RESOURCING THE CHURCH FOR ECUMENICAL MINISTRy A ...

If you want people to build a boat, don’t just
give them a blueprint, but let them be filled
with a yearning for the vastness of the sea.
I am pleased to note that the text affirms the goals of
church unity and common witness, but it never
suggests that these goals might stem from a theological
mandate rooted in scripture. But, then,
there is no reference to scripture whatsoever. There
are references to the church, but those are set
alongside an emphasis on agencies and specialized
ministries as crucial for the ecumenical family.
Ecumenism, in short, is reduced to cooperation on
behalf of peace and justice. The idea that God has
called forth a community, centered in Christ and
empowered by the Holy Spirit, to be an embodied
expression of God’s reconciling power and purpose,
is completely absent. (Similar things could be said
about some statements of the NCC.)
Am I saying this directly enough? If we want a vital
ecumenical witness in the coming generation, then
we dare not reduce a divine initiative to a purely
human enterprise. If we don’t believe that God has
acted in Christ for the world’s redemption, then the
idea that God through the Incarnation has brought
forth a new community of Jew and Greek,
Protestant and Catholic, black and white, gay and
straight, Iraqi and American will seem like pure
idealism—impossible and, ultimately, irrelevant. In
the absence of such conviction, the ecumenical
movement will become simply another arena for
pursuing political agendas or another set of agencies
engaged in occasional cooperation—easily demoted
on the list of ecclesiastical priorities. The National
Council of Churches (about which you may have
questions and comments) is suffering the effects of
this theological impoverishment.
I hope, therefore, that we have not come here to
rearrange ecumenical furniture, to discuss structural
changes (though they may be needed) as if that
were inherently renewing, but to hear God’s Word
and be renewed by God’s Spirit. Antoine de San
Exupery may have said it best: If you want people to
build a boat, don’t just give them a blueprint, but let
them be filled with a yearning for the vastness of the
sea.
My second concluding point stems from my
experience a week ago at Edinburgh 2010. As you
probably know, the symbolic beginning of the
Kinnamon • A Century of Witness, a Journey of Wholeness
8
modern ecumenical movement was a world mission
conference held in Edinburgh one hundred years
ago this very month. Peter Ainslie drew inspiration
for the Disciples Council on Christian Unity from
that historic event. The recent conference was
intended to assess what we have learned about
mission and unity over the past century, and to chart
a course for the future. I will be happy to speak about
the whole Edinburgh 2010 experience over dinner
or in the hallway, but for now I want simply to note
that the basic message of the conference was that the
church must recover a sense of urgency about its
witness. The biggest critique of the church seemed
to be that it has become too timid at a time when the
world needs bold proclamation of the gospel.
Well, yes, that is surely a problem and challenge. But
in my judgment, the church has not only borne
tepid witness, it has frequently borne false witness.
We not only need encouragement, but renewal.
Like you, I suspect, I have lots of secular friends and
family members. As they see it, the church in
general often bears witness to four things: (a) abuse
and the scandal of cover up; (b) intolerance of those
who are different; (c) irrelevance to the most
pressing problems of the day; and, (d) fragmentation.
Of course, it is easy to say, “That’s those
other Christians!” But surely, it is in the spirit of 1
Corinthians 12 to insist that when one part of the
body sins or falters, all are implicated with it. And
besides, who can deny that our own witness is one
of fragmentation?
On the way back from Edinburgh, I read a new book
setting forth a theology of the Rwandan genocide.
And it struck me that, while Rwanda figured prominently
in the conference (as it did at the Athens
world mission conference in 2005), it did so only as
a case study in the need for reconciliation—not as an
exploration of the failure of the church!
I say all of this as a reminder that the ecumenical
movement is not only about unity, but unity
through repentance and renewal. My fear, however, is
that ecumenism in this country is often a cover for
maintaining the ecclesial status quo, a way of
cooperating just enough so that we can preserve
current patterns of church life.
And so my prayer for this meeting: that, with God’s
guidance, we come here not to tinker with structures
or to give pep talks, but to examine honestly our
failures and to listen attentively to God’s calling—
that the years ahead, with God’s help, will truly be a
journey of wholeness.