Swiss union marks 75th anniversary.Geneva Geneva, canton and city, Switzerland Geneva (jənē`və), Fr. Genève, canton (1990 pop. 373,019), 109 sq mi (282 sq km), SW Switzerland, surrounding the southwest tip of the Lake of Geneva. (ENI)--The Anglican and Old-Catholic churches in Switzerland celebrated recently the 75th anniversary of an agreement on full communion that is seen as foreshadowing later accords between other churches. "You have achieved so much together," Archdeacon Colin Williams, an Anglican priest who is general secretary of the Conference of European Churches The Conference of European Churches (CEC) was founded in 1959 to promote reconciliation, dialogue and friendship between the churches of Europe at a time of growing Cold War political tensions and divisions. , told the congregation at a Sept. 2 service in the Anglican church of St. Ursula The Church of St. Ursula is located in Cologne in the Rheinland. It is built upon the ancient ruins of a Roman Cemetery, where the virgins were supposedly buried. The Church has an impressive Reliquary created from the bones of the former occupants of the cemetery. in Berne. The Old-Catholic Church in Switzerland traces its history to a movement of some Swiss Roman Catholics against the declaration of papal infallibility in 1870. They joined with similar movements in other countries to form the Union of Utrecht
The Union of Utrecht (Dutch: Unie van Utrecht in 1889 as a grouping of Old-Catholic churches. Contacts with other denominations led to the 1931 Bonn Agreement, which established intercommunion in·ter·com·mun·ion n. 1. Communion, relationship, or association between persons or groups. 2. The practice by which members of different Christian denominations can receive Communion at one another's Eucharistic services or at between Anglican and Old-Catholic churches. The anniversary celebrations started with a common Eucharist in the Old-Catholic church of St. Peter and Paul's Old-Catholic church in Berne. An international celebration of the Bonn Agreement took place in Freiburg, Germany on Aug. 9 with the participation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, and the Old-Catholic Archbishop of Utrecht, Joris Verkammen. |
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