wfn.org | Cleveland Churches Welcome Ecumenical Guests from NCC

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@wfn.org>]

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA
Email: news@ncccusa.org
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Contact: NCC News, 212-870-2227
	During 50th Anniversary - Nov. 8-12, 1999 call 216-696-8490

CLEVELAND, Nov. 8, 1999 -- CONGREGATIONS WELCOME ECUMENICAL GUESTS

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Reconciliation is "glue of the good society," and it is 
the ecumenical task, said the Rev. Dr. Joan B. Campbell, National Council 
of Churches General Secretary, in a sermon at Cleveland's Old Stone Church 
here on the occasion of "Ecumenical Witness Sunday," Nov. 7.

Congregations in Cleveland and nearby communities welcomed ecumenical guest 
preachers from across the United States and around the world, among the 
more than 1,000 people including many from northeastern Ohio expected to 
participate in the NCC's 50th Anniversary Celebration here Nov. 
9-12.  Together they prayed for the future of ecumenical witness.  Many 
churches rang their bells at noon Sunday as a symbol of their commitment to 
unity.

At Old Stone Church, on Cleveland's Public Square, Dr. Campbell set the 
stage for the event set to occur there Wednesday noon, a "Service of 
Remembrance and Recognition" with Korean survivors and U.S. military 
involved in the No Gun Ri incident during the Korean War.

The parties may not be ready for reconciliation Dr. Campbell said, but they 
are ready to take steps toward it.  She described the upcoming service as a 
tremendously significant moment for both sides, who for 50 years have lived 
with the reality of massacre.

Reconciliation is the ecumenical task, she declared in a sermon based on 
the parable of the prodigal son, the self-righteous older brother, and the 
forgiving father.  Reconciliation is about wrestling with privilege. The 
self-righteousness of the older son has been a lesson to teach all who 
claim a birthright and are unaware of the need of God's gift of 
forgiveness.  Equality is God's way; it is rooted in understanding that all 
are worthy in God's eyes.

Retiring after nine years as NCC General Secretary, Dr. Campbell said the 
story of the prodigal is as relevant today as when Jesus first told it.  " 
It is a story about reconciliation and forgiveness," she said, a necessary 
element, perhaps the essential glue, in the good society."

Similarly, Dr. Campbell described the ecumenical movement as about seeing 
all God's people.  "The search for rapprochement takes us out of ourselves 
and focuses us on the gifts and graces of others.  Therein lies healing and 
hope."

"Unity in Christ, Gift and Calling," the NCC 50th Anniversary theme, was 
the focus of the Rev. Dr. Gordon Sommers' greetings to Antioch Baptist 
Church, Cleveland. Dr. Sommers, Bethlehem, Pa., is a leader in the Moravian 
Church and a NCC past president.

"Unity in Christ is a gift we already enjoy.  It is also a calling to 
fulfill," Dr. Sommers said.  "It is our responsibility to express this 
unity to a world that is broken, divided, alienated.  How can we do that 
apart from unity among those who are entrusted with God's wholeness?"

Dr. Sommers has coordinated the NCC's 50th anniversary activities.  He 
thanked Antioch Baptist's pastor, Dr. Marvin McMickle, for serving on the 
Cleveland Site Planning Committee.  "You are Cleveland," Dr. Sommers told 
the congregation.  "Thank you for your hospitality to the NCC, 50 years ago 
and now.  And thank you for the good weather this time around," he quipped, 
referring to a snowstorm that blanketed Cleveland with 20 inches of snow at 
the time of the Council's constituting convention in 1950.

Preacher-playwright-composer the Rev. Al Carmines told worshippers at 
Pilgrim Congregational Church, "Fifty years ago the NCC came into being and 
has been making people laugh and cry ever since."  The 90-minute service 
featured The Pilgrim Jazz Trio and Pastor Carmines' preaching and singing 
from the piano.

Pastor Carmines said that for 63 years he has been moving from darkness 
into light, along the way realizing that art and faith meet along the same 
road.  He demonstrated this concept of oneness by singing Broadway show 
tunes "My Funny Valentine" and "The Story of Love" along with original 
compositions.  The service concluded with the singing of "Make Us 
One."  Pastor Carmines is in Cleveland to participate in "Artistry as Gift 
and Calling," one of the anniversary celebration programs

The Reverend Dr. Morgan W. Tann was the guest speaker for the Ecumenical 
Witness Sunday service at St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, 
where the Rev. Dr. Audie V. Simon is pastor.  His subject was "Steps toward 
Thanksgiving." The message challenged the congregation to a conscious 
awareness of the presence of God, at work among people throughout the world.

Pastor Simon indicated that the St. Paul congregation has made a real 
effort to serve the community in this rapidly changing area of the city. 
Ecumenical efforts by several neighborhood churches including St. Paul are 
resulting in new child and elder care facilities, recreational grounds and 
increased social planning services.  The 85-year old congregation, with 
more than 500 members, has the distinction of being the First Church of the 
Cleveland District and Dr. Simon is the Presiding Elder.

Through the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A and Church 
World Service, congregations work directly with people in need, said the 
Rev. Dr. Rodney I. Page, New York, deputy general secretary for Church 
World Service and Witness.

Dr. Page preached the "Ecumenical Witness Sunday" sermon at St. Mark 
Presbyterian Church in northeast Cleveland.  Church World Service assists 
people by responding to disasters, resettling refugees and providing 
resources to aid people in need throughout the world.

Through Church World Service, the people of St. Mark's share their 
resources in many ways, Dr. Page told the 150 worshipers.  In Vietnam, "you 
have dug hundreds of water wells," he said.   "In China, you have supplied 
teachers of English through the Amity Foundation."  Dr. Page also credited 
St. Mark's for helping supply blankets in Iraq, food in North Korea and 
homes in Honduras.  The congregation helps resettle refugees "in all areas 
of the world," and its gifts helped rebuild some 100 churches in the United 
States destroyed by fire, he added.

"Your church is a partner with 34 other denominations to work and pray and 
serve together," he said. "We are people with hope and compassion.  That 
hope and compassion is shown every time we reach out to others."  St. 
Mark's interim minister, the Rev. Rosalind Powell, said, "It's in 
relationships we actually come together and experience unity. We indeed are 
in ministry with our brothers and sisters throughout the world."
	
The Rev. Eric C. Shafer, Chicago, preached at Christ Episcopal Church in 
Shaker Heights, Ohio.  He also led an adult education session on the "full 
communion" relationship proposed between the Episcopal Church USA and the 
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).  Shafer is director of the 
ELCA's Department for Communication and chair of the NCC's Communication 
Commission.

In his sermon, based on the parable of the wise and foolish bridesmaids, 
Pastor Shafer likened the NCC to a marriage, since the marriage image is 
often used in Christianity to describe the relationship between Christ and 
the church.  But, he added, "perhaps the marriage image is not a good one 
for the NCC.  The image of `family' would be a better one - not a sanitized 
or traditional family, but one as dysfunctional as many our own families."

Pastor Shafer added that, since the Council's work is so public, "our 
dysfunction becomes very publicly known, but, whatever we do and whenever 
we agree or disagree, we are united in Christ's love for Christ's 
church.  And our common goal of unity in Christ's love for humankind."

He described three areas of NCC ministry, Church World Service and Witness, 
Bible translation, and the Burned Churches Fund.  He concluded by saying 
that the gospel lesson "tells us to be ready, that Christ is coming again 
but that it may not be soon.  While we are waiting, we band together in 
organizations like the NCC to do the work of Christ here in the USA and 
around the world, so that we can make a common witness to our faith in 
Jesus Christ and Christ's love for the people of this world."

At Covenant Community Church in Akron, Ohio, Barbara George, New York, told 
worshippers, "Promoting Christian unity is not an add-on to the church's 
usual list of activities.  Ecumenism is an integral part of the life and 
work of the church and must be central to all the church is and does."  Ms. 
George serves as director NCC of Ecumenical Networks.

She said, "The ministry of ecumenism is an immense task which we must not 
refuse and which we cannot carry out alone.  The call to unity is the most 
profound invitation from our God to be holy and make real the wholeness of 
our God for all."