"Turn to God - rejoice in hope": Roman Catholic perspectives for Harare and beyond - World Council of Churches, eighth assembly in Harare - "Turn to God - Rejoice in Hope": Unfolding the Eighth Assembly Theme

Ecumenical Review, The, April, 1998 by Anton Houtepen

Yet many new problems arose: the relation of gospel and culture is not simply a harmonious one. Sometimes prophetic criticism leads to persecution, as in situations of injustice and oppression; or trends in the culture may strongly oppose active Christian commitment, as in secularized societies. The Jewish background of the gospel itself must be rediscovered after ages of Greek and Roman interpretation, but such rereading of the Bible is not automatically convincing for, for example, Palestinian Christians. Syncretism may be a problem, but why is European syncretism acceptable -- and why must Asian syncretism be rejected? How can mission and evangelism practise dialogue with people of other faiths without giving up their kerygmatic task of preaching the gospel? How must dialogue be organized on a global level?

All such problems Christians have in common. Isn't this a kairos moment of the Spirit, an opportunity to work together on these problems of common witness? Why not set up a Programme on Common Witness in the framework of the Commission on World Mission and Evangelism? Why not combine the Roman Catholic Church's and the World Council of Churches' programmes on dialogue with living faiths? Why not apply the Faith and Order model of full Roman Catholic participation to the Commission on World Mission and Evangelism, where cooperation on the staff level has already been realized for some years and where mission studies in IAMS have been organized on an interconfessional basis for almost two decades?

6. Common work on church and society and JPIC

The Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation experience has been an unhappy one with regard to Roman Catholic collaboration on a world level. The experiment of SODEPAX (1968-74) as a programme to organize common peace and development work between the World Council and the Roman Catholic Church was a failure. Common diaconal and development programmes between the World Council and the Roman Catholic Church have been rare. But the desperate situation faced by many victims of injustice, oppression, poverty and hunger cries out for more concerted study and action. The Roman Catholic Church has something to offer in this domain: a strong tradition of social teaching, a missionary tradition which knew of no opposition between faith and service, a theology of liberation, appealing to the prophetic tradition and to the Sermon on the Mount. It offers its tradition of religious life in convents and monasteries throughout the centuries. This religious life has been a living koinonia on the pattern of Acts 2 and 4, offered to the service of both the materially needy and the spiritually poor. The Roman Catholic Church would bring to its collaboration with other churches a worldwide network of relief agencies such as Caritas Internationalis and Cor Unum, assisted by many Roman Catholic development agencies in the local churches like Misereor, Aide a toute detresse and Solidaridad.

Roman Catholic advisors have participated in many Church and Society, the Commission on the Churches' Participation in Development and JPIC projects and consultations. On the local, national and regional levels they work ecumenically in diaconal and development organizations, and in the commissions dealing with social questions in various of the national councils of churches. Again, wouldn't it be timely to follow the Faith and Order model of full participation by Roman Catholic delegates in a Commission on Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation (JPIC), thereby involving the International Commission Justitia et Pax and Pax Christi, as well as the study group on social issues of the WCC-RCC Joint Working Group and other social-economic experts from Roman Catholic development agencies?