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Vancouver Assembly May Have Wide Impact

Episcopal News Service. August 18, 1983 [83147]

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (DPS, Aug. 18) -- The occasionally acrimonious debate highlighted the differences that separate Christians -- and cultures -- but the style was more open and the results are a series of documents that are expected to help shape ecumenical efforts for the rest of the Century.

The World Council of Churches Sixth Assembly brought 850 delegates -- and nearly as many journalists -- to the University of British Columbia campus here for 18 days of worship, reflection, debate under the general theme Jesus Christ: The Life of the World. Through plenary sessions and working groups the official delegates shaped documents on peace, education, unity, communication, and other issues bearing on that theme. The Assembly meets once every six or seven years to bring together representatives of all 300 member communions.

Delegate guidelines laid down by the Council are designed to encourage participation of women, minorities and young people. The Council named "delegated representatives" in these categories to supplement national and denominational panels and maintain this balance.

The Episcopal Church's delegation, led by Presiding Bishop John M. Allin, was typical of the overall balance. Allin was joined by the Rev. Sergio Carranza, a priest from Mexico and a member of the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church; the Rev. John E. Kitagawa, a parish priest from Connecticut; John M. Holloway, a recent graduate of Howard University, Dr. William E. Dornemann, an official of the Library of Congress and a former member of the Standing Commission on Ecumenical Relations; Mrs. Harry Havemeyer, a clinical psychiatrist and member of St. James' Church, New York; Alycia Kojima, a member of St. Peter's, Seattle, who is active in youth and Asian-American ministries; and Mary del Cortner of Denver, Province VI evangelism and renewal consultant.

In what was characterized by one Council officer as the "most comprehensive and best-prepared" Assembly in the Council's history, the delegates found -- and celebrated -- a strong sense of unity on doctrinal matters. A mammoth striped tent in which 3,500 Christians shared a communion service will probably remain as the strongest memory and symbol of what this Assembly means to the churches.

Archbishop Robert Runcie of Canterbury was joined at the altar in that tent by a Lutheran from Denmark, a Methodist from Benin, a Baptist from Hungary, a Moravian from Jamaica, a United Church of Canada pastor and a Reformed Christian from Indonesia. They celebrated the eucharist before a multiracial congregation from all over the world and in doing so gave expression to what one journalist called a "new Pentecost for a weary ecumenical movement."

At the heart of that hope is a Council-sponsored common understanding of baptism, ministry and eucharist that has won approval of 100 theologians representing nearly all branches of Christianity. The document -- which member Churches are asked to study and respond to by 1987 -- points back to the unified apostolic heritage of the early faith, acknowledges the historical precedent for both infant and adult baptism and upholds the belief of a "real presence of the crucified and risen Christ" in the consecrated communion elements; a belief in roots in the "power of the holy spirit" and the "living word of Christ."

On the topic of ministry, the report recommends the three-fold ordained ministry but emphasizes continuity of word and sacrament over direct episcopal succession as a surer sign of apostolic tradition.

While the document in no sense looks to the creation of a super church, it is the hope of many at the Assembly that it will open the way to a mutual recognition of ministries and ministers as a step toward some future organic unity.

The buoyed hopes of such eventual unity served as a backdrop for the continuing differences in philosophy, outlook and expression that marked the discussions and debate on many of the more "secular" issues.

Peace and justice issues elicited strong Third World voices condemning western material emphasis and the repeated assertion that peace could not co-exist with the continued injustices of hunger, economic exploitation and oppression. The presence of ordained women seeking equality in church employment and the pointed reminders by Canadian native Americans that the Assembly was being held on land taken from their ancestors lent emphasis to the concept that "First" and "Third" Worlds are not geographically distinct but exist within one another.

Allegations -- especially in western media -- of the Council's "leftist" bias were largely muted but came to the fore when efforts to condemn the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan foundered. Delegates from the U.S., Europe and Pakistan -- including Dr. Dornemann of the Episcopal delegation -- had pressed such a move on the basis that numerous resolutions had condemned United States' actions strongly. More than 140 delegates, reportedly including the Episcopalians, abstained in the final tally.