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SUMMER2001

From priorities...to resolutions...to principles

Delays in England and Wales

Will 2002 be the year of the green, amber or red ecumenical light?

Keep up with the ecumenical scene in England

The Committee membership

Staff

What kind of unity are we called to seek, to strive for, to pray for?

The present ecumenical scene gives many different, but not necessarily conflicting answers. The Ecumenical Committee has struggled to articulate a way forward for the United Reformed Church which will both embrace a variety of approaches yet not avoid the hard and challenging questions.

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From priorities ....... to resolutions ....... to principles

The Ecumenical Committee will, in an amendment to its own original resolution, challenge the General Assembly to adopt three ecumenical principles.

A.    Expand the range and deepen the nature of the Christian common life and witness in each local community. 
Derby Churches Together now has Russian, Greek and Serbian Orthodox congregations in membership
Increasingly, pentecostal and house churches are joining local 'Churches Together'
There has been a net increase in registered LEPs since 1998 of 24.

B.      Proclaim more clearly, in word and deed, that in Christ we are one World Church family...
This office is currently mapping the extent to which local United Reformed churches are sharing their building with another Christian congregation, usually from a different culture and sometimes not worshipping in English.

C.      Persevere in the search for the visible and organic unity of the Church through church-to-church conversations on matters of faith and church order ....

There is also  fruitful multi-lateral work being done and to be done.

• The Theology and Unity Group of CTE studies new documents from the member churches, sometimes when they are still in draft form 

• some regional and county bodies have sponsored meetings on such new documents, as well as on new WCC faith and order papers.

• the Church Life Liaison Group of CTBI is sponsoring a consultation on ecumenical methodology across the four nations

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Delays in England and Wales

Delays in England and Wales

•    The report of the formal conversations between the Church of England and the Methodist Church will not now be published until the end of the year.  It is hoped that the report of the informal, trilateral conversations might come out at the end of September.

• Both the Methodist Church and the United Reformed Church will delay responding to the revised proposals for an Ecumenical Bishop in Wales until the Church in Wales has made its response, beginning in the Autumn.

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Will 2002 be the year of the green, amber or red ecumenical light?

2002 will be a critical year for the formal unity efforts in all three nations.

• The Church of England/Methodist report of their formal conversations, after six months of public discussion, will come to the Methodist Conference and the Church of England General Synod in June/July.

• The report of the informal trilateral conversations, also after many months of public discussion, will come to General Assembly, Methodist Conference and the Church of England's Council for Christian Unity.

• The revised proposals for an Ecumenical Bishop in Wales, provided

• the Church in Wales has not stalled or rejected them, will also come to the General Assembly and the Methodist Conference.

• the Scottish Church Initiative for Union will present its basis and plan for union to the decision-making bodies of the Church of Scotland, the Scottish Episcopal Church, the Methodist Church and the United Reformed Church.

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hosted by the Romanian Orthodox Church and attended by ecumenical officers from Kenya, South Africa, Korea, Malaysia, the Nordic countries, the Netherlands, Hungary, Egypt, Cyprus, Greece, Russia, Armenia, the Czech Republic, Argentina, USA, Ireland, Scotland, England.

• Be faithful to your home partnerships when visiting partners abroad.
  e.g. ask your partner to arrange a meeting with, perhaps, the local Roman Catholics, or Methodists, or Orthodox in order to bring greetings from those members of your Churches Together.  The 'western' members of the meeting were accused of perpetuating divisions abroad while healing them at home.

• Christian unity which is a response to hostile pressure, for example in India and in Malaysia, is in danger of being merely defensive and self-interested, for the sake of the Church rather than for the sake of the kingdom. This can apply here too as we work together to ensure our voice is heard and our rights preserved.

• The WCC, through the Special Commission and, for instance, through holding the meeting in Bucharest, is making great efforts to listen to the Orthodox voice and keep them  within the WCC.

Our Reformed partners in Romania and in the Ukraine, often see the Orthodox Church as an oppressor.  What is our role as partners?

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News 

• Revd David Helyar was made an Ecumenical Canon of Honour of Rochester Cathedral December 2000.

• Churches Together in England has moved to: 27 Tavistock Square, London WC1H 9HH, tel 020 7529 8141

• I and Mr Sukin Lee, who works with Kingston URC building bridges to the huge Korean community in that area of London, attended a World Alliance of Reformed Churches consultation on the way forward in relations between Korean presbyterians in Europe and the European reformed churches.

• Such a Feast: spiritual nourishment and the churches: produced through the Spirituality Group of CTE: a collection of responses from the churches on where people of the twenty-first century find their 'food for the soul'.  

£11 (incl p&p) - from the URC bookshop 
(due out in mid- July).

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Keep up with the ecumenical scene in England

Order Pilgrim Post - 6 issues for £13 (£12 by standing order) from Elspeth Coke at CTE.   
Tel: 020 7529 8132

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The committee membership

Bob Andrews (Convener), Mary Buchanan, Darnett Whitby-Reid, Phillip Jones, Jackie Marsh, Richard Mortimer, Elizabeth Nash, John Rees, John Smith (Scotland), Stuart Jackson (Wales).

Representing other committees:

Carole Ellefsen-Jones, Alistair Ellefsen-Jones, Hugh Graham, Suzanne Hamnett, Rosemary Johnston, Raymond Singh, John Crocker (Convener of the International Exchange Sub-Committee).

Representing other churches:

David Campbell (Presbyterian Church in Ireland), Colin Buchanan - alternate, Elizabeth Fisher (Church of England), Peter Sulston (Methodist Church)

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Sheila Maxey, Secretary for Ecumenical Relations [ecumenical@urc.org.uk]

Philip Woods, Secretary for International Relations [international@urc.org.uk]

Revd Dale Rominger, International Relations Programme Officer
[Dale.rominger@urc.org.uk]

Veronica Singh, Personal Assistant to Secretary for Ecumenical Relations
[veronica.singh@urc.org.uk]]

Doris David, Personal Assistant to Secretary for International Relations.

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