Ecumenical meeting in Rome: an opportunity to get to know one another

130 people from more than 15 Christian Churches and 26 countries, of various ages and vocations, who are part of the Focolare Movement, gathered in these days at the Conference Centre in Castel Gandolfo, Rome, in order to live an experience of profound fraternity.

The participants were representatives of Christian churches who embrace the ideal of unity promoted by the Focolare Movement. They came together to discover the challenges and the riches of their different traditions. It was an opportunity to get to know one another in order to be better able to welcome each other’s Church and to love it as one’s own.

Present at the event were Focolare President Margaret Karram and Co-President Jesús Morán. At the conclusion of the discussions, Karram quoted Chiara Lubich who, speaking of the path of unity among the Churches, said, “Each is a gift for the other, so that we may foresee in the Church of the future that one and only one will be the truth. But this truth will be expressed in various ways, seen from different viewpoints, enriched by many expressions. (…) This Church will be something marvellous, almost like a miracle, and it will engage the attention and interest of the whole world. Yes, this is necessary for the credibility and effectiveness of Christian witness.” (1)

In a fragmented world in which more and more divisive conflicts are breaking out, Christians of various Churches can offer a witness of unity in diversity, of dialogue that is possible beyond all differences. But what is the path so as to journey together and what is the contribution that people from various Churches who live the charism of unity can make to this process?

Moran commented, “Each Church can offer hospitality to the other.” He was not speaking of hospitality in the Eucharistic sense but in the spiritual sense. “In this way we will become a single Church that offers hospitality to all people as they are, with all their challenges. This is the mission of the Church: to allow all people be welcomed into Christ’s humanity; the humanity of Christ that is already in the Father, yet is still present in history. Only an eschatological vision like this can offer an appropriate response to the world of today.”

Source: www.focolare.org

1. C. Lubich, Una Spiritualità per l’unità dei Cristiani. Pensieri Scelti, Città Nuova, Rome 2020, p. 86