Living in the Church the Communion with the Other

This article presents itself as a collection of introductory texts prepared for a congress devoted to the theme "Living in the Church in communion with the other." It brings together, in the form of an annotated anthology, excerpts from philosophers, theologians and spiritual writers — Berdiaev, Yannaras, Buber, Levinas, Kallistos Ware, Zizioulas, Ciobotea and a Monk of the Eastern Church — organized around the tension between otherness and communion. The central idea is that an authentic encounter with the other cannot be reduced to a subject-object relationship: it requires a transcendence of egocentrism toward a personal and free communion. The theological contribution lies in the ecclesiological and Trinitarian grounding of this reflection: the human person, as image of the Trinity, finds fulfillment only in communion, and it is the Church, as a structurally relational body, that provides the framework within which otherness and unity coexist without destroying one another.