Catholic-Anabaptist ecumenical dialogue

[Josh]

This is a thread to discuss the possibility of ecumenism between the Roman Catholic Church and Anabaptists in general.

Please do not in this thread:
- discuss Eastern Orthodoxy other than to discuss reunification of Eastern churches into Roman Catholicism and possible analogies therewith with Anabaptism.
- call each other “papists”, “fanatics”, “extremists”
- bring up irrelevant Anabaptist sects that don’t exist anymore like Munsterites or Batenburgers
- engage in denouncing of Catholic doctrines for the sake of denouncing them
- accuse one another of not being sincere Christians

Please do:
- treat each other with respect
- listen to what each other are saying

[Josh]

I will discuss major impediments I see.

First of all, I think the likelihood of ecumenical relations is most likely with liberal-progressive Anabaptists (Central District Conference sorts of people), as they seem the most interested in liturgies and would be willing to give up tenets of Anabaptism the easiest. I will not discuss ecumenical relations with them further.

The impediments I see are:

- Anabaptists aren’t sacramental and don’t care about things like apostolic succession or sacramental baptism.
- German Baptists who do believe in a manner of baptismal regeneration still don’t think it is important who does the baptism or blesses the waters. Instead they feel what is important is the obedience and willing heart of the supplicant, not the apostolic succession and authority of the priest who performs the baptism.
- Anabaptists also don’t care about the sacramental nature of the Eucharist. Rather they think what is important is simply having a memorial “this do in remembrance of me”.
- Anabaptists do care about day to day life and feel the church should have a big say in that.
- Anabaptists generally don’t believe in a rigid episcopal hierarchy, and even those with multiple layers of bishops would chafe at the idea of a pope.
- Anabaptists who are conservative would be very leery of recent papal pronouncements about eg blessing same sex unions.
- Conservative Anabaptists would be very uncomfortable about being “in communion” with Catholics they know are living in sin (example: famous politicians around the globe).

Let’s discuss further.

[RZehr]

We believe in separation of church and state. The Vatican is both church and a state of its own.
We believe in humble lifestyles. The Pope lives in a literal palace, decked with trophy’s of wars.
We believe in doing violence to no man. Catholicism, not so much. They used to even fund wars and armies.
We believe in an upside down power structure. The Vatican believes in, well, a downside down power structure.

[ohio jones]

The locus of authority is another major impediment. Anabaptists see history and tradition as often-helpful guides, but not on the same level as scripture. Catholics have centuries of cumulative Tradition, ex cathedra teaching of the Popes, and other dogma that is viewed as authoritative. Attempts at dialogue that are based on anything other than scripture are not likely to be well received by Anabaptists.

[Ken]

There are literally thousands of different flavors of Protestant denominations and groups out there. The 1.3 billion member Catholic church is probably not going to seek out and initiate dialog with most of them in any sort of high-level leader-to-leader ecumenical dialog such as a delegation of Amish visiting the Vatican for talks. But it does engage with all the larger groups such as Episcopals and Lutherans, as well as other no-Christian faiths such as Judaism and Islam. The Vatican has a Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity whose mandate is ecumenical dialog: http://www.christianunity.va/content/un ... ni/en.html

In addition, each regional Catholic diocese does have an office of Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs which serves as a liaison between the diocese and other local faith groups and communities for everything from coordinating charity to interfaith worship and dialog. For example, here in the Portland metro area this is their web site: https://archdpdx.org/ecumenical-interreligious-affairs

I would expect it is the same everywhere else in that any sort of ecumenical interfaith dialog will largely happen between local churches and local dioceses and not some sort of high-level thing between the Vatican and the leadership of various denominations. Each diocese has actual staff dedicated to that purpose at the local level. But local diocese are obviously not going to change or concede any actual Catholic doctrine.

There are also Catholic universities all over the place (221 in the US alone) and they no doubt engage in a lot of ecumenical dialogue since they don't just admit Catholics and most of them will have students from a wide variety of faiths.

[Josh]

Good points, Ken.

That brings to mind another impediment: Anabaptists have no central organisation or authority to speak on their behalf, much less change foundational doctrine. There is no pope or committee to meet with on behalf of the Amish.

My church could put together a committee, but they would not be able to change any doctrines. And it would be impossible for us (for example) to agree to compromise on infant baptism or transsubstantiation or apostolic succession, since none of that is “built in” to our confessions.

Still, I think reunification of the church is possible, and it is worth discussion.

[Judas Maccabeus]

Generally, authority without relationship will not be well received in our church. You will not have some far away leader dictating things to those below. We very much believe in a servant leader model. The Catholic Church is simply not like that.

We also believe in local control of finances. The Catholic Church does not function that way.

[Ken]

Still, I think reunification of the church is possible, and it is worth discussion.

I think the opposite.

I mean, theoretically ANYTHING is possible. But history tells us that churches are much more likely to schism than unify. Just within the greater Anabaptist world, how many schisms have there been in the past 150 years compared to unifications?

Other denominations are the same. There is more splitting going on than unifying. Pretty much everywhere within Christianity.

[Josh]

Generally, authority without relationship will not be well received in our church. You will not have some far away leader dictating things to those below. We very much believe in a servant leader model. The Catholic Church is simply not like that.

We also believe in local control of finances. The Catholic Church does not function that way.

Good points, although some wings of Anabaptism are quite episcopal. (Eastern comes to mind.)

[Sudsy]

Still, I think reunification of the church is possible, and it is worth discussion.

I think the opposite.

I mean, theoretically ANYTHING is possible. But history tells us that churches are much more likely to schism than unify. Just within the greater Anabaptist world, how many schisms have there been in the past 150 years compared to unifications?

Other denominations are the same. There is more splitting going on than unifying. Pretty much everywhere within Christianity.

I have no idea how reunification of the church is possible unless there is so much compromise on core beliefs (i.e. salvation) that it becomes a religion that primarily accepts anyone and everyone who will live at peace with one another. The belief in an anti-Christ and one world wide religion seems to be saying that this is what will occurr and will be a mandated religion. I don't want to be here as this 'peace', I doubt, will last very long and then 'all hell will break loose'. It is already concerning regarding the belief of what it means to be 'born again' amongst professing Christians and the term amongst some seems to be avoided.