Vatican City, Oct 11, 2012 / 15:40 pm
Orthodox Christianity's most significant bishop told Pope Benedict XVI that the Year of Faith should spur greater prayer, hope and effort towards the unity of their two Churches.
"We join in the hope that the barrier dividing the Eastern Church and the Western Church will be removed, and that – at last – there may be but the one dwelling, firmly established on Christ Jesus, the cornerstone, who will make both one," said the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople.
The patriarch made his remarks in an address at the opening ceremony of the Year of Faith, which was inaugurated with Mass in St. Peter's Square on Oct. 11.
"It is fitting that this occasion also marks for your Church the formal inauguration of the 'Year of Faith,' as it is faith that provides a visible sign of the journey we have travelled together along the path of reconciliation and visible unity," he said.