Transformation in another key: reconfiguring the World Council of Churches

It is basic human experience that you can change yourself, but not others. Others will change only if and when they themselves wish. If one forces a change on others, they may obey but will not necessarily change. People change only if they find alternatives attractive. I believe the same holds true for organizations.

It is precisely at this point I find much of the current discussion about the reconfiguration of the ecumenical movement unclear and unrealistic. The ecumenical movement is, as everybody seems to agree, much more than the World Council of Churches. It also encompasses the Roman Catholic Church, evangelical movements/churches, relief agencies, development agencies, mission agencies, youth organizations, Orthodox churches and churches coming out of the Reformation, Taize, the Focolare movement, lay academies, and so on. The World Council of Churches cannot "reconfigure" all of this. It can only "reconfigure" itself. By doing that, one hopes it can become so attractive and give such convincing direction that it can persuade others to follow. The World Council of Churches has to become so credible that others will let it be the "privileged instrument of the ecumenical movement" that it has claimed to be.

New developments

Developments of the last 20-30 years have given the WCC a totally different role than it had at its inception.

Unity discussions now mostly take place at a bilateral level. My own church, the Church of Norway, has over the last 10-15 years entered three comprehensive, ecumenical agreements: the Porvoo agreement with Anglicans, a separate agreement on pulpit and altar fellowship with Methodists and the Leuenberg agreement with Reformed churches. In addition, it is part of the Lutheran-Roman Catholic joint declaration on justification. None of this would have been possible without the seminal Faith and Order document on Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry (BEM), but the WCC played no significant role in facilitating the later agreements.

Churches meet bilaterally, establish friendly relations bilaterally and transfer funds between themselves bilaterally. The WCC used to be the facilitator in this, but it is no longer--and never will be again. This is a fruit of the work of the WCC--and of that part of globalization which has made all kinds of communication easier.

Churches--or specialized agencies--do not need the WCC to coordinate relief and development work. They do it themselves, and governments which pay for much of this do not want a third, expensive and intermediary party involved.

Churches involve themselves in ethical and political issues. The WCC at certain points plays a facilitating role, but currently the organization is not playing an avantgarde role in comparison to the churches. The last 10-15 years have seen nothing coming out of any of the organs of the WCC which has not already been thought through in one or more of the member churches. On the other hand, through ecumenical involvement churches have learned and been challenged to become active in political and ethical issues.

Ecumenical youth work and involvement mostly happens in other places, rather than through the WCC. This is the way it has been for more than one hundred years, and this is the way it probably will continue to be: YMCA, YWCA, WSCE Taize, etc. One may also ask this question: Has youth involvement in the WCC functioned as a vital movement affecting the life of the churches, or has it functioned as a consitutency within the organization, taking care of its own special interests? The latter is an important function in itself, but the WCC may be missing a necessary interaction with vital youth movements.

Lay ecumenical involvement happens partly through the WCC, but where one finds the highest numbers is in charismatic movements, local groups, international manifestations like the Focolare movement, the Iona community or through other organizations or events.

The WCC may also be too little connected from the fastest growth and perhaps the freshest vitality in the global church: the African instituted churches, and many of the evangelical and Pentecostal churches in Latin America, Africa and parts of Asia. These churches are already having a substantial impact on the future shape of world Christianity.

A vital institution

The WCC never was a grassroots movement, and I do not think it ever will be. It is church elites that meet in the WCC. Those who participate in WCC activities either belong to the church elite, or will by their very participation become part of the elite. Even if all kinds of quotas are met with regard to representation in WCC meetings, the participants either

Trond Bakkevig, chair of the WCC's public issues committee, has been a representative of the Church of Norway on the central committee of the World Council of Churches since the Harare assembly in 1998. He serves as the dean of Vestre Aker, a grouping of eight parishes in Oslo. belong to or will belong to a church elite. There is no need for a doctorate in sociology to be able to discover that. Such is the nature of an organization where churches are members. People who participate in WCC activities have to be accepted or sent by church leadership--as is the case for all the staff of the WCC. Of course, the WCC can relate to people at the grassroots, but that is primarily through those who already participate in WCC activities. It is their responsibility to see to it that what happens in the WCC has a bearing on the work of local churches and congregations.