Clarifying Primacy for Catholic-Orthodox Dialogue

Pope Leo XIV’s First “What’s Next?”: Clarifying Primacy for Catholic-Orthodox Dialogue

Last month, July 13–15, I attended the 30^th annual Orientale Lumen Conference at the Saint John Paul II National Shrine in Washington, D.C. The conference’s theme was urgent: “Ecumenism at a Crossroad: Consensus Achieved – What’s Next?” The scholarly gathering brought together Roman Catholics, Eastern Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox – bishops, clergy, theologians, and laity – which resulted in the conference being not only an academic exchange but also an act of unity in prayer, conversation, and ecclesial friendship. Archbishop Flavio Pace, Secretary of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, described the conference as focused on the reception of Catholic-Orthodox dialogue at both international and local levels. The Washington Theological Consortium post captured the spirit of the gathering: “How often do you have the chance to sit down with a cardinal, archbishops, bishops, clergy, theologians, and lay leaders, from the Orthodox and Catholic traditions, not across a formal conference table, but in joint prayer or over coffee, meals, and evening conversations with others who deeply care about the unity of the Church?” That question “What’s next?” – returned to mind when Pope Leo XIV’s recent revision of the Fundamental Law of Vatican City State was announced on July 31, 2026. The revision maybe one of the first concrete answers: not a resolution of all remaining disputes, but a juridical clarification that directly serves Roman Catholic-Eastern Orthodox dialogue.

John Paul II’s 1995 apostolic Letter, Orientale Lumen made clear that Catholic-Orthodox dialogue has reached a delicate moment. There is consensus on many aspects of first-millennium ecclesiology, synodality, councils, primacy, and the need to read the history of East and West together. Yet the hardest questions remain. In one Orientale Lumen Conference panel, Bishop Anthony of Synada, speaking from an Orthodox perspective, emphasized that Orthodoxy recognizes the indefectibility of councils: when the Church gathers in council, the Church cannot err. Papal infallibility, however, is different because it is attached to one person, the Pope. The bishop’s point was well taken and not polemical; it stated the difficulty. For many Orthodox, the number one issue is still papal supremacy and infallibility. What would universal jurisdiction mean? What would unity do to the life of the Orthodox Churches? That question “What would unity do?” is decisive.

The Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church formed two subcommittees to address two major points of contention: the Filioque and infallibility. The Commission’s September 2025 communiqué says that draft texts on both questions were prepared and that the Coordinating Committee decided to take up infallibility first. This confirms what was evident at Orientale Lumen Conference: the dialogue has moved from courtesy to substance. The question is no longer whether Catholics and Orthodox can meet cordially. The question is whether Rome can clarify how primacy is to be exercised so that it appears as a ministry of unity rather than as a form of Roman Catholic domination.

Pope Leo XIV’s new Fundamental Law offers one such clarification. According to Pope Francis’s 2023 Fundamental Law the pope was called to exercise sovereign powers also over the Vatican City State “in forza del munus petrino” that is, by virtue of the Petrine office. Leo XIV’s new 2026 Fundamental Law removes that formulation. Instead, it grounds Vatican City State in the Lateran Treaty as the instrument established to guarantee the Holy See’s “absolute and visible independence … for the fulfillment of its high mission in the world” and “its indisputable sovereignty also in the international field” (Article 2). Article 1 still affirms that the Supreme Pontiff, as sovereign of Vatican City State, has legislative, executive, and judicial power. Article 2 makes an important specification: the State and its legal order are distinct from the Roman Curia and other institutions of the Holy See. This does not diminish papal authority. It clarifies categories. The pope remains sovereign of Vatican City State, but that sovereignty is no longer presented as coming directly from the munus petrinum– by virtue of the Petrine office. Instead, Vatican City State sovereignty is juridical, historical, and diplomatic. It protects the Holy See’s freedom but it does not define the theology of Peter’s ministry.

Pope Leo XIV’s distinction is important for Catholic-Orthodox dialogue because one of the most persistent Orthodox concerns is that Roman primacy has been fused with juridical centralization, political sovereignty, and a monarchical-pyramidical view of the Church. The Vatican’s own 2024 study document, The Bishop of Rome, recognized that ecumenical partners have asked for a clearer distinction among the pope’s “special responsibilities for maintaining unity in the truth and ordering things in love.” It specifically calls for a “clearer distinction between his different responsibilities, especially between his patriarchal ministry in the Church of the West and his primatial ministry of unity in the communion of Churches.” The German Lutheran–Catholic dialogue also raised the issue of the pope as “Head of State” and the political-diplomatic implications of his role as “sovereign of Vatican City.” Pope Leo XIV’s decision enacts that differentiation. It says that Petrine ministry is not “Caesar’s” map: Peter is not a “king,” and Vatican City State exists to protect the freedom of the Holy See; it is not the theological source of Petrine primacy.

This specification comes from a son of St. Augustine, and Augustine helps us see why the distinction is not merely administrative. In The City of God, Augustine teaches that two cities are formed by two loves: the earthly city by love of self even to contempt of God, and the heavenly city by love of God even to contempt of self. In the earthly city, rulers are often marked by the lust of ruling; in the heavenly city, rulers and subjects serve one another in love. Augustine does not deny the usefulness of temporal order. He knows that earthly peace matters. But he refuses to confuse earthly peace with the Church’s final destination. In Book XIX, chapter 17, Augustine explains that the heavenly city, while on pilgrimage, “seeks earthly” peace and obeys civil laws concerning the necessities of mortal life, so long as doing so does not injure “faith and godliness.” Yet the pilgrim Church orders that earthly peace toward the peace of heaven. The Augustinian logic fits Leo’s recent clarification: Vatican City State belongs to the order of earthly peace. It is useful, even necessary, for the Holy See’s mission. In this Augustinian understanding, the Vatican City State is a juridical instrument of earthly peace that protects the Holy See’s freedom, not the theological essence of the Petrine ministry.

In his Tractates on the Gospel of John 124.5, Augustine comments that the Church was personified in Peter “on account of the primacy of his apostleship.” In Tractate 50.12, Augustine states that Peter, “in receiving the keys, represented the holy Church.” Peter’s primacy is real, but it is ecclesial and representative. So, Peter is not a person detached from the Church or acting in isolation. Instead, Peter is a sign of confession, communion, forgiveness, and unity.

This Augustinian language is precisely what Catholic-Orthodox dialogue needs. The Chieti Document of 2016 states that, in the first millennium, Rome occupied the first place in the order (taxis) of the five patriarchal sees and exercised a primacy of honor (presbeia tes times) (15). It also notes that the Western interpretation of Roman primacy through Peter’s role was not adopted in the East in the same way (16). Chieti further states (19) that a number of appeals were made to the bishop of Rome also from the East in disciplinary matters. These “appeals to the bishop of Rome from the East expressed the communion of the Church, but the bishop of Rome did not exercise canonical authority over the churches of the East” (19)

The 2023 document Synodality and Primacy in the Second Millenium and Today brings the argument into the present. It warns that the Church is not properly understood either as a pyramid with a primate governing from the top or as a federation of self-sufficient Churches (5.1). It also notes there is now a willingness to distinguish the pope’s patriarchal ministry in the Western or Latin Church from his primatial service in the communion of all the Churches (5.2). That is the road forward: neither papal monarchy nor ecclesial fragmentation, but primacy and synodality together.

This is the ecumenical key for reading the significance of Leo XIV’s recent revision. It does not resolve papal infallibility. It does not answer the Filioque. It does not undo centuries of division. But it does remove one unnecessary ecumenical obstacle: the impression that the pope’s temporal sovereignty over Vatican City State is theologically identical with the Petrine office. Leo’s clarification helps Rome say to the East that communion with Peter does not mean confusing the Church with a state, primacy with temporal power, or unity with administrative absorption.

John Paul II opened this path in Ut unum sint, asking Church leaders and theologians to help him find a way of exercising primacy that renounces nothing essential but is open to all the ecclesial values present among other Christians (10) and to a new situation (95). The Orientale Lumen Conference asked, “What’s next?” Pope Leo XIV’s legal clarification may be one answer: not the final answer, but a first next.

The way forward requires more than a constitutional revision. It requires reception, synodal practice, theological courage, and above all humility. But symbols matter, and legal language matters. By removing the link between Vatican sovereignty and the munus petrinum, Leo XIV has helped distinguish the earthly instrument from the ecclesial mystery. Vatican City serves Peter’s freedom but it is not Peter’s identity.

In Augustinian terms, the Church may use the peace of the earthly city on pilgrimage toward the eternal peace of God. In ecumenical terms, Rome can now say more clearly that Vatican City State serves the freedom of the Holy See, but it does not define the theology of Peter’s ministry. That distinction does not settle every question separating Catholics and Orthodox, but it removes an unnecessary confusion between temporal sovereignty and ecclesial primacy. This, then, may be Pope Leo XIV’s first “What’s Next?”: clarifying primacy for Catholic-Orthodox dialogue.