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

THE SECOND UNOFFICIAL CONSULTATION
BRISTOL, JULY 1967
1. We give thanks to God that we have been able to come together for the second time as a study
group, with the blessing of the authorities of our respective Churches. In Aarhus we
discovered much common ground for seeking closer ties among our Churches. In Bristol we
have found several new areas of agreement. Many questions still remain to be studied and
settled. But we wish to make a few common affirmations.
2. God's infinite love for mankind, by which He has both created and saved us, is our starting
point for apprehending the mystery of the union of perfect Godhead and perfect manhood in
our Lord Jesus Christ. It is for our salvation that God the Word became one of us. Thus He
who is consubstantial with the Father became by the Incarnation consubstantial also with us.
By His infinite grace God has called us to attain to His uncreated glory. God became by
nature man that man may become by grace God. The manhood of Christ thus reveals and
realizes the true vocation of man. God draws us into fullness of communion with Himself in
the Body of Christ, that we may be transfigured from glory to glory. It is in this soteriological
perspective that we have approached the Christological question.
3. We were reminded again of our common fathers in the universal Church - St. Ignatius and St.
Irenaeus, St. Anthony and St. Athanasius, St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. John
Chrysostom, St. Ephraim Syrus and St. Cyril of Alexandria and many others of venerable
memory. Based on their teaching, we see the integral relation between Christology and
soteriology and also the close relation of both to the doctrine of God and to the doctrine of
man, to ecclesiology and to spirituality, and to the whole liturgical life of the Church.
4. Ever since the fifth century, we have used different formulae to confess our common faith in
the One Lord Jesus Christ, perfect God and perfect Man. Some of us affirm two natures, wills
and energies hypostatically united in the One Lord Jesus Christ. Some of us affirm one united
divine-human nature, will and energy in the same Christ. But both sides speak of a union
without confusion, without change, without division, without separation. The four adverbs
belong to our common tradition. Both affirm the dynamic permanence of the God- head and
the Manhood, with all their natural properties and faculties, in the one Christ. Those who
speak in terms of “two” do not thereby divide or separate. Those who speak in terms of “one”
do not thereby commingle or confuse. The “without division, without separation” of those
who say “two,” and the “without change, without confusion” of those who say “one” need to
he specially underlined, in order that we may understand each other.
5. In this spirit, we have discussed also the continuity of doctrine in the Councils of the Church,
and especially the monenergistic and monothelete controversies of the seventh century. All of
us agree that the human will is neither absorbed nor suppressed by the divine will in the
Incarnate Logos, nor are they contrary one to the other. The uncreated and created natures,
with the fullness of their natural properties and faculties, were united without confusion or
separation, and continue to operate in the one Christ, our Saviour. The position of those who
wish to speak of one divine-human will and energy united without confusion or separation
22