A Communion of Martyrs

Perspectives on the Papal Encyclical Letter Ut Unum Sint

In his encyclical letter Ut Unum Sint, Pope John Paul II mentions his pastoral visits to the Nordic countries (Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Iceland) in June 1989: "In an atmosphere of joy, mutual respect, Christian solidarity and prayer I met so very many brothers and sisters, all making a committed effort to be faithful to the gospel. Seeing all this has been for me a great source of encouragement. We experienced the Lord's presence among us" (para. 72).

The pope refers in particular to the act of anticipation of full unity made by the Swedish and Finnish Lutheran bishops at the eucharistic celebrations during which he presided in those two countries, describing this as a

   demonstration dictated by fraternal charity and marked by deep clarity of
   faith which made a profound impression on me ... At communion time, the
   Lutheran bishops approached the celebrant. They wished, by means of an
   agreed gesture, to demonstrate their desire for that time when we,
   Catholics and Lutherans, will be able to share the same eucharist, and they
   wished to receive the celebrant's blessing. With love I blessed them. The
   same gesture, so rich in meaning, was repeated in Rome at the mass at which
   I presided in Piazza Farnese, on the sixth centenary of the canonization of
   Saint Birgitta of Sweden, on 6 October 1991 (para. 72).

In this paragraph of the encyclical are two elements which can be more generally related in Ut Unum Sint: the question of communion and the celebration of a sort of martyrdom -- for St Birgitta dedicated her life to the reform and unity of the church.(1)

Communion among those who are not in "full communion" at the centre of a eucharistic celebration is a good example of the "real but imperfect communion" to which the encyclical refers (paras 96,45,84; the Second Vatican Council

Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis Redintegratio, also speaks about a "certain though imperfect communion"; para. 3, cf. Ut Unum Sint, para. 14). It has become a custom in Sweden for members of the Church of Sweden taking part in a Roman Catholic mass to approach the altar during the communion and place their right hand on their left shoulder, signifying that they are restricted from receiving the eucharistic elements. They then receive a special blessing by the priest with the laying-on of hands. The same is true if a Roman Catholic takes part in a Church of Sweden eucharist. This is the "gesture" to which the pope refers. It indicates that members of the Church of Sweden and the Roman Catholic Church share everything -- including the spiritual communion -- except the elements.(2) This is of course the case even without the gesture.

In Uppsala the pope prayed at the tomb of the ecumenical pioneer Archbishop Nathan Soderblom and at the shrine of St Erik, the Swedish national saint and martyr, whose relics remained in the cathedral even after the Reformation. He also prayed at the shrine of St Birgitta in the Church of Sweden parish church of Vadstena. A further dimension appeared during the commemorations in Rome two years later of her canonization: in a vespers service, the Finnish and Swedish "Lutheran" archbishops, together with Roman Catholic bishops and the pope, all episcopally vested, prayed together at the tomb of St Peter and jointly blessed the congregation from the high altar of the basilica.(3)

At the centre of St Birgitta's life was a fervour for the unity of the church and for church reform for which she actually gave her life. The church of her time was as disunited as the church today, and was marked by excommunications and counter-excommunications, simony and decadence. Even the bones of the martyrs were sold and traded. Today, the martyrs have become increasingly important as signs and instruments of the unity of the church in time and space.(4)

When a small package of bones discovered some years ago in the Church of Sweden diocesan cathedral in Strangnas proved to be a 4th-century relic somehow hidden and spared from the disturbances of the Reformation, the diocesan bishop Jonas Jonson began a process which led to the consecration -- in which the Catholic bishop of Stockholm took part -- of a new chapel in the cathedral. The relics were put in a new altar according to the custom of the early church; and a series of plates was put up in the chapel listing the names of 41 martyrs from modern times, representing various regions and Christian traditions. Jonson explained the meaning of all this in a book called The Martyrs of Our Time, which he refers to Ut Unum Sint.(5)

   In the encyclical the pope writes:

   In a theocentric vision, we Christians already have a common "martyrology".
   This also includes the martyrs of our own century, more numerous than one
   might think, and it shows how, at a profound level, God preserves communion
   among the baptized in the supreme demand of faith, manifested in the
   sacrifice of life itself. The fact that one can die for the faith shows
   that other demands of the faith can also be met. I have already remarked,
   and with deep joy, how an imperfect but real communion is preserved and is
   growing at many levels of ecclesial life. I now add that this communion is
   already perfect in what we all consider the highest point of the life of
   grace, martyria unto death, the truest communion possible with Christ who
   shed his blood, and by that sacrifice brings near those who once were far
   off (cf. Eph 2:13) (para. 84).