San Jose, Calif., Jun 5, 2008 / 01:44 am
Last month, Bishop Mar Bawai Soro and nearly 1,000 Assyrian Christian families were received into communion with the Chaldean Catholic Church in California. Bishop Bawai explained the process to CNA, and expressed his hope that other Assyrian churches will also consider uniting with the Catholic Church.
The Assyrian Church, centered in modern-day Iraq, dates back to the earliest days of Christianity. Around the fifth century, the Assyrian followers began to embrace the teachings of Nestorius, Archbishop of Constantinople whose doctrines were condemned by the Council of Ephesus in 431.
However, at the beginning in the sixteenth century, large numbers of Nestorian Assyrians came into union with Rome, creating the Chaldean Catholic Church which is now larger than the Assyrian Church.
Bishop Soro described the process of coming into communion with the Catholic Church to CNA: Twenty years ago, many of the Assyrian church’s faithful realized that other than Papal Primacy, there were no theological issues that existed between themselves and the Catholic Church. He explained that, “the more I studied Catholic theology, the more I became certain that both Churches were basically of the same apostolic faith and practice.”