Click to join the conversation with over 500,000 Pentecostal believers and scholars
| PentecostalTheology.com
Pneuma 41 (2019) 518–522
Response to the Report of the Sixth Phase of the International Catholic-Pentecostal Dialogue (2011–2015)
Paulo Ayres Mattos
Faculdade de Teologia Refidim, Joinville, Santa Catarina, Brazil [email protected]
First, let me express my deep appreciation to all participants in the dialogue of this sixth phase for the document they produced, especially when it makes incisively clear that “together Catholics and Pentecostals affirm the charismatic nature of the Church.”
It must also be pointed out that this document importantly recognizes “that the sovereign work of the Holy Spirit bestowing his divine gifts is a blessing for the Church.” Further, it also recognizes that “in many places, instead of awe, joy, renewal and building up of the body of Christ the exercise of charisms is a source of tensions and concerns. Catholic and Pentecostal leaders alike are concerned that at the root of these tensions lies an insufficient discernment of the charisms.”
Another important remark of this report, especially for its Latin American pentecostal recipients, is its concern for biblical and historical foundations of the charisms discussed in the present document: prophecy, healing, and discernment. Notwithstanding, to understand the result of dialogue between Catholics and Pentecostals in the first five years of the current decade, as reflected in this sixth report, it would be necessary to go back to some themes that were not sufficiently developed in the previous dialogues.
Withtheintentiontodevelopsomeof thoseissues,participantsinthisphase of the Catholic-Pentecostal dialogue dedicated themselves to the study of con- vergences and divergences about the general exercise of charisms in the dif- ferent areas of life and mission of the church, giving special attention to the exercise of the gifts of prophecy, healing, and discernment. After discussing the distinct biblical, historical, and pastoral dimensions of each of those spiritual gifts, they concluded that, despite some important differences between pente- costal and Catholic approaches to the theme of charisms, “what has become clear from this study together is a significant unity in the way Pentecostals and
© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2019 | doi:10.1163/15700747-04103034
1
ecumenical reflections
519
Catholics understand these gifts and seek to ensure their proper exercise. Given the fact that it is the Holy Spirit who gives these charisms to the one Body of Christ […], it should come as no surprise that such unity surrounding these charisms should exist.”
In response to the report of the Sixth Phase of the International Catholic- Pentecostal Dialogue, from a Latin American perspective, I would like to make two remarks. The first has to do with the recognition that the conversations developed in this last period should be under the light of the conclusions and decisions of the five previous phases. The second has to do with one of the motivations that led the agenda of conversations developed in the last period: theological responses to conflicting pastoral problems involving Catholics and Pentecostals in Latin America.
In all phases of the dialogue, the participants from both traditions have con- tinued to reaffirm the fact “that the Holy Spirit has never ceased to bestow his charisms on Christians in every age to be used for the spread of the gospel and the upbuilding of the Church.” Maintaining the continuity of the gifts of the Spirit throughout the whole history of the church, Pentecostals and Catholics make clear that they do not share the prevalent teaching of many of the Reformed Churches that the manifestation of these gifts ceased after the apostolic era, particularly after the definition of the NewTestament Canon.The document states, “[Catholics and Pentecostals] reject the idea that charisms ceased after the age of the apostles or at any other point in history.” Despite their marginalization at different times over the centuries and the tensions caused by their exercise, such convergence on the continuity of spiritual gifts in the life and mission of the church goes in the same direction pointed by Walter Hollenweger when he proposed that, alongside other theological influences, Catholicism has also influenced the pentecostal movement in its theological formation. Therefore, pentecostal pneumatology reflects somehow Catholic pneumatology by returning the person and work of the Holy Spirit to the cen- ter of ecclesial life. Thus, all the six reports of the Catholic-Pentecostal dialogue raise significant questions about Catholic anti-Pentecostalism and pentecostal anti-Catholicism practiced by different segments of both traditions throughout Latin America.
Regarding the second observation about the motivations behind the latest conversations, Cecil M. Robeck, Jr., in an article written in 2012, states, “because of the continuing concern expressed by a number of bishops from Latin Amer- ica that Pentecostal churches should be placed in the category of ‘sect,’ the PCPCU has suggested and the Pentecostal steering committee has accepted that the next round of discussions builds the solid academic base, so that it may provide theologically grounded answers to very real and sometimes diffi-
Pneuma 41 (2019) 518–522
2
520
ecumenical reflections
cult pastoral issues being raised in Latin America.”1Robeck adds in a footnote, “various bishops from Latin America have appealed repeatedly to the PCPCU not to engage further with Pentecostals,” an appeal fortunately not accepted by the Council. However, it must also be recognized that such Catholic resistance to the Catholic-Pentecostal dialogue is also strongly shared by most of Latin American Pentecostals, particularly among their church leaders. So, accord- ing to Robeck, the steering committee decided that the main theme for the sixth round should be “Charisms in the Church: Their Spiritual Significance, Discernment, and Pastoral Implications,” with a special attention to the conflic- tive Latin American theological and pastoral issues involved in the ecumenical dialogue between Pentecostals and Catholics.
From a Latin American perspective, these two remarks are necessary for any consideration of this report, and both have a lot to do with the almost ignored reception of all reports of the International Catholic-Pentecostal Dia- logue.The fact that Latin America has the largest number of Catholics through- out the world and that the membership of the various expressions of Pente- costalism has experienced exponential growth in the last five decades should have aroused greater interest in their dissemination and study by both tradi- tions, which has not happened. We must remember that in this regard, Daniel Ramirez notes that “ironically, the world region where the Catholic Charismatic Renewal has evidenced strong power is also where Catholic-Pentecostal rela- tions remain the most conflicted … The result, the nearly four decades of the International Catholic-Pentecostal Dialogue have unfolded without the par- ticipation of the flagship on denominations from Latin America.”2 The fact is that, although the conclusions of the dialogue have pointed to several simi- larities between Catholics and Pentecostals over the continuity of the Holy Spirit’s work in the outpouring of spiritual gifts for building up and empow- erment of the life and mission of the Church in Latin America, Pentecostal- Catholic dialogue continues to be almost ignored by the leaders and members of both traditions. And what is the cause? I believe that one of the reasons is the generic treatment given in the document to the gifts of prophecy, heal- ing, and discernment and their implications for those pastoral and missionary issues that may have motivated the strong resistance of many Latin Ameri-
1 Cecil M. Robeck, Jr., “The Achievements of International Dialogue,” inCelebratingaCenturyof
Ecumenism: Exploring the Achievements of International Dialogue, ed. John A. Radano (Grand
Rapids,MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2012), 193.
2 Daniel Ramirez, “Pentecostalism in Latin America,” in The Cambridge Companion to Pente-
costalism, ed. Cecil M. Robeck Jr. and Amos Yong (New York: Cambridge University Press,
2014), 127–128.
Pneuma 41 (2019) 518–522
3
ecumenical reflections
521
can Catholic bishops to the dialogue between Catholics and Pentecostals. Such generic treatment from top to bottom does not consider that at local levels pen- tecostal/Catholic relationships faced concrete problems not contemplated in the report.
For example, on a continent in which there is a growing violation of human rights, where does the report consider the denunciation of human sin and the announcement of the restorative grace so evident among the Hebrew prophets as well as in the exercise of the gift of prophecy as exhortation and building up of the church according to the teaching of the New Testament? Regarding the exercise of the gift of healing, a continent on which public health is victim to the greed and corruption of government officials, causing serious damage mostly to the impoverished sectors of our populations, where in the document is the understanding that this is one of the main reasons for their looking to Pentecostalism for healing of body and soul, their last resort against their daily experiences with the forces of death? Regarding the gift of discernment of spir- its, on a continent that, according to Daniel Ramirez, was culturally shaped by “the subsoil of Catholic popular religiosity” (with its expectation of the mirac- ulous and battle with the demonic) and popular culture (with its corporeality and festive musicality) provided the elements for the distinct hybrid,3 how to discern the spirits so that both Catholics and Pentecostals are not influenced by neo-gnostic spiritual warfare theologies that, in particular, demonize indige- nous religious practices as well as those of the descendants of Africans violently brought to the Americas as slaves? In most cases Catholics and Pentecostals have responded to these issues with different and antagonistic pastoral and missionary proposals, thereby reinforcing the strong intolerance among their members.
What I observe also in this last report of the International Catholic-Pente- costal Dialogue is the absence of a theological and pastoral treatment of the exercise of the gifts of prophecy, healing, and discernment, from the bottom to the top, based upon the practical experiences of Latin American Catholics and Pentecostals that have shown strong resistance to any approach between the two traditions. So, if one of the intentions of the last phase of the dia- logue, as announced in 2012 by Robeck, was to “provide theologically grounded answers to very real pastoral and sometimes difficult pastoral issues being raised in Latin America,”4 the same issues continue without such answers. Unresolved pastoral issues listed in the five previous reports seem even to have
3 Ramirez, 114. 4 Robeck, 193.
Pneuma 41 (2019) 518–522
4
522
ecumenical reflections
been ignored in the discussions of this last stage. On the other side, surely the absence of Latin American participants of both traditions in these ecumeni- cal bilateral conversations has not helped in overcoming our mutual, painful, and sometimes conflictive strangeness (just one of the dialogue participants, Father Marcial Maçaneiro from Brazil, is from Latin America). The long fifty- year road of the dialogue between Pentecostals and Catholics has provided a better understanding of their convergences and divergences about the matters of faith and order that must be appropriated by Latin American Catholics and Pentecostals in order to make, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, more visi- ble in Latin America the unity that has already been given to us in Jesus Christ. However, without a more visible participation of Latin American Catholics and Pentecostals in the world conversations, such challenges will hardly be met. My hope and prayer are that in the next round, Latin American voices will be more clearly heard in the International Catholic-Pentecostal Dialogue.
Pneuma 41 (2019) 518–522
5
