News
"In a century of surprises which we have already begun," the churches of Christ will have to move closer to unity to give the 75-year-old Faith and Order movement renewed meaning, a church leader told an anniversary celebration Sunday (25 August).
"It will be necessary," said Archbishop Anastasios, primate of the Orthodox Autocephalous Church of Albania, "to move into new areas (and) distance ourselves from the established order, systems of organisation and ways of thinking." Unity, the Archbishop said, depends on the churches' ability to overcome their "enmity and incomprehension inherited from the past."
Anastasios' sermon was delivered to a packed ecumenical service organised by the Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches (WCC) and a local ecumenical committee in the Cathedral of Lausanne, where the movement was born. He called for a return to the basic principals of the Great Commission of Jesus Christ to his disciples in Matthew 28.
Those principles, Anastasios declared, include a call to "make disciples of all nations" and trust in Christ's promise that "I am with you always." Christian unity requires believers to "trust in him to whom 'all authority in heaven and on earth has been given.'"
The archbishop's sermon climaxed an afternoon of reflection and celebration that began with a wreath-laying ceremony at the grave of Bishop Charles Brent (Episcopal Church), one of the founders of the Faith and Order movement, in the Cimetière du Bois de Vaux.
A Convocation followed in the Aula du Palais de Rumine in Lausanne, where speakers commented on the impact and future of Faith and Order. The gathering was chaired by the Rev. Prof. David Yemba of the Democratic Republic of Congo (United Methodist Church), moderator of the WCC's Faith and Order Commission.
Anastasia Vassiliadou (Church of Greece), a young adult intern for the WCC's Faith and Order staff team, told the gathering that young people hoped to see Faith and Order broaden its perspective and "intensify its efforts towards the goal of visible unity of the church."
Vassiliadou's conclusion was greeted with sustained applause: "God wills unity, not for the sake of the church but for the sake of the world; and we constantly pray to God: Your will be done."
Christian unity remains the goal of the movement, said Lukas Vischer (Swiss Protestant Federation), former staff head of the WCC's Faith and Order team. "Some of these hopes have been fulfilled. But the basic call is still as valid as ever -- that the divided parts allow their ecumenical initiatives, through concerted action, to become a movement."
Dr. Mary Tanner (Church of England), former moderator of the Faith and Order Commission, said the conversations that began 75 years ago have made a difference.
"The real prize of all of this is that churches together are a more convincing sign of that reconciliation that God intends for all creation," Tanner said. "It is possible, even for those who once burned one another at the stake, to be reconciled, and these acts of reconciliation form in us a people inclined to reconciliation."