Pope Leo XIV: “Nicaea, the compass that must guide towards unity”

“Not just an event of the past, but a compass that must continue to guide us towards the full visible unity of all Christians”: This is how Pope Leo XIV referred to the Council of Nicaea, addressing the participants in a Symposium dedicated to the 1700th anniversary of the First Ecumenical Council.

The symposium, which took place from 4 to 7 of June 2025 at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, had as its theme “Nicaea and the Church of the Third Millennium: Towards Catholic-Orthodox Unity” and was jointly organised by the Angelicum Ecumenical Institute for Ecumenical Studies and the International Orthodox Theological Union.

The Pope received the conference participants on Saturday, 7 June. Among them, from the side of the Ecumenical Patriarchate were His Eminence Elder Metropolitan Emmanuel of Chalcedon, and His Eminence Archbishop Nikitas of Thyateira and Great Britain.

The Symposium was addressed by His Eminence Metropolitan Job of Pisidia, Co-Chair of the Committee for Theological Dialogue between the Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches.