World Church-In Brief
Diocesan Press Service. September 14, 1967 [57-4]
Ecumenically Speaking
Presiding Bishop Hines met with the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, His All-Holiness Athenagoras, I, in Istanbul, Turkey on Aug. 14, prior to the meeting of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches in Haraklion, Crete. The meeting was at the invitation of the Patriarch.
The World Council of Churches Faith and Order Commission, which met in Bristol, England, July 29 - August 8, focused on new directions in deciding to give top priority to a study on the Christian doctrine of man. Retiring chairman of the Commission is the Rt. Rev. Oliver Tomkins, Bishop of Bristol.
The World Council of Christian Education held its fourth annual institute in Nairobi, Kenya. Christian educators from 75 countries sought answers to the question: How can we best educate adults, children and youth to understand the Christian faith and to participate intelligently and constructively in the community, nation and the world as Christians?
The Roman Catholic Church and the World Council of Churches may well "be in a position to spend some money together in 1968" in a joint program for international justice, development and peace, Dr. Eugene Carson Blake, WCC general secretary, told a press conference during the meeting of the WCC Central Committee in Crete this August. Final authorization must still be obtained, however.
The Church Women United elected four Roman Catholics to its Board of Managers at its First Ecumenical Assembly held in East Lafayette, Ind. during the latter part of July. Church Women United is an agency of the National Council of Churches.
Woodstock College, a leading Jesuit institution, has requested permission from the Vatican to transfer the institution from Woodstock, Md., to New Haven, Conn. and to affiliate with Yale Divinity School. The move, which has the Yale Divinity School's approval, would permit an exchange of courses and lecturers. The Jesuits would attend classes with students from Yale Divinity School during their fourth year.
The first ecumenical consultation on practical theology was held at the Ecumenical Institute, Bossey, Switzerland, Aug. 21 - 27. Some 50 representatives from Protestant, Anglican, Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches in Africa, Asia, Eastern and Western Europe and North America attended.
Overseas
The Church in the Southern Sudan is growing weaker due to the absence of leadership, Mr. Ezekiel M. Kodi, Member of Parliament in the Sudan Government, told a reporter for the Anglican newspaper New Day during a visit to Kampala, Uganda. Many leaders of the Christian church in the Southern Sudan were forced to flee for their lives during a series of raids, accompanied by murder, torture, looting and destruction, by Khartoum government troops in 1965.
The Diocese of Burma, Church of India , Pakistan, Burma and Ceylon, has instituted a new training center at Indaw. The seventeen participants in the program are presently constructing additional buildings, as the accommodations they occupy are too small. The program itself will allow for the training of lay persons, the testing of vocations to the ordained ministry and experimentation in new agricultural methods.
Zulu Chief Albert Luthuli died July21 from injuries suffered in a train accident near his home in the district of Stranger, 30 miles north of Durban, So. Africa. Chief Luthuli was awarded the 1960 Nobel Peace Prize for his non-violent efforts against racial separation in his country.
At Home
The Rev. John Courtney Murray, S. J. died this August. In a statement issued by the Rt. Rev. Stephen F. Bayne, First Vice-President of the Executive Council, Bishop Bayne referred to Father Murray as "a great crusader for religious liberty... His counsel and advice to agencies of the Episcopal Church will long be gratefully remembered. " Father Murray had served as an advisor to the Committee on Theological Freedom and Social Responsibility most recently.
Project Choice, which will involve some five million Americans in a study of the grave domestic and international crises of the technological age will be launched during November with the aid of television. Several thousand small study groups are being organized in some 30 cities. They will focus on four programs to be seen on Look Up And Live, the CBS-TV religious program. Following these programs the first locally planned and coordinated "feedback" system for television will go into operation and will serve as the basis for a follow-up show in February.
The General Board of the National Council of Churches will meet Sept. 14 - 15, in Atlanta, Ga. On the agenda will be world hunger, the churches role in the Middle East crisis and an appraisal of explosive issues in international affairs. Also scheduled for consideration is a policy statement on "withholding consumer patronage to secure justice. ' The statement has been debated at several previous meetings and was tabled each time for reconsideration and rewriting.
The Washington Diocese, official publication of the Diocese of Washington, became a tabloid newspaper with its September issue. It has an initial free circulation of over 30, 000. The publication was formerly a magazine with a circulation of 10,000.
A new assembly of the Brotherhood of St. Andrew has been formed in the western portion of the Diocese of Tennessee. This new assembly, The West Tennessee Assembly, brings to a total of 43 the number of Assemblies of the Brotherhood in the United States.