Changes

The first phase was 1871-88. While the Dutch Old Catholic church from the 18th century repeated the Roman anathemas against the Eastern Church, the young anti-Vatican movement in Germany began to take initiatives for a serious dialogue. Anglicans and Orthodox were both invited to the Bonn reunion conferences of 1874 and 1875. It was decided that agreement on the faith of the ecumenical councils, scripture and Tradition, the office of bishop and the seven sacraments was necessary for unity. Both the developments which had led to the declaration of papal infallibility in the [[Roman Catholic Church]] and those which in Protestantism had led to discontinuity with the early church were rejected. As for the filioque, it was agreed that the clause had been inserted wrongly into the creed but that it was possible to explain it in an orthodox Orthodox way.