Ecumenism: Mutual Sacraments

Another ancient barrier of suspicion between Roman Catholics and Protestants seems about to fall: the distrust of one another’s sacraments. Catholics have historically refused to acknowledge the validity of such Protestant spiritual acts as ordination, confirmation and celebration of the Eucharist, although they do not question Protestant baptisms or marriages.* In the current issue of the in terdenominational Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Dutch Jesuit Frans Josef van Beeck, 36, finds a basis for arguing that Catholics can give full credit and validity to any or all of the Protestant spiritual acts.

Essential Requirements. Van Beeck, who is director of studies of the Dutch Jesuit Province, notes that traditionally the Roman Catholic Church has insisted on three essential requirements for sacraments: They must be celebrated in a true church, the doctrine underlying them must be sound, and those administering them must be priests in the apostolic succession — that is, ordained by bishops who are spiritual successors of Christ’s first followers. Because they fulfill all three conditions, the sacraments of the Orthodox Church have always been recognized by Rome as valid.

Now, Van Beeck notes, the Second Vatican Council has acknowledged the major Protestant faiths as “churches” rather than just “Christian communions,” which implies a recognition of their good faith. On the question of doctrine, Van Beeck observes that contemporary Catholic theologians are in the process of redefining the church’s sacramental theology, while Protestants are generally less zealous than they used to be about holding strictly to Reformation positions.

Extraordinary Ministers. Thus, the key obstacle is that Protestant ministers are not properly ordained from the Catholic point of view. To solve this dilemma, Van Beeck turns to historical precedent, pointing out that the church has always accepted the validity of sacraments per formed by so-called “extraordinary ministers” under emergency conditions. Penance, for example, was occasionally administered by laymen well into the Middle Ages, while up to 314 A.D. deacons rather than priests sometimes celebrated the Eucharist. Even today laymen can validly baptize when no priest is around. Thus, concludes Van Beeck, Protestant clergymen may well be, from a Catholic viewpoint, “extraordinary ministers” of the sacraments for their own churches, whose good faith, sound doctrine, and correct spiritual intentions fulfill the essential conditions for validity.

-For that matter, most Protestant churches themselves give full sacramental character only to baptism and the Eucharist. Lutherans and Anglicans regard the other sacraments that Catholics hold sacred (ordination, confirmation, marriage, penance and extreme unction) as salutary but subordinate.