This June 5, 2020, the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity celebrates the 60th anniversary of its founding. On the same date, but from 1960, the day of Pentecost, the then Secretariat for the Promotion of Christian Unity was created by St. John XXIII with the “Motu proprio Superno dei Nutu”. The establishment of the Secretariat marked the first official step of the Catholic Church in the ecumenical movement. Word New shares the statement of Cardinal Kurt Koch, President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity on the occasion of this important historical date.!! ️
These days we commemorate two events of great importance for the promotion of Christian unity. Twenty-five years ago, on 25 May, St John Paul second published his encyclical on ecumenical endeavor “Ut Unum sint”.
With this document, which was published thirty years after the closing of the Second Vatican Council, it gave renewed impetus to the conciliar decision concerning the Catholic Church’s participation in the Ecumenical Movement, describing it as the “irreversible way of the Catholic Church”.
Sixty years ago, on 5 June 1960, St John XXIII instituted the then Secretariat for the Promotion of Christian Unity, which since 1988 has been called the Pontifical Council.
This Dicastery, on behalf of and on behalf of the Holy Father, conducts ecumenical dialogues with the other Churches and Ecclesial Communities with the aim of restoring the unity of the one wounded Body of Christ, in the course of history, through many divisions. These two commemorative dates show the essential value of the ecumenical task for the Catholic Church.
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