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By Mary Tanner
H
ow can the Petrine ministry bea service to the unity of the uni- versal Church? The question thatforms the title of this bookis crucialfor Christian churches,as the con-tributors to this volume of 21 essaysacknowledge. One writer calls it“the most important ecumenical problem.”The editor, James Puglisi,describes how the book emergedout of a decade-long study initiativeof the International BridgettineCen-terin Farfa Sabina, outside Rome.The essays were presented at con-sultations in 2003 and 2004. Thesemeetings led to a long-term dialoguegroup of Lutherans and RomanCatholics which will shortly publishits conclusions.Most of the essays are from Luther-ans and Roman Catholics, but thereare also important contributions fromMethodist, Orthodox and Reformedtheologians. Although the commenton the back cover leads us to expect Anglicans among the contributors, Iwas not able to identify any essayfrom an Anglican perspective. This isa pity as the Anglican-Roman CatholicInternational Commission has pro-duced valuable insights and chal-lenges to both communions on thesubject which would have supportedsome of the insights in these essays.There are no women among thecontributors, and it would have beenuseful to have known somethingabout each contributor.Nevertheless,these essays mark an important stagein reflection on the Petrine ministryfor all who are committed to the unityof the Church in communion with theministry of the bishop of Rome. I feltinformed and stimulated after readingeach of the essays.In a useful introduction Peder Nør-gaard-Højensets out the problem thata ministry, “by its very nature a min-istry of unity,”has been a reason for“severe divisions and insurmountabletensions,”both between churches andconfessions and within the RomanCatholic Church itself. The good newsis that the Farfa conferences didreveal a decisive readiness of those onboth sides to re-examine respectivetraditions in the light of biblical andhistorical research with the aim of reaching a common understanding of the Petrine ministry. A major factor in thebackground to the Farfainitiative was the remark-able appeal in 1995 madeby John Paul II to leadersand theologians of severalchurches to engage withhim “in a patient and fra-ternal dialogue on theforms in which this min-istry may accomplish a service of love recognized by all concerned.”Nørgaard-Højenpoints out that atthe same time the pope did not devi-ate from the basic principle that“the communion of the particularchurches with the Church of Rome,and of their bishops with the bishopof Rome, is— in God’s plan— anessential requisite of full and visiblecommunion.”Almost all of theessays acknowledge the enormoussignificance of the remarkable appealmade by John Paul II. Anessay byPeter Lüningpresents a valuable sum-mary of the responses made to thisinitiative, highlightingthe main issuesraised in those responses.The essays cover issues relating toScripture and patristics, post-Refor-mation developments, systematics,and ecumenical conversations. OnScripture and the early history JohnMeier reflects onhow the RomanCatholic Church can give a histori-cally responsible account of the ori-gins of the papacy,as it is importantfor Christians to know how thePetrine ministry developed in theNew Testament and early centuries if they are to understand the claimsmade for the office today. Meier andRoland Minnerath emphasize several points, including: the authority of thechurch of Rome, the church of Peterand Paul, was the reference for apos-tolic teaching rather than the personof the Bishop of Rome; Tertullian wasthe initiator of Petrine theology but henever thought that Peter would exer-cise jurisdiction; Stephen was the firstBishop of Rome (in 254-57)to claimto exercise the Petrine office;by thethird century the apostolic church of Rome was recognized as reference inmatters of doctrine and Church order.
Receiving a Ministryof Universal Primacy
How Can the PetrineMinistry Be a Serviceto the Unity of theUniversal Church?
Edited by
James F. Puglisi
.Eerdmans. Pp. 384. $40.(Continued on next page)
January 15, 2012 • THE LIVING CHURCH
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REVIEW ESSAY
 
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THE LIVING CHURCH • January 15, 2012
By the fourth and fifth centuriesthe Bishop of Rome was pope, thefirst of the five patriarchs by canoni-cal prescription but not by divine law.In the first millennium there was noquestion of Roman bishops governingthe Church in distant solitude. Whenmatters of universal concern arosethen they resorted to an ecumenicalcouncil. It was a lengthy and compli-cated history that led to the doctrineof the papacy. And as Minnerath points out, the East never shared thePetrine theology as elaborated in theWest and “assumed that the synodalconstitution of the church would be jeopardized by the very existence of aPetrine office with potential universalcompetence in the government of thechurch.”He ends his essay with aquestion that lies behind many of theessays — “whether synodality and primacy are not only compatible butmutually necessary.” A second group of essays exam-ines the reactions of Melancthon andLuther,as well as post-Reformationdevelopments. Günther Gassmannreviews Lutheran reactions from the17th century to the 20th century,including reactions to the definitionsof the first Vatican Council. The voices he cites are marked by thespirit of their time.He highlights thehistorical stumbling blocks that arerepresented by the papacy andProtestant reactions to it — reactionswhich remain legitimate critical the-ological questions but alsomayreflect anti-Roman or anti-papal pho-bias that turn the papacy into akindof shibboleth.He asks how to make clear that papal authority stands under andserves the authority of God’s wordand is to be exercised in collegial con-sultative relations. He also asks howa view of papal authority may be for-mulated that corresponds to theresults of modern biblical and histor-ical criticism. He leaves the discus-sion with an imaginative suggestionthat there might be an official RomanCatholic commentary on the natureof papal infallibility and primacy. An essay by Hermann Pottmeyeroffers fresh avenues of thought. With pragmatic rationality he takesaccount of both the positive and thenegative in the development of a papacy which does notpermit anyglobal verdict of success or failure. Itappears as both a convincing min-istry of unity and also as an abuse of  power, both beneficial and harmfulto the Church. Pottmeyer very help-fully explains Vatican I in its historicalcontext, emphasizing the majorityand minority views that existed—with maximalist and minimalist inter- pretations.Papal primacy and infallibility wereinsisted on, to safeguard the Churchagainst the state, and doctrine againstliberalism and modernity. It was,Pottmeyer maintains, a one-sided for-mulation that resulted in the impres-sion that Vatican I had declared the pope to be an absolute and sovereignmonarch. There was a more accept-able view of papal ministry but it waswritten out of the script. What is lack-ing today is a shared experience of the papacy.The Roman CatholicChurch must give a convincing formto the Petrine ministry to make it pos-sible for others to share and thedogma must be integrated into anecclesiology of communion with abalance between communal, colle-gial,and personal forms of the pri-matial ministry.The Orthodox theologian JohnZizioulas makes the same plea in hisimportant essay in the section on sys-tematics. It is particularly valuableto have an Orthodox perspectivebrought into the discussion,for papal primacy and authority was the maincause of estrangement between Eastand West. Zizioulas makes a theolog-ical case for primacy and suggeststhe conditions by which the Ortho-dox might accept it: that it is not aministry of jurisdiction or interfer-ence and that, in an ecclesiology of communion of local churches, pri-macy is always exercised in a synod-ical context. It must be together withall the bishops, exercised in com-munion and not in isolation.The largest collection of essays isgrouped under the title of ecumen-ics. Walter Cardinal Kasper stressesthe need to “re-read”and “re-receive”the doctrine of primacy from Vati-can I in order to find a “lively and
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Receiving a Ministryof Universal Primacy
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