Sandro Magister skriver om hvordan pave Benedikts økumeniske initiativer (overfor anglikanerne spesielt) fungerer i praksis. Noen har vært kritiske til hva paven har gjort, men:
… the Church of Rome is viewed today by the majority of Anglicans all over the world in a much more positive light than in the past, as a valid guardian of shared apostolic traditions, against the modernist tendencies.
As a result, the boundary between Catholicism and Anglicanism has become more open today. And Anglican primate Williams himself, who is a sophisticated theologian, has found in the theological magisterium of Benedict XVI a broadly shared vision.
The ecumenism of Benedict XVI is not one of negotiation, of reciprocal concessions of sovereignty, of the watering down of doctrine, for the sake of creating a structure acceptable to all. It is simply meant to revive fidelity to the roots of the mission of Christians in the world, as intended by Jesus Christ. It is meant to create unity on the basis of this fidelity.
And the choice of the Roman monastery of San Gregorio al Celio, for vespers celebrated together with Anglican primate Williams, was precisely an insistence on these essential roots, «because it was from this monastery that Pope Gregory [the Great] chose Augustine and his forty monks and sent them to bring the Gospel to the Angles, a little over 1,400 years ago.» And from their islands, the English monks then set out again to evangelize Europe. …