Towards a common global ecumenical assembly?

In his report to the ninth assembly of the World Council of Churches [WCC] in Porto Alegre in February 2006, the WCC general secretary Samuel Kobia said he hoped the WCC would be able to "develop fresh and creative ways of working which strengthen our relationships with churches and a wide range of ecumenical partners". (1) This included, he said, finding ways to interact with Christian World Communions (CWCs), a readiness to develop relationships with churches and Christian families that did not actively participate in the ecumenical movement, and a closer programmatic relationship between the WCC and regional ecumenical organizations. Then he added,

   But I want to go beyond these suggestions and renew the proposal
   that, as a concrete step, the next assembly of the WCC should
   provide a common platform for the wider ecumenical movement. If we
   are ready to take such a significant concrete step, we could
   envisage together, instead of the many different global assemblies
   and general conferences organized by the various world communions
   and other bodies, just one celebration of the search for unity and
   common witness of Christian churches. To be even more specific, and
   as a minimum next step, I propose that this assembly give us a
   mandate to accelerate the dialogue with the Lutheran World
   Federation [LWF] and the World Alliance of Reformed Churches [WARC]
   to explore possibilities of holding our next assemblies as a
   combined event. And we should also invite any other world Christian
   body to join us in this dialogue. (2)

Leaders of the LWF and WARC attending the Porto Alegre gathering hailed the proposal. The WARC president, the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, said he was "thrilled with the proposal of the [WCC] general secretary that we look forward to a common global assembly", while the LWF president, Bishop Mark Hanson, said the proposal "broadens the scope of the ecumenical movement, and provides a way for Christian world communions to make a larger contribution to the wider ecumenical movement." (3)

Kobia's report noted implicitly that it was not the first time that such a suggestion had been made. It was, however, the first time that the proposal had been made explicitly to a WCC assembly in a general secretary's report. The idea was picked up by the assembly's policy reference committee, which stressed the "importance of strengthening" the relationship between the WCC and the CWCs, while noting that the "various structures and self-understanding of the Christian World Communions and of the member churches of the WCC result in a variety of ways of relating to the WCC". Some CWCs, it continued,

   and the [WCC] General Secretary have called for new ways of
   relating CWCs to the WCC, including new possibilities related to
   future WCC Assemblies, expanded space in the structure of WCC
   Assemblies for confessional meetings, and the vision ultimately
   of a broadly inclusive ecumenical assembly.

The WCC assembly adopted a series of recommendations to strengthen links between the WCC and CWCs that included directives for the WCC to:

... jointly consult with the Christian World Communions to explore the significance and implications of overlap of membership, coordination of programmes, and other common efforts between the WCC and the Christian World Communions;

... initiate, within the next year and in consultation with the Christian World Communions, a joint consultative commission to discuss and recommend ways to further strengthen the participation of Christian World Communions in the WCC;

... explore the feasibility of a structure for WCC assemblies that would provide expanded space for Christian World Communions and confessional families to meet, for the purpose of deliberation and/or overall agendas. Early in the term of this next central committee, a decision would be expected as to whether the next WCC Assembly should be so structured;

... [ensure] that United and Uniting churches be included in this process. (4)

These decisions appeared to be more far-reaching than the proposals made by Kobia in his report to the assembly. (5) They embedded the issue of the "structure of WCC assemblies" into a broader network of relationships with CWCs that would include joint consultations on programmes and the setting up of a "joint consultative commission" to further strengthen the participation of CWCs. Rather than restricting the discussion to the WCC, LWF and WARC holding their assemblies as a "combined event", the resolution referred to "expanded space" at WCC assemblies "for Christian World Communions and confessional families to meet for the purpose of deliberations and/or overall agendas". Such language reflects the CWCs' differences in size, structure, self-understanding and views on what holds them together as Christian World Communions. (6)

Kobia returned to the issue at the WCC central committee meeting in August-September 2006, when he presented the evaluation of the Porto Alegre gathering. (7) The assembly recommendation on a possible "joint" or "common" assembly had, he stated, set the goal as "an 'ecumenical assembly' of celebration, rather than a 'common event' for respective business agendas of different organizations". The decision represented, he continued, "a considerable ecumenical momentum and the specific commitment of the WCC to explore how an 'ecumenical assembly' could be a celebration of faith that reaches beyond ecumenical boundaries, but could also provide space for other Christian bodies to pursue the deliberations most appropriate to their self-understanding". He noted: