“I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.” (John 17:20-22)
We are currently in the middle of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Each January, a week is designated to encourage all Christians to take extra time to pray that the Christian world might find a way to come together. As we can tell for the passage above from the Gospel of John, unity was an important value to Jesus.
Here we see him praying for his disciples and specifically praying that they might be one. And the model he has in mind is the unity that exists between him and the heavenly Father. The Father and Son are one as there is only one God. Jesus prayed for that, not only for his disciples, but also for those who would become believers because of the faith that those disciples would pass on.
Historically there are many reasons as to why the Christian world became so divided. Different understandings of theology, of practice, of Church structure led people to form the many different denominations we see today. However, the present reality should not make us lose sight of what was so important to Jesus “that all may be one.”
As human beings it becomes so easy to focus on what makes us different from one another. And in matters of faith and religion focusing on the differences easily become judgments, such as what I do is right and what you do is wrong.
That is so hard to overcome and it has been that way since the first days of the Church. In St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians he had to reprimand them over the divisions that had developed in that Christian community.
“For it has been reported to me about you, my brothers, by Chloe’s people, that there are rivalries among you. I mean that each of you is saying, ‘I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Apollos,’ or ‘I belong to Kephas,’ or ‘I belong to Christ.’ Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?” (1 Corinthians 1:10-13)
As we pray for Christian Unity, we need to pray that we can keep our focus on makes us Christian, namely faith in Jesus Christ. Even with our differences, living out the values of Jesus can bring us together.
As we read the Gospels we see Jesus healing, feeding, teaching, forgiving and praying. We see him reaching out to the outcasts of society and ultimately giving his life for us. If we each in our own way can incorporate these same values into our lives and into our faith communities, the unity that we pray for this week can become real.
I would like to close with a quote from Pope Francis made during the Week of Prayer in 2016. “In light of the Word of God which we have been listening to, and which has guided us during this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, we can truly affirm that all of us, believers in Christ, have been called to proclaim the might works of God. Beyond the differences, which still separate us, we recognize with joy that at the origin of our Christian life there is always a call from God Himself. We can make progress on the path to full visible communion between us Christians not only when we come closer to each other, but above all as we convert ourselves to the Lord, who through His grace, chooses and calls us to be His disciples.”
Father Kenneth Taylor is pastor of Holy Angels Catholic Church and St. Rita Catholic Church. He can be reached at fatherkt@mailhaven.com
