Journey towards unity
Week of Prayer for the unity of Christians 2016.
Some passages from two articles Giordani wrote on the occasion of the Week for Unity of Christians and published in the New City magazine on 10.12.1978 and 10.12.1979, give us an insight of his prophetic vision of ecumenism. Giordani also stressed the importance of the journey John Paul II made to Turkey in those years, a “journey towards unity” which Pope Francis is pursuing today with determination and hope.
«Ecumenism has already made some progress in the unity of hearts, from which that of the minds will follow. Since evangelisation is the duty of all baptized Christians, in support of and in line with the ecumenical encounters of priests, pastors, and theologians, their evangelization is done simply and amongst the people. The effort is to seek what unites, excluding all that divides. It consists of prayer, conversation, singing together, and little by little, especially among the youth, aversion and moral, social, and ethnic divide disappears and friendship seeps in, which is a form of love. Then together all will love God who is Love, and the Father of each.»
Igino Giordani, Seven days for Unity, «Città Nuova», n.23 of 10.12.1978.
«Also this year the horizon of unity opens out. ”The full exploitation of liberty is love, [1]” John Paul II wrote in his Apostolic exhortation “Catechesi tradendae,” and demands “a continual growth of solidarity, that is, of communitarian love.” Each one sees the importance of such observations that translate, for the demands of our time (the refugees of Cambodia, hunger, wars, oppressions and persecutions), into Jesus’s testament: “that all be one.” John Paul II recommended a particular solidarity with the Oriental Churches and with “all people, without regard to their religious convictions.”
John Paul II translated these concepts and ideals into apostolic operations aimed at awakening the awareness, that unity of the Church in the spirit of our time, inside and outside the Catholic communities. «The journey towards unity», as the Pope’s pilgrim to Turkey was defined, repeated and extended the dialogue between Paul VI and Athenagorsa, two genial promoters of ecumenism.
Many Christians on this side of and beyond the Ocean are impatiently suffering because that unity still has not been reached. It is one which responds to the conviction of both sides and scares only the foolish activists of terrorism, who aspire the disaggregation of
human society. The journey involves also our relationships with Islam, i.e., with the great community of Muslims who venerate and adore the sole and true God. The importance of this event is evident, and that led the Pope from the Vatican to participate in the celebration of the feast of St. Andrew in the Fanar of Istanbul: a sign of the continuity between the two hierarchies and the respective Churches, and the increasing intensification of these relationships.
If we all contribute with prayer to the positive outcome of the joint initiatives aimed at expressing a convergence towards the full unity of all the problems being discussed, we would put an end to the «scandal of division» — as Pope John Paul II called it — and will impress a forward thrust towards the ideal of universal unity amongst peoples, nurtured by millions of war victims. ».
Igino Giordani, The Journey towards Unity, «Città Nuova», n.23 of 10.12.1979.
[1] John Paul II, Apostolic exhortation “Catechesi tradendae,” 16.10.1979
