The Church of Ireland said yesterday it was "concerned and disappointed" that the Vatican's declaration Dominus Iesus appeared to represent a retreat from much of the ecumenical progress that had been experienced by many communities throughout Ireland.
On Tuesday, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, spelt out the Catholic Church's position on ecumenical and inter-religious dialogue.
The cardinal vigorously asserted the Catholic Church's "infallible" teachings about the "single Church of Christ, which subsists in the Catholic Church".
The Dominus Iesus document on the "Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church" came within two days of the beatification of Pope Pius IX, a conservative pontiff with a strong belief that the Catholic Church was the only acceptable Christian faith.
The Church of Ireland in a statement said yesterday its bishops were considering Dominus Iesus at a meeting in Dublin.
However, in a preliminary statement, the bishops said: "We are concerned and disappointed that the tenor of Section 17 of the Declaration Dominus Iesus appears to represent a retreat from much of the ecumenical progress that has been experienced by many communities throughout Ireland".
The statement continued: "As bishops of a Church that has sought to play a full and active part in efforts to increase understanding and improve relations between the Churches in Ireland, we have written to the Episcopal Conference of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland, seeking urgent clarification of their view on how Dominus Iesus affects the Irish situation".
Media reports earlier this week suggested that Cardinal Ratzinger had warned Catholic episcopal conferences not to use the expression "sister churches" when referring to Anglican and other Protestant faiths.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr George Carey, said the declaration questioned the steps taken towards working together by the different churches and did not "reflect the deeper understanding that has been achieved through ecumenical dialogue and co-operation during the past 30 years".
Dr Carey added: "the idea that Anglican and other churches are not `proper churches' seems to question the considerable ecumenical gains we have made."
The National Conference of Catholic Priests in England and Wales yesterday reaffirmed its commitment to ecumenism and suggested the Vatican had not foreseen the way "certain sections of the media" would report Dominus Iesus.