VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The Vatican's top ecumenist, Cardinal Walter
Kasper, said
the Russian Orthodox Church has led ecumenical dialogue into
a "blind alley" with its
objections to Catholic Church activities in a predominantly Orthodox
country.
Such territorial claims are more ideological than theological
and eventually lead to
an "ecclesial heresy" that sees church mission confined by cultural
and ethnic
identities, Cardinal Kasper said.
"As long as the Russian Orthodox Church is anchored to these ideological
positions, it
cannot begin a constructive dialogue with modern society and
with the Catholic
Church," the cardinal said.
Cardinal Kasper made the comments, the bluntest by a Vatican official
on the
Catholic-Orthodox impasse, in a lengthy article published in
the March 16 edition of
"La Civilta Cattolica" ("Catholic Civilization"), an influential
Jesuit magazine.
Despite Orthodox objections to the increasing Catholic presence
in post-communist
Russia, in February Pope John Paul II created four Catholic dioceses
in Russian
territory. Defended by the Vatican as a normal administrative
move, it was denounced
by the Russian Orthodox as further evidence of Catholic "proselytism"
in an Orthodox
land.
Cardinal Kasper emphasized that the church's pastors have no intention
of bringing
Orthodox believers into the Catholic Church. But he said the
Orthodox have widened
the definition of proselytism to include any Catholic-sponsored
appeal to the many
nonbelievers in Russia.
This is something the Catholic Church cannot accept, because it
violates the church's
missionary identity, he said. It also reflects badly on the Orthodox
Church's own
pastoral efforts, he said.
"The Orthodox Church sees its own pastoral and evangelizing weakness
and therefore
fears a Catholic presence that is more effective at a pastoral
level, although much
smaller in numbers," he said.
The Orthodox objections are basically ideological, in that they
identify their church
with the Russian culture, Cardinal Kasper said.
"(The Orthodox Church) is defending not only a Russian reality
that no longer exists,
but also a relationship between church and people or church and
culture that is
problematic on a theological level," he said.
Cardinal Kasper rejected the Orthodox idea of "canonical territory"
that would
reserve Russia to the Orthodox Church. He said the church instituted
by Christ is
universal and was never subdivided into territorial spheres of
influence.
He said, however, that in instituting the four Russian dioceses,
the pope was careful
to respect Orthodox sensibilities and the ancient principle of
"one city-one bishop,"
by naming the dioceses for saints and not for the cities themselves.
Cardinal Kasper repeated the Vatican's invitation for the Russian
Orthodox Church to
provide concrete cases of Catholic proselytism among Orthodox
believers --
something that has never been done, he said.
The cardinal acknowledged that "some Catholics are certainly too
zealous," but he said
that was true of individuals in every church.
He insisted that the Catholic Church was not employing a "strategy"
to "try to exploit
the current weakness of the Orthodox churches and turn Russia
into a Catholic
country."
The cardinal said that at an individual level, an occasional Orthodox
Christian may
decide to join the Catholic Church. But such cases are rare and
must be respected for
reasons of religious freedom, he said.
In the end, Cardinal Kasper said, the Russian Orthodox decision
to freeze dialogue
will prove counterproductive.
"By interrupting the dialogue, the Russian Orthodox Church is
damaging itself and its
own interests above all" because it is strengthening extremists
instead of moderate
forces, he said.
"It would do better to resume dialogue with the Catholic Church
instead of
interrupting it and pull itself out of the blind alley in which
it finds itself ... in order
to assume the place it deserves in today's world, especially
in a Europe that is
unifying," he said.
He said the Catholic Church was ready to cooperate and promote
this type of dialogue.