Prawda – Kościół – miłość. Czy Kościół prawdziwy może szczerze uprawiać ekumenizm?

Abstract

The paper takes up the problem of a denominational decision and ecumenical openness which problem is principal in ecumenism. Different Churches eagerly emphasize their own authenticity or truth fulness which is opposed to untruth fulness or incomplete truth fulness of other Churches. The author claims that putting things in this way is a misunderstanding which he explains per longum et latum. None of the Churches is in possession of the whole truth. Each Church is on its pilgrim age to the fulness of the truth in eschata. A Church can be true only in the dynamical sense of the word. It means that it is saint and at the same time sinful; it is one and yet it tends to unity; it is universal and it yearns to expand; it is apostolic and yet it tends to apostolicity; it possesses the fulness of good and yet it does not stop praying so that the Lord fill it with good; it has received means needed for salvation and it gets to know them better and better over the ages and it serves humanity better and better using these means; it is teaching and it continually learns itself; it gives gifts and it needs gifts; it sanctifies and it calls upon the Spirit of Sanctification; it proclaims God's Word and must obey this Word; it corrects and needs corrections; it is pure and needs purification; it brings up and needs to be brought up. A statical understanding of the possession of the full truth leads to conservatism and blocks the way to an authentic dialogue among Churches. In traditional apologetics there is one well-known reasoning, i.e. "There is only one truth [...] That is why there cannot exist two true Christ Churches. Since our Church is the true one, and others identify themselves with ours, then they cannot be true". Such a reasoning contains an error of identifying the logical truth, which is one, with the truth (authenticity, truthfulness) of the Church. Each) Church has a rich stratum of convictions in matters of faith and morality. It regards some of them as the articles of faith and others as their interpretations, and still others as its own institutions or formulas accepted on the basis of mutual agreement. In view of that, in order to prove untruthfulness of a Church, it is not enough to prove that there is an error within its principles. We can find many errors in every Church which fact does not necessarily decides about its inauthenticity or untruthfulness. We cannot defend the thesis that there is a Christin Church in which everything is undoubtedly true, everything is in accordance with Christ's institution... Even in those Churches which regard themselves as truly and authentically belonging to Christ, there are, without any doubt, non-Christian and non-evangelical elements. Each Church has a chance to become more and more of Christ, i.e. more "truthful". This problem should be brought onto the level of the hierarchy of truths and we should ask about every particular Church, to what extent it remains faithful to Christ's institution and will. We should ask about that which is central in the Gospel.