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Welcome by His All-Holiness Ecumenical
Patriarch Bartholomew to His Grace Justin

Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury

PHANAR, 13 JANUARY 2014

Your Grace Archbishop Justin, Beloved Brother in Christ:
‘Christ is in our midst! He is and shall be!’
It gives us the greatest joy to welcome Your Grace as the hon-

oured guest of the Ecumenical Throne, on this your ?rst pilgrimage to
the Patriarchate. We hope that Your Grace will be very happy during
your time in Constantinople, and that your visit will strengthen the
bond of mutual love that exists between our two Churches, the Ortho-
dox and the Anglican.

The friendship between our Churches is not new, but has deep
roots in past history. As long ago as the early 17th century Cyril Lukaris,
Patriarch ?rst of Alexandria and then of Constantinople, had many con-
tacts with the English Church and State. As a token of his esteem, he
sent to King James I the Codex Alexandrinus, one of the three most
ancient manuscripts of the Greek Bible, which is now one of the great-
est treasures at the British Library in London. Personal contacts be-
tween our two communions have been promoted more recently by the
Eastern Church Association, founded in 1864 – now known as the An-
glican and Eastern Churches Association – and by the Fellowship of St
Alban and St Sergius, founded in 1928. These two societies have fos-
tered countless ecumenical friendships; and without such ecumenical
friendships, on the direct and personal level, we cannot hope to build a
?rm foundation for Christian unity.

Since 1973, as Your Grace will be well aware, there has been an
o?cial dialogue, world-wide in scope, between our two ecclesial fami-
lies. The International Commission for Anglican-Orthodox Theological
Dialogue has so far produced three weighty reports: the Moscow

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