Coptic Church & Ecumenical Movement - Saint Mina Coptic ...

The Third Consultation
The Coptic delegation to the third Pro Oriente consultation in Vienna, 1976, consisted
of: H.G. Bishop Gregorious, the late Bishop Samuel (1920-1981), the late Bishop
Youannis of Gharbia (1923-1987) and the Reverend Father Antonius Ragheb, Dr
Maurice Tawadros, lecturer in New Testament at the Coptic Theological College and
Deacon Dr. George Bebawi. Bishop Samuel presented a paper on the practical
consequences of the three Vienna consultations. Bishop Gregorious delivered a paper
entitled “The Church of Christ as the local church” and Bishop Youannis presented a
paper entitled “The Origins of the Counciliar Idea”. A special feature of the
consultation was the celebration of the Divine Liturgy by the Coptic Delegation in an
Austrian Protestant Cathedral, which was attended by some of the Orthodox and
Catholic delegates and where Bishop Samuel delivered the Homily.
Communiqué of the third non-official ecumenical consultation between theologians of
the Oriental Orthodox and the Roman Catholic Churches organised by the Foundation
Pro Oriente, in Vienna, August 30-September 5, 1976.
For the third time we have gathered together as a non-official Consultation of Oriental
Orthodox and Roman Catholic theologians, here in Vienna, from August 30 th to
September 5 th , 1976, upon invitation of the Pro Oriente Foundation.
On the basis of the wide area of Christological agreement in the first two
Consultations, which we reaffirmed here, we sought to enter into the question of an
understanding of the nature of the Church, and the structure of its unity. Unity is
Christ’s gift to His Church, and is not merely the result of human endeavours. While
this unity allows for a multiplicity of traditions, the diversity has to be held together
by basic unity in fundamental matters.
One of our concerns in this third non-official Consultation has been to discuss the
notions “local” Church, the “universal” Church and Church Catholic. We confessed
that it is the same mystery of the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church, the Body of
our Risen and Ascended Lord, that is manifest both in the “local” Church and in the
“universal” Church. One and the same Church, for there cannot be more than one, is
manifested both locally and universally as a koinonia of truth and love, characterised
by Eucharistic communion and the corporate unity of the episcopate. The unite of the
Church has its source and prototype in the unity of the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit, into which we have been baptised.
Today, all our churches are spreading worldwide. As a consequence, more than
before, we experience today in many places, both our sharing of much in common of
the Christian faith and life, and also our disunity in so far as we are unable to manifest
fully the unity of the Church in truth and love, in eucharistic communion and unity of
the episcopate.
We have studied together the notion of conciliarity, ie the understanding of the
Church as koinonia, so essential to the nature of the Church as the Body of Christ, and
so clearly visible in the structure of its life and leadership from the very inception. It
is the Holy Spirit who leads us into all truth and all unity through councils and other
means; it is to Him that we look in hope for a council in which the unity of the one
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