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Catholic World News News Feature

Greek Orthodox leader plans visit to Vatican February 17, 2006

The Vatican is hoping for a visit from the Orthodox Archbishop Christodoulos of Athens.

The Greek prelate, who received an invitation from Pope Benedict XVI last year, said on February 13 that he planned to make the trip sometime this year. On February 17 the deputy director of the Vatican press office, Father Ciro Benedettini, confirmed that both parties are hoping that the visit will take place soon.

Archbishop Christodoulos confided his plans to Cardinal Dionigi Tettamanzi of Milan, who is visiting Athens this week. The Greek Orthodox leader had hoped to travel to Rome in November 2004, in answer to an invitation from the late Pope John Paul II, but postponed the trip at the request of the Greek Orthodox Synod.

Pope Benedict repeated the invitation in October 2005, and the Greek archbishop agreed that a meeting would be a useful step toward reconciliation and cooperation between the two churches.

The invitation from Pope Benedict was conveyed by Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, the Vatican archivist, who was in Athens last October for the publication of an ancient manuscript on the saints of the Byzantine liturgical calendar: a project jointly undertaken by the Vatican with the Orthodox archdiocese. In a personal letter hand-delivered by Cardinal Tauran, the Pontiff said that he hoped a personal visit would stimulate "ever more active cooperation between the Catholic Church and the Greek Orthodox Church." Since May 1999, when Pope John Paul made the first historic visit by a Roman Pontiff to a predominantly Orthodox country-- Romania-- relations between Rome and the autocephalous Orthodox churches have steadily improved. But hostility toward Rome was especially strong among the Greek Orthodox, including some who discern an "imperial strategy" by Rome to infiltrate and ultimately annex the Orthodox communities.

Pope John Paul eventually won over the support of the Greek Orthodox Synod, leading the way to his visit to Athens in May 2001, and opening the path to future ecumenical exchanges. Since that visit-- in which the Pope thawed some Orthodox opposition by asking pardon for the sack of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204-- there have been several visits by Vatican delegations to Athens, and Orthodox leaders to Rome.