Team members from the two groups have attempted to be present as observers at each other's Communion service, but found it too painful to continue the practice. The group has shared a love feast, a Christian holy meal not to be confused with the Lord's Supper or Holy Communion. In approaching the study of Mary, United Methodist and Roman Catholic Dialogue participants began to tackle one of the areas of great difference between the two bodies. The Rev. Bruce Robbins, staff executive of the United Methodist Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns, acknowledged the difficulty United Methodists have concerning the Roman Catholic doctrines on the conception and assumption of Mary. The doctrine of assumption states that Mary was transported into heaven because of her continued sinless state.
Assumption is the more recent of the two doctrines.
N.Y. Sister Mary Aquin O'Neill of Baltimore said for her it meant one could be a woman and be free from sin and that a woman's body was not incompatible with the divine presence. Both these ideas were in contrast to theological tradition, she added. The Rev. Yolanda Pupo-Ortiz, an associate general secretary of the United Methodist Commission on Religion and Race, said she believed that the glorification of Mary had good and bad effects on women. She said it encouraged a reverence for women as mothers that both elevated them and limited what they were allowed to do. Vatican II, a Roman Catholic Ecumenical Council held 1962-65, made clear that Mary was an active participant in salvation, he said.