During 2013 ACT3 conducted five area-wide Unity Factor Forums. You can learn more about these events on our site. (I hope we can do 5-6 more in 2014 so please consider inviting us to do one in your area.) The last one that we did in 2013 was in Aurora, Illinois. I asked Fr. David Engbarth, a local Catholic priest, to share something of his own journey into missional-ecumenism. He surprised me when he invited a non-Catholic friend to stand with him in order to talk about their deep and growing friendship. There is a popular saying that says “a picture is worth a thousand words.” If this is true then this video says more about what ACT3 is seeking to do than anything I can write. In the light of my post on December 2, about Pope Francis’ letter Evangelii Gaudium, this is a wonderful follow-up that reveals the human reality of love between two brothers from different ecclesial traditions.
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A Beautiful Testimony to Missional-Ecumenism: During 2013 ACT3 conducted five area-wide Unity Factor F… http://t.co/61OdItHP6e
So, John, I really like your missional-ecumenism and this in particular. It is quite encouraging. I have a question: do you think we will ever see in the future a time when the Catholic (and Orthodox) communions open up the Eucharist to Christian non-Catholics (and Christian non-Orthodox) and allow their people to take Eucharist/Communion in non-Catholic (and non-Orthodox) churches as well?
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I think it will happen eventually but it seems we are still a long way from this becoming reality. On the other hand the Lord could turn the situation in a moment’s time. They are surely close enough in their respective views for this to become reality, or so it seems to me and a lot of others people on both sides of this millennium long divide.
John: I hope you are correct. I come from baptist churches that pretty much emptied the ‘Lord’s Supper’ of its meaning in both practice and theory. Its even more ironic that they all opted to taking it every three months in order to protect its meaning from overuse. In effect this meant the churches I grew up in met to vote on stuff (every month) more than they took communion. In an case, that is all background as a contrast to my now very sacramental theology (what some have called Baptist sacramentalism). As I have grown more sacramental (thanks to some Catholic and Orthodox influence no less), I have of course grown more Eucharistic, and this issue has become more important to me. I pray to see this open up within the Body of Christ in my lifetime.
Your story is very similar to my own Russell, as related to some extent in Your Church Is Too Small. (I hope you will read the book!) I am now in a communion where the Supper is taken each week and it has been life-changing for me to enter into this divine liturgy of the Table.
John: Actually, I have read your book. Very good. We were fortunate to be at churches in Texas, that while affiliated with Texas Baptists, were nevertheless liturgical in orientation (preaching from the lectionary) and taking the Eucharist every week … and to have spent some good time with some missional Methodists who utilized a re-imagined liturgy and took the Eucharist every week. It took a bit but we found a church in Edinburgh with weekly litrugy/Eucharist. It has indeed been life changing for us; and just doesn’t feel right without it.
Were you in Waco in the church where Ralph Wood is a leader I think?
No, never lived in Waco. We chose Logsdon Seminary over Truett so it was in Abilene where both my wife and I were ordained at Crosspoint Fellowship (and then at the missional Methodist new church called The Branch) and in Houston at Ecclesia.
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