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Third pastoral letter available in PDF Format; and in Booklet Format
Pastoral Letter: Unity and Hope (PDF)Pastoral Letter: Unity and Hope (PDF, booklet)
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THIRD PASTORAL LETTER FOR THE JUBILEE OF 2025
UNITY AND HOPE
Dear brothers and sisters,
As I write this third pastoral letter for the Jubilee Year the Church throughout the world is concluding the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. The quest for unity among the different Christian churches and denominations has been part of my own spirituality since I was a teenager and first learned of the movement for this unity (called the “ecumenical movement”). In this pastoral letter I would like to encourage all of us to work for unity among Christians, and to identify what I believe is an ambiguity in current Christian doctrine that in part drives tensions within the Christian community.
Christian unity: a prophetic hope
The efforts to restore Christian unity through friendship and dialogue are typically understood to have begun in earnest at the Edinburgh Missionary Conference in 1910. In the Gospel of John, Jesus prayed to his Father as follows:I ask not only on behalf of these but also on behalf of those who believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. (John 17: 20-23)
As I mentioned in my last Pastoral Letter, the unity of Jesus with his Father is a unity of love. In this prayer, Jesus is praying for, and proclaiming, our highest calling: to be one with God in love, just as Jesus and his Father are one in love. However, at the conference in 1910, the delegates humbly recognized that Christians sometimes did the opposite, and treated each other with contempt. Their call to unity included a call to profound conversion, a turning away from sinful habits and attitudes that hindered that call to love. Greater union with God, as well as mutual love and unity among Christians, would become more evidently part of the credibility of the Christian message. In this way, the world would believe that Jesus came to us as an expression of God’s love, and as a pathway into that love.
Many leaders in the Catholic Church were at first suspicious of the ecumenical movement, concerned it was going to be an attempt to establish a kind of “lowest common denominator” Christianity. Even today, Catholics do not endorse this latter approach. However, at Vatican II, the bishops of the world instituted a new openness to the movement through the Decree on Ecumenism. There is no question that Christian unity remains an unfinished project, and there are some who doubt if it is a very realistic aspiration. It remains part of my hope, however, because I believe it is part of the plan of God for us. The Decree on Ecumenism was approved by literally 99.5% of the Bishops who voted on it, gathered in the largest ecumenical council in the history of the Church. If that isn’t an expression of the will of God, nothing is.
We still have our own part to play, of course. In fact, looking over the Decree on Ecumenism, we can see that many of its recommendations remain implemented only in part. For myself I pray for unity among Christians and I try to do my part to work for that unity. I have been blessed to be part of different ecumenical organizations, such as the Canadian Theological Students’ Association, the Canadian Centre for Ecumenism, the Order of Saint Lazarus, the Orthodox-Catholic Bishops’ Dialogue, the Canadian Council of Churches, and the Joint Working Group with the World Council of Churches. I cherish all those experiences, and they have enriched my life and my ministry greatly.
Diagnosing disunity
This extensive experience has caused me to reflect deeply on the reasons for our disunity. The Church is the Body of Christ, so if disunity is present in the Church we can look at it as a kind of symptom of a disorder in that body. Jesus wants his Church to be united, but that unity is wounded. Those wounds have their origins in past history but remain present today, while new threats to unity continue to appear. As with any medical condition, sometimes the presenting issue is not the real, underlying cause, and it is important we treat the cause of this disunity and not just a symptom.
As I look at the Christian landscape today, I can’t help but notice that the major tensions being experienced in almost all denominations have to do with a contrast between more “traditional” members of a church body and the more “progressive” members of it. Both of these dimensions are important to the life of the Church, as Jesus himself said concerning the Holy Spirit. In John 14: 26, Jesus assured his Apostles that the Holy Spirit would remind them of everything he had taught them, which is an expression of tradition, but in John 16: 12-13 he also tells them that the Spirit would lead them into even greater truth, which is an expression of progress. The true Church of Christ is therefore not either “conservative” or “liberal”: it is both, simultaneously. While the political world will oppose those principles to each other, the Church can embrace both as long as we live in the Spirit and do not isolate ourselves in one tendency over another. We need the entire life of the Church, both past and present, to succeed in this, as well as a willingness to be renewed in the Spirit day by day.
But if there is no need for dispute between people who are more “traditional” by temperament with those who are more “progressive”, why do those disputes exist? Is it just because political attitudes are being smuggled into the Body of Christ? This may indeed be part of it, as political actors have often tried to co-opt the Church for other ends. But I believe the real issue is a tension around the concept of salvation. “Who can be saved?” is a key question that even the disciples asked Jesus. The answer we give affects the meaning and pattern of our lives and of the life of the Church. Depending on how we answer, it can bring us great hope, or great anxiety.
Models of salvation
In my last Pastoral Letter I tried to describe the fullness of salvation: it is the eternal sharing of the divine life, both received and given (also known as divinization, or the “beatific vision”). But “who can be saved”? It is not possible to describe in detail every theological understanding of salvation in this brief letter, but it is worthwhile having an overview of the different approaches. I have summarized these views in the following table. I will look at the extremes first, and then come to the middle.TERM Universalism Particularism
Universal loss
This point of view is not Christian, as Christianity definitely teaches that salvation is real and possible. However, this is the view of (for example) materialistic atheists, who believe that with death individual human existence simply ends. When we compare Christianity to other world religions, we also see that, while many of them propose a path to some sort of salvation, very few propose that our ultimate destiny is a sharing in something like the beatific vision. Dialogue with other religions is important, therefore, for mutual understanding on this important issue, and for sharing Christian hope.
Universalism
The opposite of universal loss, universalism is the view that everyone will ultimately enjoy eternal divinization. In its extreme form, this would even include the salvation of evil angels (a teaching called apokatastasis), or simply a denial of the existence of such diabolical beings. As for human beings, some universalists will concede that there might be a form of purification after death for those not ready for divinization, i.e. the entry into divinization might not be immediate. That said, all universalists agree that, in the end, ultimately everyone will enjoy the full blessedness of salvation—otherwise, they would not be universalists!
Particularism
Particularism believes there are two possible ultimate outcomes: salvation, and not-salvation.
There are many theories of what the “not-salvation” might be like. Some believe it is simply non-existence, similar to what the atheists think, while others believe it is far worse—a kind of active eternal torment we call Hell. There is also a gentler view which imagines no active torment, or which even includes the possibility of an eternal satisfaction of our natural happiness. These latter views are often called “Limbo”. I will not enter into a discussion of all these different types of non-salvation here, as I believe it is more important for us at this point to keep our desire fixed on the awesomeness of salvation than on the threat of its opposite. That said, particularism does hold that both outcomes, “salvation” and “not-salvation”, are possible.
The mixed form of particularism is often called “double predestination”. This point of view teaches that some people are predestined to salvation, and others are not. Typically this point of view goes further and teaches that some people are actually predestined by God to eternal loss. This is not a Catholic viewpoint: Catholics do not believe that anyone was created by God to simply be damned, with no possibility for salvation.
In the pessimistic form of particularism, people are, by default, not saved. This is generally understood to be a universal consequence of something called “original sin”, a negative spiritual state which started with our first parents Adam and Eve, and whose effects continue in their descendants throughout history. This unfortunate situation can be corrected on an individual basis, however, by a personal act of faith in Christ, much like the Good Thief did from his cross next to Jesus. It can also be corrected by baptism, which is particularly relevant for infants and others who lack the use of reason and who therefore cannot make their personal act of faith. There have been attempts by theologians to identify other mechanisms to switch to the path of salvation, but all these views have one thing in common: some sort of intervention is needed for the individual to change their final outcome, because our default state is to not be saved.
The optimistic form of particularism holds that people are, by default, saved. This salvation can, however, be lost, through a personal, deliberate and informed choice of grave sin (what Catholics call a “mortal sin”). Absent a mortal sin, however, a person is assured of eventual salvation. That said, there is an even more extreme form of optimistic particularism, which holds that it is virtually impossible for a person to commit a mortal sin. There are different theories to justify this approach, one of the most common being a doubt in the possibility of a person to truly make the kind of psychological investment such a sin would require. In practical terms, this sort of extreme view starts to approach universalism.
There are many variations within these approaches, some of which are more compatible with Catholic teaching than others. For much of our history, the pessimistic particularist approach was dominant, while today the optimistic or even universalist approach is more and more prevalent. There is still much discussion among theologians about the right approach to take, knowing that the Holy Spirit continues to lead the Church into all truth. But each has an impact on the life and mission of the Church, and of individual believers.
The symptoms of division
Readers of this letter might be wondering what the upshot of all this theory is. But I have seen the practical consequences.
As I mentioned earlier, for much of our history the general understanding of salvation was more pessimistic. The more we lean towards a form of particularism that includes a real possibility of not being saved, the more the problem of individual sin presents itself. On the positive side, people can feel greater motivation to strive for Christian perfection. On the negative side, however, anxiety and scrupulosity can take over the psyche. I have met people really tortured by a fear of not being saved, and I wonder if some of the move in recent years to a more universalist outlook was a rejection of such oppressive feelings, whether in ourselves or with regards to those we love and care for.
Obviously, the more one leans towards universalism, the less one is concerned by the possibility of not being saved. More positively, our Christian faith is then presented as a path to human flourishing. People with this view often present this path as a religion of love, as opposed to one of fear, and they believe that the love of God and of neighbour should be enough to motivate good behaviour. Indeed, it should, but practical experience shows that it becomes very easy to relativize that path, particularly its more challenging personal demands. Our individual spiritual ambition often reduces to being a “good person”, or even just a “good enough person”, leaving aside the parts of discipleship we find difficult or even just inconvenient. Christian unity itself ceases to be a priority, because doctrinal differences between churches don’t really matter.
Christians who are more universalist in their outlook therefore tend to be more interested in questions of social justice, as in such a view the only real hell we need to tackle is the suffering caused by injustices in this life. Issues of so-called “personal” morality, such as sexual matters, are often seen as less important in this context, or even as things to be modified in Christian doctrine. On the other hand, those who are more particularist will tend to focus on personal sin. This does not mean they exclude matters of social justice, although I have also seen people adopt attitudes of contempt, derisively calling people “social justice warriors” when in fact these latter are challenging matters of genuine social concern. As attitudes harden and recrimination becomes a habit of speech, tension and division sets in.
Personally, I am convinced this division is unnecessary. It is possible to emphasize the importance of love while also taking sin seriously because, after all, they are two sides of the same coin. True love is a choice, not just a feeling, and that is what empowers it to even lead to self-sacrifice for others. True sin is also a choice, only with a more self-centred (rather than other-centred) orientation. The theological and catechetical challenge of our day, then, is to articulate an understanding of salvation that motivates us to perfection through love, not just fear, while at the same time giving sincere warnings about the pitfalls of sin.
As for myself, I believe God is very generous in offering salvation to all people, even those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Him. That said, I am not a universalist, nor do I lean in that direction. I believe that sin is serious business: it can lead to terrible personal and social disruption in this life, and it can, in some circumstances, lead to a loss of our salvation, although always with the possibility, in this life, of a return to hope through repentance.
In my next pastoral letter, to be released in Lent, I will try to tackle the problem of sin and the beauty of repentance, so that we may explore together how we can, as a Church, proclaim the gospel of love (both God’s love for us and our love for Him), offer people practical opportunities to put that love into concrete action, and make sure those who stray have the chance to return to the path of that eternal divinization in love. Please stay tuned!
+Thomas Dowd
Bishop of Sault Ste. Marie
January 25, 2025
Feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul
Conclusion of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity
QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND GROUP SHARING
● What friendships have I formed with believers from other Christian churches? How have I shared my Catholic faith with them? How have I benefited from their witness of faith in Christ?
● What tensions have I experienced in the relationship between churches? What tensions have I experienced between believers within the Catholic Church?
● How can we as Catholics promote mutual understanding and respect between believers of different churches?
● Of the different approaches to the question of salvation, which one do I identify with the most, and why? Which one do I have the most difficulty with, and why?
● What do I think are the biggest sources of tension within the Church today? On the positive side, what experiences have I had of genuine mutual love among Christians?
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