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Index > Interconfessional Dialogues > M-RC > Paris (Singapore) Rep. 1991 | CONT. > Part Two
 
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V. Convergences And Divergences

   86. Previous paragraphs make it clear that Methodists and Catholics share a fundamentally important perspective on ministry, affirming that the ordained ministry is essentially pastoral in nature. Ordained ministers have the special responsibility of exercising and holding together the functions of proclaiming the Gospel, calling people to faith, feeding the flock with word and sacrament and making Christ known through the ministry of servanthood to the world. The ordained ministry is a representative one, in the sense expounded in paragraph 71 above.

   87. Within this perspective there remain several unresolved issues related to ordained ministry which call for further examination.



1. Sacramentality

   88. For Catholics, ordination is a sacrament. Methodists are accustomed to reserve the term sacrament for baptism and the Lord's Supper. They do, however, with Catholics, look upon ordination as an effective sign by which the grace of God is given to the recipient for the ministry of word and sacrament.

   89. A way forward may lie in deeper common reflection on the nature of sacrament. Christ, "the image of the invisible God" (Col 1:15), may be thought of as the primary sacrament, revealing God's nature and purpose and enabling us to know and serve him. We may also discern within his action on our behalf certain gifts by which our lives are ordered, nourished and sustained. These have traditionally been classified by Catholics as sacraments in a more specific use of the word.

   90. Both Methodists and Catholics see the Holy Spirit as the One who empowers all ministry, both ordained and lay. Further, both Methodists and Catholics would agree that all the people of God must be a sign of Christ in a real sense and that all ministry must be exemplary of Christ and the Gospel. Thus a life clearly in consonance with Christ is a vocation for all Christians.

   91. At Vatican II the Roman Catholic Church referred to the Church in terms of a "sacrament of salvation" (Ad gentes, 5; cf. Lumen gentium, 1). Methodists would prefer the word "sign" to sacrament, but the meaning in each case is essentially the same, because the Church obeys the mandate of its Founder to preach to all nations the Gospel of salvation it has received.



2. Episcopè

   92. Methodists and Catholics can acknowledge together the reality of episcopè (oversight) in the New Testament and can agree that an ordained ministry which exercises episcopè is vital for the life of the Church. Without the exercise of this gift of oversight, disorder and therefore disunity are inevitable. Koinonia and episcopè imply one another. In a Catholic perspective this mutual implication reaches its culmination when the bishop presides over liturgical worship, in which the preaching of the Gospel and the celebration of the Lord's Supper weld together into unity the members of Christ's Body.

   93. Central to the exercise of episcopè is the task of maintaining unity in the Truth. Thus teaching is the principal part of the task of episcopè. In a Catholic understanding the Church is united through its unity in faith and sacramental communion. The teaching of a common faith by the college of bishops in union with the successor of Peter ensures unity in the Truth. The succession of bishops through the generations serves the continued unity of the Church in the faith handed on from the apostles. In the Methodist tradition, Wesley accepted and believed in the reality of episcopè within the Church of England of which he was a minister. In relation to the Methodist societies he exercised episcopè over the whole; all his followers were bound to be in connection with him. He expounded the main teachings of the Church by means of his Sermons, Notes on the New Testament and Conference Minutes, and made available to his people authorized abridgements of doctrinal and spiritual work. His appointment of Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke to the superintendency in America was rooted in his belief that the Holy Spirit wished to bestow the gift of episcopè at that time and in that place for the sake of maintaining unity of faith with the Church of all ages. It was part of a fresh and extraordinary outpouring of the gift of the Spirit who never ceases to enliven and unify the Church.

   94. As we continue to consider remaining differences over the sacramental nature of ordination and the forms of succession and oversight, we rejoice in the work of the Spirit who has already brought us this far together, recognizing that the ecumenical movement of which we are part is itself a grace of the Holy Spirit for the unity of Christians. When the time comes that Methodists and Catholics declare their readiness for that "full communion in faith, mission and sacramental life" toward which they are working (Towards a Statement on the Church, 20), the mutual recognition of ministry will be achieved not only by their having reached doctrinal consensus but it will also depend upon a fresh creative act of reconciliation which acknowledges the manifold yet unified activity of the Holy Spirit throughout the ages. It will involve a joint act of obedience to the sovereign Word of God.



3. Who may be ordained

   95. In the New Testament record there is strong evidence that the pastoral ministry was exercised by both married and unmarried people. By long-standing tradition the Latin rite of the Catholic Church, seeing a positive congruence between celibacy and the ordained priesthood, requires that priests remain unmarried, although exceptions to this practice have been allowed. Methodists, in common with other Protestant churches, ordain both married and unmarried people, but no ultimate doctrinal obstacle divides Methodists and Catholics here.

   96. Methodists ordain women because they believe that women also receive the call, evidenced by inward conviction and outward manifestation of the gifts and graces and confirmed by the gathering of the faithful.

   97. Catholics do not ordain women, believing that they have no authority to change a practice that belongs to the sacrament of order as received in the Tradition of the Church.

   98. Our general reflections on the nature of ordained ministry and our treatment of this particular question will need to be mutually illuminating. Further thought will be of benefit to both traditions.

 
 

 
 
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