Fr George Florovsky is a Russian Orthodox theologian of repute, at present teaching at Harvard in the United States. We are happy to print here a translation of an article which first appeared in Russian in the Messenger of the Russian Christian Students Movement, and then in a French translation in Vers L'Unité Chrétienne./rom which this translation is made. We thank the editors of both journals for permission to publish an article so remarkable for its calm objectivity and its understanding and appreciation of the Roman Catholic position.
The Vatican Council (1869-70), by the reckoning of the Roman Church, was the last ‘ecumenical council'. This council has never been formally closed. Its labours were only temporarily interrupted by the pressure of outside events, the occupation of the Papal States and the city of Rome by the troops of nationalist Italy, which at the time appeared to threaten the freedom of the council's decisions and even the freedom of the Church itself.
