WCC changes assembly date

Christian Century, July 2, 1997

Major scheduling difficulties have forced the World Council of Churches to change the dates for its next assembly, which was to have been held September 10-22, 1998, in the Zimbabwe capital of Harare. The WCC announced June 16 that the assembly, which is expected to bring together more than 4,000 participants from the organization's 330 member churches and other religious groups, will now take place December 3-14, 1998, on the campus of the University of Zimbabwe.

The change in plans results from a decision of the Zimbabwe university authorities to switch from a three-term calendar to a two-semester academic year. The WCC was informed on May 29 by the university's vice-chancellor "that the university campus would not be available for the assembly in September 1998, as had been agreed." The WCC was told that following a government decision to reduce student allowances the university had been obliged to rearrange the academic year "to avoid in future students on campus with insufficient funds to sustain themselves."

The decision to switch the assembly dates will also have implications for a series of other events, including a festival to mark the culmination of the Ecumenical Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women, which had been planned to be held in Harare immediately before the assembly. In a letter sent to member churches, the WCC's general secretary, Konrad Raiser, said that there had been a "tentative exploration of alternative sites in South Africa, the Netherlands and, as a last resort, Geneva." However, the WCC's officers had decided to switch the dates rather than the venue after the assembly planning committee recommended giving "priority to maintaining the venue of Harare even if it meant adjusting the dates of the assembly."

The WCC's decision to hold its next assembly in Harare was made in January 1994 at a meeting of the organization's Central Committee in Johannesburg, South Africa. This is the second time that the dates for the Harare assembly have been changed. The original dates were August 24 to September 7, 1998. However, in 1995, when the WCC's Central Committee confirmed the University of Zimbabwe as the venue for the assembly, the timing was changed to September 10 to 22 "to fit in with the university dates," according to WCC documents.

The decision to convene in Harare has also stirred a sharp debate about meeting in a country whose president, Robert Mugabe, has supported an ongoing antihomosexual campaign, and whose Council of Churches has issued a condemnation of homosexuality. In April a Dutch denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands, withdrew from the forthcoming assembly, citing Zimbabwean human rights violations in the antigay campaign as the main reason for its decision not to attend. An 11-member church commission said it wants to "send a clear signal of protest against the situation in Zimbabwe."

Mugabe, a Roman Catholic, has declared publicly on several occasions that homosexuals are not welcome in Zimbabwe and has described them as sodomites and perverts, saying it is "extremely outrageous and repugnant" that they have any supporters. A number of WCC member churches have raised questions about holding the assembly in Harare in light of Mugabe's stance and have asked whether gay delegates from churches would be allowed into the country and whether they would be harassed while there. The WCC has negotiated a "Memorandum of Understanding" with the Zimbabwean government to guarantee that the government will not interfere with the meeting. The issue of homosexuality is one that has been debated in many of the WCC's Protestant and Orthodox member churches. Some Protestant churches openly welcome practicing homosexuals into their congregations; however, many WCC member churches consider homosexual activity sinful.

The WCC holds an assembly every seven to eight years. The previous assembly was held in Canberra, the Australian capital, in 1991. Next year's assembly will be the eighth such gathering of the WCC, which at the same time will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of its founding in 1948 in Amsterdam.