charles Wesley,
and others in the Evangelical tradition. In seminaries and
programs of ministerial formation, leaders are increasingly
being educated in both the unity and diversity of the one
Christian movement in world history. Thus do we cultivate an
understanding and experience of our belonging to a common
Christian tradition. This is of growing importance in a
century in which Christianity is sharply challenged by other
world religions, most notably by Islam.
Always we are brought back to mission, and to explore how
we might be more fully together in mission, for there is no
doubt that Jesus speaks to all of us when he commands that we
“make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of
the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew
28:19). As we are sent by the same Lord, as we go forth in the
name of the same Lord, as we proclaim the same Lord, so we
ought to evangelize with one another rather than against one
another. In the words of the Evangelical leaders gathered at
the Amsterdam 2000 conference on evangelization:
Jesus prayed to the heavenly Father that his
disciples would be one so that the world might believe. One
of the great hindrances to evangelism worldwide is the lack
of unity among Christ’s people, a condition made worse when
Christians compete and fight with one another rather than
seeking together the mind of Christ. . . . In all ways that
do not violate our consciences, we should pursue cooperation
and partnerships with other believers in the task of
evangelism, practicing the well–tested rule of Christian
fellowship: “In necessary things unity, in nonessential
things liberty, in all things charity.” We pledge ourselves
to pray and work for unity in truth among all true believers
in Jesus and to cooperate as fully as possible in evangelism
with other brothers and sisters in Christ so that the whole
Church may take the whole gospel to the whole
world.
We participants in Evangelicals and Catholics Together join
in the pledge of Amsterdam 2000, agreeing also with the words
of John Paul II in the 1990 encyclical Redemptoris
Missio (The Mission of the Redeemer):
The relationship between activity aimed at
Christian unity and missionary activity makes it necessary
to consider two closely associated factors. . . . We must
recognize that the division among Christians damages the
holy work of preaching the gospel to every creature and is a
barrier for many in their approach to the faith. The fact
that the good news of reconciliation is preached by
Christians who are divided among themselves weakens their
witness. It is thus urgent to work for the unity of
Christians, so that missionary activity can be more
effective. At the same time, we must not forget that efforts
toward unity are themselves a sign of the work of
reconciliation which God is bringing about in our
midst.
Faithful discipleship requires of us, Evangelicals and
Catholics, that we “do good to all men, especially those who
are of the household of faith” (Galatians 6:10). We grow in
the gift of, and vocation to, holiness as we give ourselves in
service to the poor and needy. While individuals may disagree
about what constitutes a just social order, we are united in
our commitment to certain moral truths and their public
recognition. Respecting the sanctity of human life at every
stage of development and decline, securing the integrity of
marriage and family life, protecting the disabled and
vulnerable, caring for the marginalized and imprisoned—these
are among the mandates that are bringing, and must
increasingly bring, Evangelicals and Catholics together.
Heartening also is our common witness and action in defense of
religious freedom here and around the world, and an awakened
sense of solidarity with persecuted Christians, joined with
effective concern for non–Christians denied their rights of
conscience. Moreover, Catholics and Evangelicals can assist
one another in various circumstances by, for instance,
defending one another from unfair public attacks, providing
worship space and other facilities in times of need, and by
taking up offerings for one another’s charitable works. In all
these and in many other ways we can both express and deepen
our communion with one another that is God’s present gift.
III
Communion among Christians includes the recognition of
certain sacred rites, especially the sacraments or ordinances
that come to us from Christ and the apostles. Although we have
different understandings of how Christ orders his Church, we
agree that communion has both visible and invisible
dimensions. Catholics believe that the full and right ordering
of the Church embraces seven sacraments, including the
apostolic and sacramentally ordained ministry. Evangelicals,
while differing both with Catholics and among themselves on
the number and importance of sacraments, are agreed in
respecting certain practices, such as Baptism, the Lord’s
Supper, marriage, and the reading of Scripture. Some of these
sacred practices and institutions, though differently
understood, are bonds between us that maintain and deepen our
communion.
The Church itself can be understood as a sign and
instrument of grace, instituted by the one mediator between
God and man, Jesus Christ, and, through the gospel, mediating
his grace to the world. While the ancient formula “Outside the
Church no salvation” may lend itself to misunderstanding, we
agree that there is no salvation apart from the Church, since
to be related to Christ is necessarily to be related, in
however full or tenuous a manner, to the Church which is his
body. Although Catholics believe that the Church is visible in
its universal dimension and not only in local congregations,
we as Catholics and Evangelicals together affirm the statement
of Amsterdam 2000:
The Church is the people of God, the body and
the bride of Christ, and the temple of the Holy Spirit. The
one, universal Church is a transnational, transcultural,
transdenominational, and multi–ethnic family, the household
of faith. In the widest sense, the Church includes all the
redeemed of all the ages, being the one body of Christ
extended throughout time as well as space. Here in the
world, the Church becomes visible in all local congregations
that meet to do together the things that according to the
Scripture the Church does. Christ is the head of the Church.
Everyone who is personally united to Christ by faith belongs
to his body and by the Spirit is united with every other
true believer in Jesus.
Similarly, we together affirm the statement of the Second
Vatican Council:
All are called to belong to the new People of
God. Wherefore this People, while remaining one and unique,
is to be spread throughout the whole world and must exist in
all ages, so that the purpose of God’s will may be
fulfilled. . . . It follows that among all the nations of
earth there is but one People of God, which takes its
citizens from every race, making them citizens of a kingdom
which is of a heavenly and not an earthly nature. For all
the faithful scattered throughout the world are in communion
with each other in the Holy Spirit. (Lumen Gentium
II.13)
Because we do not have the same ecclesial structures and do
not fully agree on the doctrinal heritage that we share, there
are some things that we cannot in conscience do together. Our
communion is most manifestly and painfully imperfect in our
inability to be one at the table of the Lord in Holy
Communion. Evangelicals differ among themselves as to how open
or restrictive admission to the Lord’s Supper should be.
Catholics, for their part, cannot in conscience participate in
an observance of the Lord’s Supper absent communion with the
apostolic ministry that they believe Christ wills for his
Church. Evangelicals and Catholics together know that our Lord
commanded us, “Do this.” We know that he intended that we do
this together. Our different discernments of what is entailed
in doing this obediently prevent us from doing this together.
This circumstance is an abiding and heartbreaking sadness.
We together pray that our imperfect communion will one day
give way to full communion in eucharistic fellowship. At
present, we cannot see beyond some disagreements that appear
to be intractable. Our visibly fractured fellowship at the
Lord’s table can, at the same time, be a salutary reminder of
how far we are from the goal of complete unity, and a spur to
more urgent prayer and work that one day the prayer of Jesus
in John 17 will be fully answered. That fulfillment is finally
the work of the Holy Spirit, who moves in ways that we cannot
always anticipate. In the meantime, however, we recognize that
the right ordering of the Church and all the means of grace
are precisely means. They serve the end of personal union with
Christ, and that union is effected, by the grace of God, when
believers avail themselves of the means of grace available to
them. We Evangelicals and Catholics gratefully acknowledge our
unity in being reconciled to God through Christ, and pray for
the day when that unity can be expressed and strengthened by
agreement on all the means of grace that Christ intends for
his Church.
IV
The communio sanctorum embraces all Christians,
including those whose lives are not notably marked by
holiness. In the New Testament, the term “saints” generally
refers to all who are baptized and confess Christ as Lord. The
Christian tradition, following the New Testament, also lifts
up some persons for special respect and veneration. The Letter
to the Hebrews, for instance, proposes an honor roll of those
in the history of salvation who are exemplars of heroic faith.
The lives of such faithful men and women both point to and
reflect the holiness of God in Christ.
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a
cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and
sin which clings so closely, and let us run with
perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to
Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the
joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the
shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
(Hebrews 12:1–2)
As early as the second century, Christians gathered for
worship at the tombs of the martyrs, celebrating the power of
God’s grace in the lives of these faithful men and women. They
prayed to God for spiritual and temporal favors to be granted
through the intercession of the martyrs. Indeed, in the early
Church and through the patristic era, the phrase communio
sanctorum had primary reference to this enduring bond
between the faithful on earth and the faithful who had gone
before, especially those whose witness was crowned with
martyrdom. While all Christians are properly called saints,
the word “saint” soon became a title of honor referring to
exemplary lives among the faithful, and most notably the lives
of martyrs. Our own time is rightly understood as a time of
the martyrs, and it is a most encouraging development that
Christians today increasingly recognize and revere those
members of the several ecclesial communities who, in the
century past and still now, offer the ultimate witness to the
lordship of Christ.
As Christians, we are wayfarers who look forward to joining
one day “the assembly of the first–born who are enrolled in
heaven” (Hebrews 12:23). Scripture indicates that the martyrs
beneath the heavenly altar still await their full vindication
(Revelation 6:10). They are one with us, and we are one with
them, in yearning for the completion of God’s plan of
salvation in the final establishment of the Kingdom of Christ
who is “the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the
beginning and the end” (Revelation 22:13). In a world where
many believe that this life is all there is, Christians are
called to bear bold witness to the solidarity of the
communio sanctorum, a solidarity secured by our
communion with Jesus Christ—crucified, risen, and coming
again—and with all, both the living and the dead, who are
alive in Christ.
Catholics believe that there is a lively interaction,
including an exchange of spiritual goods, between ourselves
and those who have gone on to glory. This interaction is
always in Christ and through Christ. Just as all Christians
request the intercession of brothers and sisters on earth, so
Catholics rely also on the intercession of the saints in
heaven, of whom the Blessed Virgin Mary is foremost, and
invoke their aid in prayers, recognizing that prayers to the
saints are also prayers with the saints, directed to Christ
and to the Father, and that all blessings are received from
God. When the saints in heaven act, it is God who acts through
them. This understanding is expressed in the Constitution on
the Church (Lumen Gentium):
It is supremely fitting that we love those
friends and fellow heirs of Jesus Christ, who are also our
brothers and extraordinary benefactors, that we render due
thanks to God for them and “suppliantly invoke them and have
recourse to their prayers, their power and help in obtaining
benefits from God through His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord,
who is our sole Redeemer and Savior.” For by its very nature
every genuine testimony of love which we show to those in
heaven tends toward and terminates in Christ, who is the
“crown of all saints.” Through him it tends toward and
terminates in God, who is wonderful in His saints and is
magnified in them.
Evangelicals do not generally affirm the intercession of
the saints in heaven, and do not ask for their intercession,
since they do not find any explicit biblical warrant for such
practice. They are sometimes puzzled, if not repelled, by the
intense and various ways in which Catholics express communion
with the saints. They caution, as do Catholics, against the
dangers of abuse and superstition in connection with the cult
of saints and of relics. Indeed, the formal Catholic
procedures for beatifying and canonizing saints are intended,
inter alia, to guard against superstition, miracle–mongering,
and popular enthusiasms of a possibly heretical nature. While
Evangelicals do not have such formal procedures, they have
informal ways in which those who have lived exemplary lives of
faith are recognized as deserving of particular honor. At the
same time, however, some Evangelicals express concern that the
Catholic doctrine of the “merits” of the saints implies that
there is a basis of merit other than Christ the sole Redeemer,
and are not convinced by Catholic assurances to the contrary.
These are among the questions in need of further examination
in our continuing conversation.
All Christians of all times have asked how God prepares
believers for the beatific vision of the fullness of His
glory. Holy Scripture does not present us with details about
what happens to those who die in Christ—whether, as most
Evangelicals believe, they enter immediately into the fullness
of God’s glory or, as Catholics believe, ordinarily undergo a
period of further preparation. If sanctification is not
complete here on earth, is it somehow completed between the
time of death and the beatific vision? Catholics hold that one
who dies in God’s friendship while still suffering from
certain sinful attachments and dispositions will be cleansed
by “spiritual fire” in Purgatory. Evangelicals agree that our
lives will be reviewed before the judgment seat of Christ, and
all that is unworthy will be burned away. While Evangelicals
find no biblical warrant for the doctrine of Purgatory, we
together affirm with Paul, “If the work which any man has
built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If
any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he
himself will be saved, but only as through fire” (1
Corinthians 3:14–15).
A detailed exploration of the doctrine of Purgatory and
related questions is beyond the scope of this round of our
conversation. Nor have we examined adequately suffrages for
the dead, the question of indulgences, the role of Mary in
Christian piety, or the sins of denominationalism against the
communion that is God’s present gift. Together, however, we do
affirm that no true Christian, living or dead, can be outside
the communio sanctorum, the fellowship of all who live
in the crucified, risen, reigning, and returning Lord. Within
the body of Christ, we know that we are to pray for one
another and to offer up our sufferings for the sake of the
Church (Colossians 1:24).
Living as we do in communion with those who have gone
before us, we strive to realize in the pilgrim Church on earth
a life together that more fully anticipates the communion of
the Church in glory. It is our hope and prayer as Evangelicals
and Catholics that by rightly using the means of grace
afforded to us in the Church here on earth, we will be more
fully conformed to Christ and thus be drawn into more perfect
communion with one another and with the communio
sanctorum triumphant, to the glory of the one and immortal
God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Evangelical Protestants
Dr. Harold O. J. Brown
Reformed Theological Seminary
Mr. Charles Colson
Prison Fellowship
Dr. Timothy George
Beeson Divinity School
Dr. Kent R. Hill
Eastern Nazarene College
Dr. Cheryl Bridges Johns
Church of God School of
Theology
Dr. T. M. Moore
Cedar Springs Presbyterian Church
Dr. Thomas Oden
Drew University
Dr. J. I. Packer
Regent College,
British Columbia
Roman Catholics
Dr. James J. Buckley
Loyola College of Maryland
Dr. Peter Casarella
Catholic University of America
Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J.
Fordham University
Father Thomas Guarino
Seton Hall University
Father Francis Martin
John Paul II Institute for
Studies
on Marriage and Family
Father Richard John Neuhaus
Institute on Religion and
Public Life
Edward T. Oakes, S.J.
Mundelein Seminary
Mr. George Weigel
Ethics and Public Policy Center
Dr. Robert Louis Wilken
University of Virginia

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