When Christians meet: signposts for an ecumenical pilgrimage.

Falconer, Alan ; Robra, Martin

"Rise, let us be on our way" (John 14:31)

People of the way

Even before they were named Christians, disciples of ,Jesus were called "the people of the was" in the city of Antioch. Following Jesus, "the way, the truth and the life" (,John 14:6), they were seen to be on a common journey, searching for a waS of life that embodied, reflected and glorified the good news of the gospel. Christians over the centuries were seaming and struggling for new life in the Spirit. The whole life of people of the way--pilgrims, sojourners and wayfarers, called to repent and turn around, and guided by the Spirit of truth (John 16:13)--became a journey towards the community of the household and the city of God (Eph. 2:19; Rev. 21).

On their journey through history, Christians "from different nations and cultures learned to live together and share the good news of ,Jesus Christ with other people around the globe. But they also fought, oppressed and killed each other, like any other people interested in their own power and wealth. Too often, mistrust and divisions among Christians marked the waS and overshadowed the message of the gospel. While this remains true today and has to be confessed not just as failure, but as sin, there were also those who gave witness to Christ, who risked and gave their lives so that present and future generations might live and believe in God. Their example inspired the founders of the ecumenical movement to discover again what they held in common, overcome the divisions among them, and work for justice and peace.

Remembering those who ran the race before us and were committed to work for a community of Christians that really is a sign and foretaste of God's dwelling among the people (Rev. 21) provides us with a new sense of direction and purpose for the journey. At every ecumenical meeting we are reminded not to forget that the search for visible unity among the churches and a clear and truthful witness of God's compassionate love to all humankind and creation is of the essence of the common pilgrimage of the ecumenical movement.

At the crossroads and hostels

Longing for a deeper experience of the presence of God, Christians visited holy places, the tombs of the martyrs or monasteries and churches of saints. Remembering the one who is the Source of life and the bread broken for the community, some even travelled to Jerusalem and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. When pilgrims travelled in foreign lands, they were well aware of the risks of their journey and their own vulnerability. They left behind what they loved and what was dear to them--family, friends, their home and the support and security of their communities. Relying on hospitality offered to them, they learned to be grateful for any safe space to rest and for strength received from each other.

Strangers among other strangers, they learned to respect other people's cultures and customs and thus their own world-view and identity was challenged by the encounter with others. They experienced, like Abraham, that their life depended on the blessing of God in the midst of conflicts, unexpected challenges and the daily struggle to find something to eat and a shelter for the night. Because of the many temptations pilgrims confronted on their journey, St Hieronymos as well as St Gregory of Nyssa emphasized that a pilgrimage was never an end in itself, but a search for renewed relationships, reconciliation and transformation on the way.

At the crossroads and hostels, pilgrims met many different people and sometimes other wayfarers with a common destination. Often, it was welcome, helpful and enriching to travel together and encounter each other. The pilgrimage was a unique opportunity to experience community in faith and life across boundaries and differences. But at other times, it must have been disturbing and even painful to see who else embarked on the same journey. People whom they would never accept in their community at home might have even shared the room with them as fellow travellers, in situations like that, it was necessary to remember that the purpose of the pilgrimage was a spiritual journey which would change every one of them and their convictions--just as the apostles had to change their fundamental opinions when the Spirit called the people of the nations into the koinonia of the early church (Gal. 2:11-14; Acts 10,11,15).

They were baptized into the death and resurrection of Christ. Who would dare to be the one to throw the first stone and destroy the peace of the pilgrimage (John 8:1-11) ? Who would judge other pilgrims on the basis of who they were, or seemed to be? Were not all of them called to the pilgrimage by the one who gave his life to reconcile the world with God (Man. 7:1-5)? Trusting the guidance of the Spirit, they could name and confront what separated them. Having deep passion for the faith in Christ, they would challenge each other and not avoid confrontation in order to discern what to do and where to go. But they would never harass, persecute and oppress anyone whom they met on their way.

Markings and cairns

For others following them on their journey, pilgrims left signposts or cairns behind, marking the way. Certain markings also emerged on the ecumenical pilgrimage of churches, ecumenical groups and individual Christians. They experienced on their way that Christian unity is as much a gift as it is a calling. The commitment to dialogue in the search for visible unity responds to the promise that the Spirit will be with the disciples and guide them wherever they go and wherever they are, liberating them from the bondage of sin and binding them together in what belongs to each other.

The recent Faith and Order study on ecclesiology and ethics has mentioned shared ethical convictions in the ecumenical movement:

 the reverence for the dignity of all persons as creatures of God,
 the affirmation of the fundamental equality of women and men,
 the "option for the poor", the rejection of racial barriers, a
 strong "no" to nuclear armaments, the pursuit of non-violent
 strategies for conflict resolution, and the imperative for
 responsible stewardship of the environment--all these are ecumenical
 achievements, given by God as the churches have worked together on
 crucial ethical issues facing humanity and creation. (1)

But at times pressing personal and social moral issues hayed prompted discord among Christians themselves and even threaten new divisions within and between churches. Addressing this difficult problem, the Joint Working Group between the Roman Catholic Church and the WCC undertook a study on "The Ecumenical Dialogue on Moral Issues: Potential Sources of Common Witness or of Divisions". Based on the experiences of churches in various parts of the world as they deal with controversial ethical issues, this study itself has become another signpost for the common journey of the churches towards unity.

The study stated:

 Other Christians or other churches holding diverging moral
 convictions can threaten us. They can question our own moral
 integrity and the foundations of our religious and ethical
 beliefs. They can demean the authority, credibility and even
 integrity of our own church. Whenever an individual or a community
 selects a moral position or practice to be the litmus test of
 authentic faith and the sole criterion of the fundamental unity of
 the church, emotions rise high so that it becomes difficult to hear
 one another. Christians, while "speaking the truth in charity"
 (Eph. 4:15), are called upon, as far as possible, "to maintain the
 unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Eph. 4:3) and avoid
 wounding further that koinonia which already exists, although
 imperfectly, among Christians.

 Therefore, if some ethical issues arouse passionate emotions
 and create awkward ecumenical relations, the churches should
 not shun dialogue, for these moral issues can also become
 church-reconciling means of common witness. A variety of issues
 are woven into the moral positions of communities. In a prayerful,
 non-threatening atmosphere, dialogue can locate more precisely
 where the agreements, disagreements and contradictions occur.
 Dialogue can affirm those shared convictions to which the
 churches should bear common witness to the world at large.
 Furthermore, the dialogue can discern how ethical beliefs and
 practices relate to that unity in moral life which is Christ's
 will. (2)

 The biblical vision by itself does not provide Christians or
 churches with all the clear moral principles and practical norms
 they need. Nor do the scriptures resolve every ethical case.
 Narratives join many instructions about proper conduct--general
 commandments and prohibitions, prophetic exhortations and
 accusations, counsels of wisdom, legal and ritual prescriptions and
 so forth. What moral theology names universal moral principles or
 norms are in the biblical texts mixed with specific but ever valid
 commandments and particular provisional prescriptions. The
 scriptures' use of imagery in provocative, often paradoxical ways
 makes interpretations of biblical moral teaching difficult.

 Nevertheless, there is general consensus that by prayerfully
 studying the scriptures and the developing traditions of
 biblical interpretation, by reflecting on human experiences
 and by sharing insights within a community, Christians and
 churches can reach reasonable judgments and decisions in many
 cases of ethical conduct. (3)

Different churches, however, use different methods and pathways of reflection and deliberation. Although they share common resources such as scriptures, liturgy and sacramental life, confessions of the apostolic faith, some moral traditions, catechisms, sermons, etc., they configure those common resources differently and have developed different mechanisms for decision-making and teachings of the churches. In some cases, different conclusions are the result which gave and still give rise to tensions and divisions (e.g., the Christian stance towards war). (4) The closer the churches come together, the more they are confronted with new ecumenical challenges to moral formation and deliberation. The space for dialogue and deliberation that is created in ecumenical meetings and conferences, therefore, is a forum gathering Christians with sometimes divergent and even contradictory opinions and convictions that requires an ethos of humility and respect for the others and their convictions.

Ecumenical space is the milieu in which, even in a state of division, we bear witness to our common allegiance to Jesus Christ and cooperate to advance the visible unity of the church. In this space we affirm our common Christian identity. For this reason, we have the possibility of a new discourse: we talk to one another in a new way. In turn, we have a greater opportunity to discern together Christ's will for the church in ways that are not possible in isolation from one another. Space, thus understood, brings Christians and churches into living encounter with one another. (5)

The statement of the WCC's seventh assembly in 1991 at Canberra, "The Unity of the Church: Gift and Calling", described a process of how this space can take shape and grow in the process of:

--recognizing each other's baptism;

--moving towards the recognition of the apostolic faith in the life and witness of one another;

--considering, wherever appropriate, forms of eucharistic hospitality on the basis of convergence in faith in baptism, eucharist and ministry and acknowledging that some who do not observe these rites share in the spiritual experience of life in Christ;

--moving towards the recognition of ministries;

--endeavouring in word and deed to give common witness to the gospel as a whole;

--recommitting each other to work for justice, peace and the integrity of creation, linking more closely the search for sacramental communion of the church with the struggle for justice and peace;

--helping parishes and communities express in appropriate ways, locally, the degree of communion that already exists.

Signposts for an ecumenical pilgrimage

Mindful of the Canberra statement and referring to the study on "Ecumenical Dialogue on Moral Issues" and ecumenical discussions on "episkope and episcopacy" that took into consideration long-standing experience with ecumenical dialogues and encounters in ecumenical conferences and previous assemblies of the WCC, it is possible to identify a number of very basic guidelines for the common pilgrimage of individual Christians, churches and ecumenical groups. They translate and interpret the commitment to processes of dialogue in the search for Christian unity, and thus to transformation and renewal.

Challenging one another, we should:

--engage each other in frank and serious discussions, including search and discovery, questioning and listening;

--interrogate each other in mutual respect, so that no individual Christian and no church is required to deny their identity or heritage;

--understand what others want to be and to do in order to be faithful disciples of Christ, even though those others--as we ourselves--are burdened with weakness and sin;

--refrain from judgment, thus excluding a purely negative attitude towards one another, but also confront as clearly as possible anything that threatens the very basis of faith, as in the case of racism and apartheid;

--continue dialogue, even if disagreements seem incapable of resolution.

Experiencing new opportunities together, we should:

--seek and be open for the reconciliation of memories (the memories of action, reaction and separation which make it difficult to hear and accept the other);

--embrace conversion and renewal;

--gladly take opportunities for common witness, and act together in all matters except those in which deep differences of conviction compel us to act separately (Lund 1952);

--be thankful for guidance into the will of the Spirit;

--expect help to discern what will advance the visible unity of the church.

Accepting the obligations of being together, we should:

--have in mind the compatibility of attitude and behaviour within and outside of the space where we meet;

--avoid actions inconsistent with maintaining healthy relationships with fellow pilgrims;

--be ready to support each other mutually, act with patience and forbearance with one another and accept the need for mutual accountability.

Nurturing each other on the way

As a pilgrim people, Christians and churches are sustained by the gospel in their dwelling in and journeying towards truth. They are committed to a goal that is both beyond their grasp and constantly offered as a pure gift. Meeting each other on their way and walking together, they experience fellowship among themselves, the koinonia that is real and genuine, by the grace of God, although overshadowed by tensions in doctrine and practice and not yet fully realized.

Ecumenical meetings and conferences and WCC assemblies are opportunities to experience and nurture this fellowship, and to be enriched by the many gifts of the Holy Spirit to individual Christians, churches and the ecumenical family as a whole. Participants in ecumenical events again and again have emphasized that praying and worshipping together has helped them to recognize that the others, although different, are of the same Spirit. Common worship, common reflection and action, common confession, mission, witness and service have influenced and sometimes changed the lives of many people and churches who participate in the ecumenical journey.

(1) "Costly Commitment", in Thomas F. Best and Martin Robra eds, Ecclesiology and Ethics: Ecumenical Ethical Engagement, Moral Formation and the Nature of the Church, WCC Publications, 1997, p.28, para 16.

(2) "The Ecumenical Dialogue on Moral Issues: Potential Sources of Common Witness or of Divisions: A Study Document", in Joint Working Group between the Roman Catholic Church and the World Council of Churches, Seventh Report, WCC, 1998, section I, "Ethics and the Ecumenical Movement", paras 3-4.

(3) Ibid., section III, "Common Sources and Different Pathways of Moral Deliberation", para 1.

(4) Ibid., para 5.

(5) Peter C. Bouteneff and Alan D. Falconer eds, Episkope and Episcopacy and the Quest for Visible Unity: Two Consultations, WCC, 1999, p.43.

This November 2000 presentation prepared by Alan Falconer and Martin Robra reflects on the ethos of the "Padare" educational workshops at the eigth assembly of the World Council of Churches in Harare (1998). Falconer, then the director of Faith and Order in the WCC, now serves as minister of the cathedral church of St Machar, Aberdeen, Scotland. Robra continues to work in the WCC on the justice, peace, creation staff team.