Towards a common global ecumenical assembly?

Ecumenical Review, The, July-Oct, 2006 by Stephen Brown

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   An "ecumenical assembly" would be first and foremost a space of
   common celebration, prayer and dialogue. It would also be an event
   in which the WCC and other bodies were afforded the space necessary
   to conduct their respective deliberations. The event as a whole
   would be an unparalleled witness of Christian unity and
   spirituality. The WCC is committed to working with other Christian
   bodies that see an 'ecumenical assembly' as an opportunity to
   enrich their faith, an invitation to deepen their ecumenical
   commitments and as a space to gather in counsel.

There were, by the beginning of the 21st century, representatives from 17 CWCs at the annual conferences of CWC secretaries which began in 1957. (8)

But in his address in Porto Alegre, the WCC general secretary had singled out two CWCs--the Lutheran World Federation and the World Alliance of Reformed Churches. This reflects the proximity of the three organizations, all of which have their headquarters at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, as well as their structural similarities: all three hold major delegate assemblies every six to eight years, which are often also used as a kind of market place bringing together participants from outside the circle of official delegates, and all three have similar structures of governance. Moreover, as a WCC report has noted, the membership of WARC and the LWF overlap to the extent of 70-80 per cent with that of the WCC, (9) and all three organizations have a similar "footprint" in terms of the sources of their financing, the bulk of which comes from the same countries and, in many cases, from the same churches or agencies. Nevertheless, despite such similarities, there have been significant theological and ecclesiological differences underlying the way in which the LWF and WARC have related to the WCC:

   WARC has consistently sought to give priority to the life and
   witness of the WCC. It avoided duplicating programmes and invited
   its member churches to act directly through the WCC. While many
   Lutheran churches were among the founders of the WCC and have
   remained active members, the LWF has to a larger extent than WARC
   sought to contribute to the wider ecumenical movement also through
   its common life and witness as a federation and as a communion. (10)

1. Towards Harare 1998

Moves to promote what have been described as common, joint or coordinated assemblies reach back more than a decade. As early as 1995 Konrad Raiser, who had become WCC general secretary two years earlier, spoke of the potential for the WCC to become an "organizing" agent of a forum in which the World Council would be one member alongside other Christian organizations. While the WCC was still the "most comprehensive" ecumenical body at the world level, it "cannot and should not pretend to be its main centre", he told the 1995 WCC central committee. (11) Raiser's proposal was intended, on the one hand, to reach out to Pentecostal and Evangelical churches and movements in one direction, and the Roman Catholic Church in the other. (12) But the proposal also addressed the relationship between the WCC and Christian World Communions such as the LWF and WARC, many of which, Raiser noted, had played a decisive role in the ecumenical movement through bilateral doctrinal dialogues:

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Towards a common global ecumenical assembly?

Ecumenical Review, The, July-Oct, 2006 by Stephen Brown

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