Phanar to fight for orphanage

Published by The Wall Street Journal, May 29, 2005

Pope Reaches Out to Orthodox During First Papel Trip to Bari

BARI, Italy -- Pope Benedict XVI visited the eastern port of Bari on his first papal trip Sunday and pledged to make healing the 1,000-year-old rift with the Orthodox church a "fundamental" commitment of his papacy.

Benedict made the pledge in a city closely tied to the Orthodox church. Bari, on Italy's Adriatic coast, is considered a "bridge" between East and West and is home to the relics of St. Nicholas of Myra, a 4th-Century saint who is one of the most popular in both the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches.

Benedict referred to Bari as a "land of meeting and dialogue" with the Orthodox in his homily at a Mass that closed a national religious conference. It was his first pilgrimage outside Rome since being elected the 265th leader of the Roman Catholic Church on April 19.

"I want to repeat my willingness to assume as a fundamental commitment working to reconstitute the full and visible unity of all the followers of Christ, with all my energy," he said to applause from the estimated 200,000 people at the Mass.

Words aren't enough, he said, adding that "concrete gestures" were needed even from ordinary Catholics to reach out toward the Orthodox.

"I also ask all of you to decisively take the path of spiritual ecumenism, which in prayer will open the door to the Holy Spirit who alone can create unity," he said.

Benedict has said previously that reaching out to the Orthodox and other Christians would be a priority of his papacy, and his call to ordinary Catholics to take the charge as well built on that agenda.

Although a brief, three-hour visit, the trip was Benedict's inaugural pastoral pilgrimage and showed he was following in the much-traveled footsteps of his predecessor, Pope John Paul II.

The most-traveled pope in history, John Paul made 104 foreign pilgrimages and 146 pastoral visits in Italy during his 26-year papacy. John Paul visited Bari in 1984.

Benedict, 78 years old, has said he is looking forward to attending the World Youth Day celebrations in Cologne, in his native Germany, this August -- a trip John Paul had hoped to make himself.

He also has told residents of Castel Gandolfo, the lakeside papal residence in the hills south of Rome, that he would spend the summer months there. The Holy See distinguishes between pastoral visits to Italian cities and visits to Castel Gandolfo, which is Vatican property.

Polish bishops have said they also want Benedict to visit the late pope's homeland.

Benedict flew by helicopter to Bari, near the "heel" of boot-shaped Italy, and waved to the crowds from a white "popemobile," before celebrating the seaside, open-air Mass to close the conference on the Eucharist.

Wearing his bishop's miter and white vestments with Swiss Guards standing at attention at the foot of the altar area, Benedict blessed the faithful, many of whom waved the Vatican's yellow and white flags or white baseball caps handed out by organizers to shield them from the sun.



Volume 7 Number 22 - Tuesday, May 31st, 2005	A Publication of the ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN LAITY