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The Christian Century - October 8, 1997

Split Widens Between Orthodox, Wcc

Patriarch Alexsy of the Russian Orthodox Church reportedly will withdraw the church's membership in the World Council of Churches (WCC) sometime before the 1998 general assembly. The church apparently agrees with few of the WCC actions and resents some of the member churches' efforts in Russia.

Russian Orthodox Church leaders revealed September 16 that Patriarch Alexsy, angered about the direction of the World Council of Churches, is likely to sever ties with the WCC before its eighth general assembly in Zimbabwe next year. The withdrawal would represent a severe blow to the ecumenical organization that for 50 years has prided itself on being an honest broker among some 330 Christian churches.

"I see no reason why we would continue," commented Viktor Petliuchenko, a Russian Orthodox priest and a member of the WCC Central Committee, which met in Geneva recently to draft an organizational blueprint that will be the subject of next year's conference. "We don't agree about many of the things the World Council is doing," Petliuchenko said. "Their acceptance of women priests, their attitude toward homosexuals. This is not something we can support." The Central Committee is the WCC's top decision-making body between assemblies.

Petliuchenko also reiterated the Russian church's view that the WCC has not forcefully enough opposed member churches' proselytizing efforts in the former Soviet Union--a major cause of the rift. Denying the charge, WCC officials have said the organization believes in religious freedom but does not support aggressive recruitment efforts. But another Russian priest, Nestor Zhiliaev, said, "I think we're wasting our time. It becomes pointless to go on." Both priests said Alexsy is preparing to revoke the Russian Orthodox Church's WCC membership before the December 1998 general assembly.
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Meanwhile, Archbishop Spyridon, head of the Greek Orthodox Church in America, urged Russian Orthodox officials not to withdraw from the WCC. Speaking at a Washington news conference outlining the October visit to the U.S. of the Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomeo, Spyridon said September 16 that a Russian Orthodox pullout from the WCC "would be disastrous." Spyridon said such a move would "lead the Russian church into isolation [and] cannot but have negative results for [it] and the Orthodox Church overall."

In addition to the tension with Orthodoxy, the WCC finds itself in the middle of a dispute among members over the organization's mission--a controversy that is being aired among some 156 Central Committee members and is likely to intensify in the months ahead. "Some people are saying that the WCC has become more of a leader of movements than churches," remarked Karel Blei of the Netherlands Reformed Church. "There's a sense that it is becoming more distant from the churches it represents. Blei said the WCC's decision to consolidate many of its tasks in an attempt to save scarce resources could have the undesirable effect of "giving the executive committee more power than the Central Committee, even though they are supposed to answer to us.

The principal aim of the Central Committee meeting, which ran through September 19, was to formulate a "common understanding and vision" of the WCC, a task that top members acknowledge is becoming increasingly difficult due to the growing differences among traditional Christians, such as the Orthodox, and more progressive churches, such as many of the Protestant bodies. Attempts to seek full communion among all Christian churches--the original stated goal of the organization--are also complicated by the rapid growth of new ecumenical groups and new religious movements, which are vying with traditional Christian denominations for members. "We used to be the only visible players in the ecumenical movement," said Donald Elliot of the Anglican Church. "But that is changing and shrinking our base."

Many members of the WCC, clergy and laity alike, believe they are merely responding to changes that have emerged over the past several decades. Women have been permitted to minister in many Christian churches for years. And homosexuals have been welcomed into many churches, some of which accept same-sex marriage. "The number of ordained women several decades ago was really small. Today, doing theology from a woman's perspective has become something nobody can avoid," said Aaron Tolen, a Presbyterian from Cameroon and one of the six presidents of the WCC. "The WCC is not for itself. It is called to speak for the world," he added.

But some of the 15 canonically independent Eastern Orthodox churches, renascent after 50 years of communism, contend that the World Council does not speak for them. Last May the Georgian Orthodox Church withdrew its membership in the WCC, accusing the organization of furthering a distinctly Western brand of Christianity. It also declared opposition to the proselytizing efforts of some WCC member churches in its backyard and averred that moves to expand rights for gays and women were politically motivated and out of step with its teachings.

The strains between the Russian Orthodox and the WCC were voiced in the wake of critical remarks made by another prominent Orthodox leader and ecumenical official. In a speech delivered on the opening day of the Central Committee meeting, Catholicos Aram, the committee's moderator, praised the WCC's achievements during the cold war when it helped churches "build bridges across geographical, ideological, racial and cultural divisions." But he echoed the views of some of the member churches whose leaders have complained that a Western agenda has been imposed on the WCC by West European and North American Protestant churches. Aram is catholicos (a title similar to bishop) of the Armenian Orthodox Church's See of Cilicia in Lebanon.

"The WCC came into existence mainly as a council of European Protestant churches, and then it became a World Council through the participation of Orthodox churches and other regions," Aram said. "Fifty years of Orthodox-Protestant ecumenical partnership within the fellowship of the WCC did not change the Western and Protestant character of the council.... Today almost two-thirds of [the WCC's] member churches come from the South. The council's ethos, however, remains the same. This fact is due not so much to Protestant intention to dominate the council, but rather to Orthodox reluctance to become fully involved in the total life and work of the council and to identify with it."

Aram urged the Orthodox churches to stop standing back from the WCC. "If the Orthodox are seriously committed to transforming the ethos of the council, which is the source of some prevailing concerns and tensions, they have to replace their growing alienation, resignation or indifference by a critical approach and constructive participation." Aram went on to say that the WCC "must be reshaped in order to provide more space to Orthodox participation and interaction."

[ The Christian Century - Vol. 114 - No. 27 - October 8, 1997 ]