New Protestant chairman affirms principle of unity

The 500th anniversary of the start of the Reformation in 2017 must not be a “self-adulatory Protestant celebration”, the new chairman of German Protestant Churches, Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, told the Cologne Archdiocese website, domradio.de, this week, write Christa Pongratz-Lippitt and Hannah Roberts. Rather than being a memorial of Martin Luther’s “heroism”, it should express what was decisive for Luther, namely to take a new look at Jesus Christ, he said.

Bishop Bedford-Strohm was “very glad indeed” that he had been able to talk at length to the president of the German bishops’ conference, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, about how their Churches would take advantage of the 2017 anniversary to “celebrate Christ”.

Speaking to the Ecumenical Colloquium of Religious Men and Women coinciding with the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, Pope Francis said different Christian Religious  should be “an invisible monastery” praying for unity.