BRIEFING ON CONSISTORY OF COLLEGE OF CARDINALS

VATICAN CITY, MAY 22, 2001 (VIS) - Early this afternoon, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, Holy See Press Office director, briefed journalists on the speeches given yesterday evening and this morning in the extraordinary consistory of the College of Cardinals, highlighting the themes which emerged, rather than summarizing individual speeches. There were 153 cardinals at the sessions.

One of the most dominant themes, he stated, was that of the family. Most cardinals indicated the need for a strong formation for family life and for a reflection on an anthropology of human sexuality. They also felt that the Church should produce a lexicon of terms relating to the "new" sexuality and to themes relating to the family. Navarro-Valls pointed out that the Pontifical Council for the Family is already working on such a lexicon. He said, by way of example, that some of the "new" terms regarding human sexuality, such as "sexual health," or "gender," emerged in recent years during the United Nations conferences on population, women, social development and human settlements in which Holy See delegations took part.

Ecumenism was another very dominant theme in both sessions of the consistory and was presented under two aspects: in terms of relations between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church and between the Catholic Church and non-Catholic Christians. The press office director said that Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor suggested a pan-Christian encounter. Cardinal Adam Maida said that there must be, at the level of universities, education towards evangelization and interreligious dialogue. He and a great number of the other cardinals present, said Navarro-Valls, thanked Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, for the document "Dominus Iesus" and suggested that it be used in interreligious dialogue.

Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, termed ecumenism "the" theme of our times. He added that, while we cannot deny resistance and misunderstandings on the part of some Christians, the path taken since Vatican Council II has produced much progress. He noted that interreligious dialogue "has accelerated" in John Paul II's pontificate but nonetheless remains a great commitment involving all Christians.

Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, archbishop major of Lviv of the Ukrainians, referring to the Oriental Catholic Churches and to the Orthodox, stated that there was a principal difference, the primacy of Peter. Thus, he underlined, when full unity is reached it will perforce come through us who have the same liturgy and same rite.

Cardinal Avery Dulles also spoke of the primacy of Peter and its importance for the unity of the Church. Theoretically, he stated, one could think that primacy creates a great ecumenical difficulty; still, it is precisely the lack (of such a primacy) in other Christian confessions which creates difficulties of doctrinal and disciplinary types, for example.

For a series of reasons of historical nature, said Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, Vatican Council II preserves yet today a great richness which must be developed in such as way that it would not be truly useful to speak of a new council.

Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, archbishop of Milan, suggested that the Synod of Bishops hold an assembly on the theme "The Word of God in the Life of the Church."

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