wfn.org | WCC OPINION: Konrad Raiser: The Berlin Wall & the ecumenical movement

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World Council of Churches - Feature

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For immediate release - 05/11/2009

THE FALL OF THE BERLIN WALL AND ITS MEANING FOR THE ECUMENICAL MOVEMENT
By Konrad Raiser (*)

The opening or fall of the Berlin Wall was an unexpected event for the  people most directly affected, but even more so for the world at large.  The ecumenical movement was no exception. However, the events in 1989 East  Germany were to have a wide and long lasting impact on it that can still  be felt today.

To be sure, large numbers of people from the former German Democratic  Republic had left the country since the opening of the border between  Hungary and Austria in the summer of 1989. Also, a growing network of  civic groups, struggling for fundamental social and political change in  the country, had emerged. They had benefited from the protection by the  churches and were inspired by the ecumenical assemblies earlier in the  year at Magdeburg and Dresden as part of the conciliar process on Justice,  Peace and the Integrity of Creation.

Similar groups and movements had been operating in neighbouring countries  already for some time. All of this had created a dynamic pushing for  change, especially after the large, explicitly non-violent demonstration  in Leipzig on Monday, 9 October 1989. But even then, few people expected  that the wall would come down so soon, preparing the way for the end of  communist rule not only in East Germany but in the entire region of  central and eastern Europe and eventually overcoming the division of  Germany and of Europe.

The series of events taking place in Europe from the summer of 1989  continuing well into the year 1990 and complemented by radical changes in  South Africa and in other parts of the world had profound implications for  the ecumenical movement. During the four decades following the First  Assembly of the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Amsterdam 1948,  ecumenical efforts for justice and peace had been conditioned by the  antagonism of the two major power-blocks and its consequences for  countries in the southern hemisphere.

Ecumenical organizations, especially the WCC and the Conference of  European Churches had tried to maintain links with the churches in the  countries under Communist rule. Their witness for peace under the threat  of nuclear confrontation had finally borne fruit. The 1990 Paris Charter  for a "new Europe" appeared to herald in a new world order of peace and  justice and a process of genuine disarmament began to take shape.

But the transformations in Europe and in other parts of the world had come  so suddenly that neither governments nor the churches were sufficiently  prepared for the new situation. The countries and churches, liberated from  oppressive ideological and political constraints, had to find a new  identity. In many instances this led to sharp internal struggles,  especially between those involved in or complicit with the former system  and those who had struggled for liberty, justice and human rights.

Ecumenical organizations came under scrutiny as well in view of their  relationships with representatives of the former system and their lack of  effective support for the struggles of dissident movements. In some cases,  "ecumenism" even became a term to be avoided. Internal tensions developed  particularly in many of the Orthodox churches leading to the withdrawal of  the Orthodox churches in Georgia and Bulgaria from membership in the WCC.

Soon after the fall of the Berlin Wall the second Gulf war in 1991, the  conflicts in the former Yugoslavia as well the rapid progression of the  process of globalization presented the ecumenical witness for justice and  peace with unprecedented new challenges. The fragile order of the "cold  war" years had been replaced by a new "world disorder".

In recognition of the important, and in some cases decisive ways in which  the churches had contributed to the peaceful revolution in central and  eastern Europe as well as to the ending of the apartheid regime in  southern Africa, the ecumenical movement accepted the challenge to  overcome violence as its special vocation. That the Decade to Overcome  Violence should have been officially inaugurated in February 2001 in front  of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin was therefore a symbolic tribute to the  peaceful revolution that brought down the Berlin Wall.

>[678 words]

(*) The Rev. Dr Konrad Raiser, a Lutheran theologian from Germany, is a  former WCC general secretary (1993-2003).

>See also:

WCC general secretary's comment on the 20th anniversary of the fall of the  Berlin Wall
http://www.oikoumene.org/en/news/news-management/eng/a/article/1634/lessons -from-the-fall-of.html

Feature story: "The Berlin Wall fell in many places"
http://www.oikoumene.org/en/news/news-management/eng/a/article/1634/the-ber lin-wall-fell-in-m.html

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The World Council of Churches promotes Christian unity in faith, witness  and service for a just and peaceful world. An ecumenical fellowship of  churches founded in 1948, today the WCC brings together 349 Protestant,  Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 560 million  Christians in over 110 countries, and works cooperatively with the Roman  Catholic Church. The WCC general secretary is Rev. Dr Samuel Kobia, from  the Methodist Church in Kenya. Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.