PRESS RELEASE
Catholicosate of Cilicia
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Armenian version: nian.htm
"WE MUST MOVE FROM ECCLESIOCENTRIC TO CHRISTOCENTRIC PERCEPTION OF
CATHOLICITY"
Said His Holiness ARAM I
In a keynote lecture on "Catholicity: its implications and challenges" His
Holiness Aram I emphasized christocentric nature and missionary dimension of
catholicity and challenged the prevailing perception of catholicity
considering it as a mere mark of the church.
The lecture was given at an International Conference in Berlin organized in
honor of Bishop W. Huber, the presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Church in
Germany.
Hereunder excerpts from the lecture of His Holiness.-
CATHOLICITY: THE ESSE OF CHURCH
. Catholicity is not a mere mark of the church; it is the very esse of the
church. As Christ’s body, the church is catholic by its nature, scope and
purpose. Catholicity refers neither to geography nor to institution, neither
to quantity nor to universality. It points to the wholeness, fullness and
uniqueness of truth revealed in Jesus Christ. Therefore, the church is
catholic not because of its world-wide presence, but for the very truth it
holds. Catholicity goes beyond the church to embrace the whole humanity and
creation, time and space. Catholicity cannot be totally identified with the
church; it is much larger than the church in its historical expression and
institutional form. Catholicity pertains to God’s universal plan of
salvation in Christ.
. Catholicity is a gift of God and not a human achievement. It is rooted in
the mystery of God himself. Catholicity challenges the church’s
self-contained existence and self-sufficient perception, and calls for an
ecclesiological self-understanding that considers the church not an
established institution, but a becoming reality for the purpose it is
destined to.
. Catholicity is essentially a qualitative reality, even though it has
quantitative, institutional and functional dimensions, manifestations and
implications. Catholicity is dynamic; it incorporates all time and space
within all-embracing fullness and plenitude of Christ. Catholicity is the
blood of the church, which in the power of the Holy Spirit ensures the
continuity and growth of the church in history. It makes the church the
ferment and the anticipation of the Kingdom of God, which will achieve its
consummation with the second coming of Christ in parousia.
THE LOCUS AND FOCUS OF CATHOLICITY
. As a gift of God, catholicity already exists in the church permeating its
entire life and witness. Therefore, an excessive eschatological perception
of catholicity may endanger its giveness and fullness. Catholicity is not an
abstract notion; its locus is the people of God, the eucharistic Koinonia.
The church does not generate catholicity; catholicity creates, sustains and
nurtures the church. It is an ontological, not an institutional or
geographical reality. It is important to make a clear distinction between
essence and form, substance and expression.
. Catholicity is essentially related to the church’s membership and not to
its institutional expression. It points to the fullness of Christ’s presence
in the community of faith. This fullness of truth is received, preserved and
taken to the world by the community of men and women baptized in the name of
Triune God. Therefore, catholicity is not related to the size of church
membership but to its quality of life, namely, to its obedient response to
God’s call in Christ and commitment to His mission in the world. Catholicity
embraces not just the so-called dues-paying members of the church but the
entire community, all those baptized.
. The eucharist is the focus of catholicity and its living expression. The
memory of the past, the struggle of the present, and the vision of the
future dynamically interact in the eucharist. The fullness of God’s salvific
act and His transforming presence among the faithful are revealed through
the eucharist. The eucharistic is the sacrament of catholicity par
excellence. Through the eucharist the catholicity builds the community of
faith and reaches out to the whole world, as the fullness of God’s creating,
restoring, reconciling and fulfilling act for the whole humanity and
creation.
CATHOLICITY AND UNITY
. Catholicity makes the church an integral part of the wholeness and
fullness of truth revealed in Christ. It enhances the church’s God-given
unity within the framework of history and protects it against the forces of
division. It also generates interaction, interpenetration and
interdependence by deepening mutuality and the churches’ self-understanding
of belonging to the one and same Christocentric Koinonia.
Catholicity cannot be identified or possessed by one part of the body; it
pertains to the whole body and embraces the historical experience of the
church in time and space by creating unity with the past (apostolicity),
with the present (missionary outreach) and with the future (eschatology).
This is catholicity in time. Catholicity also calls for unity in faith
manifested through the eucharistic gathering and conciliar communion among
the local churches. This is catholicity in space. It is important that the
brokenness within the institutional church does not reduce or distort
catholicity ontologically; it only hampers its fulfillment in time and
space. It must be also underscored that the brokeness of the church is not a
hindrance to share in the fullness of catholicity, which only belongs to
God. Catholicity deals with the substance of faith, not its formulation, and
it gives the churches a broader framework of unity in which to articulate
their God-given unity in diverse forms.
. Catholicity does not aim for monolith or uniform vision of the church;
rather it enhances God-given pluralism and strives for the whole without
undermining the particular. Catholicity aims for reconciled diversity
against unrelated pluralism; it safeguards the fullness and distinctiveness,
diversity and coherence of God’s revelation against dualistic and monistic
tendencies. Catholicity rejects self-sufficiency and calls for
inter-dependence. It challenges the church’s self-imprisonment within
local, confessional, ethnic or institutional boundaries _ a temptation that
surrounds the church in all times – and calls for a dynamic and enriching
interaction with its environment and the world at large. Through
catholicity, the integrity and vitality of the body of Christ is maintained
in the midst of the upheavals and polarizations of history.
. Catholicity and unity are intimately interwoven. Unity of the church is
sustained and protected by catholicity, and catholicity is strengthened and
is given more visibility by the unity of the church. Catholicity maintains a
creative tension between the fullness and wholeness of the Christ-event and
the brokeness of the church in the context of historical process, and aims
at healing all forms of division within and outside the church. The
catholicity of the church is a constant reminder that the churches must go
beyond their ecclesial unity and strive for the unity of humankind. God’s
gift of unity and catholicity in Christ was a response to the brokenness of
the world. The world is still – if not more – broken: racially, morally and
ecologically.
CATHOLICITY AND LOCAL-UNIVERSAL
. Where there is a eucharistic community there is also the catholic church.
The church is not merely an institution or a community established by
Christ; Christ Himself is the church. Hence, any church, great or small, is
fully catholic. Catholicity cannot be partial or incomplete. Each
eucharistic community is the prefiguration of the fulfillment and telos of
God’s catholicity. The church is catholic and constantly becomes catholic by
realizing itself in time and space, vertically and horizontally.
. The local eucharistic community is integral and inseparable part of the
whole oikumene. Catholicity expressed fully in a local eucharistic gathering
must be shared in communion with other local churches in each and in all
places. The church must transcend its locality in the perspective of
catholicity. The church’s local and universal manifestations are, at the
same time, the local and universal manifestations of catholicity. Therefore
the local and universal are closely interconnected, conditioning and
strengthening each other. Catholicity rejects unicentrism and promotes
polycentrism. The Orthodox Churches do not agree with the view that
communion with an ecclesial center is the criterion of catholicity and
maintain that communion between the local churches, based on unity of faith,
is a sine qua non condition for catholicity. However, even in division, the
churches share in the catholicity of the church, each expressing it in
different ways.
. Catholicity does not aim at a centralized universal church; but it does
aim for a world-wide church: by opposing geographical localism and
ecclesiological confessionalism, by promoting inter-action and
inter-connectedness, by challenging blind parochialism and triumphal
universalism, by calling the local church to go beyond its confines and
entering into ecclesial communion with other local churches in all places,
and by taking the church beyond the limitations of time and opening it to
eschaton.
. The growing globalization and pluralism present both opportunities and
risks for catholicity. On the one hand, they revive and reactivate the
church’s inner catholicity by opening the church to all places, nations and
cultures. On the other hand, they expose the church to ‘catholicities’ of
globalization, which may endanger the true nature and vision of God’s
catholicity.
CATHOLICITY AND MISSION
. Catholicity experienced in the local community cannot take place in
isolation from the realities of the world. It is destined to transform and
recreate the world. Therefore, catholicity is a call to participate in the
salvific-event of Christ (vertical Catholicity) and Missio Dei (horizontal
catholicity). Through baptism we share catholicity, through eucharist we
participate in it, and through mission we take it to the world. Catholicity
is both an event and a process, the in-going and out-going of the church, a
gift and a task.
. Catholicity reminds us that the Christ-event, as realized eschatology,
cannot be conditioned and determined by historical processes. It helps the
church to move forward towards the eschatological fulfillment and
reconciliation of humanity and creation in Christ to God. Catholicity makes
the church, in the power of Holy Spirit, a missionary reality by sending it
to the end of the world to bear witness to the Gospel. This imission is also
a commission. The more the church goes beyond itself, the more it becomes
truly itself and the more catholicity acquires its genuine meaning. Indeed,
catholicity is the sharing of God’s kenosis in Christ with others.
SOME OBSERVATIONS
1) Catholicity has become a loose concept with no direct relevance to the
life of the church. How can we revive its crucial importance for the
ecclesiological self-understanding of the church? How can we clearly spell
out its missiological implications. How can we give a focal attention and a
concrete expression to it in the church’s sacramental life, missionary
outreach, evangelistic witness, and diakonal action? This is, indeed, a
major task before the churches. The ecumenical movement played a significant
role in deepening the awareness towards catholicity by enhancing the
churches’ sense of belonging to each other and thus helping them to manifest
in different ways their inter-connectedness and inner catholicity. The
ecumenical movement must continue its unique vocation with renewed
commitment.
2) Because of dominant trends of confessionalism in Protestant churches,
universalism in the Roman Catholic Church, and ethno-centrism in the
Orthodox Churches, we have lost much of the meaning and centrality of
catholicity. Based on their respective ecclesiological self-understanding,
the Roman Catholic Church gives a visible expression to catholicity through
its universal structure, the Orthodox Churches stress the eucharistic
communion, and the Protestant Churches emphasize the centrality of the Word
of God. In my judgment, these approaches complement each other and must be
taken as one integrated whole. How can the churches transcend their disunity
and give more visibility to the church’s catholicity on local and global
levels? This is a major question before the churches. We must rediscover the
catholicity of the mind of the church, and identify the concrete
implications of the catholicity of the church’s ecclesiological and
missiological self-understanding.
3) In my view, the inward-looking concept of catholicity, strongly held by
the Orthodox Churches, must be balanced by the outward-looking perspective
of catholicity, maintained by the Catholic and Protestant churches. In other
words, the ontological and functional dimensions of catholicity must be
taken in their inter-connectedness. Such an approach may give a new vitality
both to the inner evangelism and the missionary outreach of the church in a
world where the Gospel message is threatened by secularism, materialism and
anthropocentrism. The backward-looking approach to catholicity, aimed at
seeking its importance within the historical process, must be completed by a
forward-looking vision, that will help the churches to orient modern
societies towards the Kingdom of God. Further, the Word-centered perception
of catholicity, a basic trend in Protestant ecclesiology, must be balanced
by the eucharistic vision of catholicity. It is only within such a broad
framework that we can develop a comprehensive, interactive and ecumenical
theology of catholicity.
4) Catholicity strives for God’s future, while globalization strives for
human future. Catholicity reminds us that the human future can be built only
within the universal plan of God. Hence, catholicity must become a critique
of the "catholicities" of globalization by combating the "powers and
principalities" of the new world that create disintegration and
polarization. At the same time, the church must respond positively to those
trends and opportunities provided by globalization which may help the church
to articulate its God-given catholicity in the context of a globalized
world.
5) A shift from excessive church-centered catholicity to Christ-centered
catholicity is indispensable. The Logos theology of the early church, with
its particular stress on cosmic Christology, can help us to develop an
all-embracing and inclusive concept of catholicity. A Christo-centric
approach to catholicity, in its turn, must be strengthened and balanced by
pneumatological and eschatological dimensions. Such an interactive
perspective and holistic understanding of catholicity is of crucial
importance in view of the growth of pluralism. This perspective and
understanding may considerably facilitate inter-faith dialogue which has
become integral to Christian life and witness.
6) With its christological, ecclesiological, missiological, pneumatological,
eucharistic and eschatological aspects, the Orthodox theology has all the
potential to develop a holistic perspective and eschatological vision of
catholicity. Therefore, the Orthodox theology must make a serious effort to
consider qualitative and quantitative, vertical and horizontal dimensions of
catholicity in their inseparable interconnectedness. Such an all-inclusive
concept of catholicity is imperative in a world in which inner-dependence
has become a salient mark of human life. A redefinition of Logos and
eco-centered theology and spirituality, dominant in all aspects and spheres
of the Orthodox churches, may significantly enhance this process.
7) Finally, catholicity is a God-given vocation and a dynamic process.
Therefore, we must emphasize its task-oriented aspect; we must recognize
that it cannot be owned by any one church, but must be shared; we must fight
against the growing confessionalism, which may eventually reduce the church
of Christ to self-centered local communities; and we must constantly deepen
the churches’ consciousness of catholicity and its relevance to the issues
and challenges of the present world.
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The Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia is one of the two Catholicosates of
the Armenian Orthodox Church. For detailed information about the Ecumenical
activities of the Cilician Catholicosate, you may refer to the web page of
the Catholicosate, The Cilician
Catholicosate, the administrative center of the church is located in
Antelias, Lebanon.