The Assyrian Church of the East : History and theology, concerning theological conflicts alongside the Syriac Orthodox Church and the Coptic Church (in contemporary Sweden).

The Purpose of this essay is to seek an answer to whether or not a conflict exists between priests of the Assyrian Church, the Syrian Orthodox Church and the Coptic Church in contemporary Swedish society, as well as to examine the environment between the three. The theological dissimilarities will be studied (from a historical standpoint), along with the interviewed participants views on the division in Christianity which will be presented also. I choose to interview six priests/chorbishops who live and work in Sweden, and the result was analyzed according to the senior professor of peace- and conflict, Peter Wallensteen’s theories on conflict and conflict resolution, where important issues are laid out to identify the core problem, and theological differences are discussed and compared from a union perspective. The result of the interviews illustrate a clear response that the participants experience a lack of functioning collaborations (from the Assyrians Church view, a collaboration is absent from the Syrian Orthodox Church and the Coptic Church, and vice versa) and most of the participants experience negative consequences from the divide in churches, as they strive for unity in Christianity as a whole. The theological differences between the churches proves not to be as significant as expected, the actual predicament lies partly in language-and phrase division along with a general rejection of each other’s interpretations. In many instances all the churches mean to express the same things, but it is the explanation of expressions that vary and cause misunderstandings. Consequently it is imperative for these churches to develop functional communication to (amongst other issues) solve their interpretations. If not to unify, then to develop an acceptance for each other and the different understandings