The Importance Of The Church's Decree On Ecumenism

The Church’s decree on Ecumenism was a movement that seeks to unify christens, it applied to ecclesial openness to other churches. The Ecclesial movement has been led by the World Council of Churches since 1948. This movement created full communion among the Evangelical Lutheran Church, Presbyterian Church, United Church of Christ, and the Reformed Church in America. Even before Vatican II made ecumenism a pivotal theme Father Yves Congar highlighted the ecumenical issue that divided Christianity. In 1995 John Paul II reaffirmed the catholic commitment to Christian ecumenism with the encyclical of On Commitment to Ecumenism and again when Benedict XVI named ecumenism as a goal of his pontificate in 2005. This decree on Ecumenism sought to restore unity rather than return to the Catholic Church. Also in this decree the Church admitted shared responsibility for the divisions and viewed Catholic reform essential component in any reunion as well as accepting protestant communities as brother and sister churches. This decree focused on what united Christians rather than what divides us and also opened dialogue which created a sense of community among churches.
Vatican II brought with it the declaration on the relation of the Church to Non-Christians religions. This declaration did a variety of important things first it expressed respect for …show more content…
The second was accepting Protestant churches as brother/sister churches, and that Protestants were eligible for salvation. Ecumenism also recognized weaknesses in other Christian churches, which is saying that the best way to salvation is through the Catholic Church, however this was not the only path to salvation. Finally, the decree of ecumenism wants Christians to focus more on what unites us rather than what divides and separates us from one