ecumenism – Catholic Commission for Social Justice

by Leela Ramdeen, Chair, CCSJ and Director, CREDI

Today’s gospel, John 6:24–35, offers us an opportunity to reflect on what it means to be a disciple of the “true bread”; “the bread of life”. In the gospel Jesus tells us: “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst.”

For Catholics Jesus, the bread of life, is literally present—body, blood, soul and divinity—in the Eucharist under the appearances of bread and wine. This is what we refer to as the doctrine of the Real Presence. Our catechism tells us that the Eucharist is “the source and summit of the Christian life” (CCC, 1324).

On Monday, November 20, I addressed the members of the Catholic and Anglican communities of St Francis RC and St Margaret’s Anglican Church, Belmont, at a service organised by Fr Thomas Lawson OP and Rev Canon Ronald Branche, to remember the 500th Anniversary of the Reformation. I share below extracts from my presentation. The music of GRACE Music Ministry was spiritually uplifting.

“We come together to heal and to build unity in Christ, our Lord. October 31, 2017 marked 500 years since Martin Luther, a university lecturer and Augustinian monk posted on the door of the All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg, Germany, his 95 Theses – a list of criticisms of the Catholic Church’s doctrines and practices at that time e.g. he objected to the highly profitable sale of indulgences.