An inter-Mennonite newspaper, putting the Mennonite world together every week since 1923

EDITORIAL

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Perhaps some of the harder questions remained unspoken during the fifth annual Bridgefolk conference on Anabaptist and Catholic dialogue June 29-July 2. And perhaps the pain of those questions and a lingering legacy of mutual exclusion and isolation make them nearly impossible to ask.

But not far from the surface of those four days of discussion at St. John’s Abbey, a Benedictine monastery in Collegeville, Minn., lay an unnameable wound that many agree begs to be healed.

If these questions could be voiced, this is how they might take shape: After centuries of separation and conflict, how can Anabaptists and Catholics remain so conclusively apart when it is the same unchanging Christ that both traditions seek? And how can God be pleased when those who believe in his Son are still in tension and conflict?

The focus of this year’s Bridgefolk gathering, on peacemaking and the practice of the Lord’s Supper, struck at the fundamental heart of this separation. It brought to light an emphatic longing to engage not only in deeper dialogue but also in actual fellowship at the table of the Lord.

For some Anabaptists, and probably a like number of Catholics, both rooted in centuries of opposing teachings and practices, such a bond remains hard to imagine. To some it also remains undesirable and even offensive. Though Pope John Paul II made the way clearer for non-Catholics to receive the Catholic eucharist, key theological and ecclesial barriers remain between the two traditions. And the shadow left by centuries of antagonism and, at times, bloodshed, remains too heavy to chase away all at once.

Still, at the center of this movement is a palpable desire among some Anabaptists to reconcile with the traditions from which our churches sprang. This would mean replacing the violent legacy that surrounded this movement’s birth with the quiet abiding of repentance, forgiveness and peace, and connecting more with Catholicism as it is practiced today. Also, and just as important, it means helping Catholics connect again with the peacemaking, community and mutual support long espoused by Anabaptists.

A guiding motivation for ecumenical dialogues such as Bridgefolk is Christ’s prayer that God would keep his church as one. Groups such as Bridgefolk hold out the deepest hope that God will achieve this and that all believers will be swept up in a cleansing tide of welcome and forgiveness.

The differences between Anabaptism and Catholicism must not be oversimplified. And movements like Bridgefolk are not for everyone. For some, such groups are willing to overlook too many differences and admit to too many sins of pride or alienation.

But the element of faith at the heart of such dialogue — that God is still at work in this broken world — cannot be neglected. Such efforts to explore closer communion and what it can mean should be welcomed — by us and, it is hoped, by God. — Robert Rhodes