wfn.org | ECUMENICAL: WCC SETS OUT VISION FOR THE FUTURE

[Audrey Whitefield <a.whitefield@quest.org.uk>]

Sept. 26, 1997
ANGLICAN COMMUNION NEWS SERVICE
Canon Jim Rosenthal, Director of Communications
Anglican Communion Office
London, England

[97.9.4.1]

ECUMENICAL: WCC SETS OUT VISION FOR THE FUTURE

(ENI) The central committee of the World Council of Churches (WCC) has
overwhelmingly approved a set of proposals aimed at giving the
ecumenical movement, the WCC and its member Churches a new sense of
purpose in the run-up to the new millennium and to the WCC's 50th
anniversary next year.

The proposals, contained in a policy statement entitled "Towards a
Common Understanding and Vision [CUV] of the World Council of Churches",
are intended to provide the WCC's 330 member Churches - drawn from
Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican traditions on five continents - with a
clear statement of their areas of agreement, and to inspire member
Churches and ecumenical partners to "recommit" themselves to the
ecumenical movement.

The statement will now be sent to WCC member Churches and other
ecumenical partners, and be forwarded to the WCC's eighth assembly which
takes place in Harare in December 1998 for possible adoption by the
assembly as an "ecumenical charter" for the 21st century.

Explaining the need to restate the WCC's "common understanding and
vision", the policy statement describes signs of a "weakening of
ecumenical commitment, a growing distance between the WCC and its member
Churches, and of a widespread perception among the young generation that
the ecumenical movement has lost its vitality". It also refers to the
fact that some "member Churches are experiencing internal conflicts and
even the threat of schism because of their participation in the
ecumenical fellowship", an indirect reference to opposition, in some
Orthodox Churches, to ecumenism.

As well as encouraging existing WCC member Churches to play a greater
role in the ecumenical movement, the statement is also intended to
strengthen the WCC's relationship with the Roman Catholic Church, which
is not a member of the WCC, and with those Evangelical and Pentecostal
Churches which are not WCC members.

According to WCC officials, it is hoped that a proposal on organising an
"ecumenical forum" between the WCC and other ecumenical partners,
will be brought to the WCC's Harare assembly next year.