Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Archbishop Martin reflects on work of WCC Assembly in Korea

How can the vigour and vitality generated by the 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches bring new impetus to the ecumenical movement? 

How can Christians of different denominations rediscover their common spiritual roots? 

And how are Catholic leaders aiming to implement the goals of the Assembly in the life of their own local Churches?

At the conclusion of her trip to Busan, South Korea for the 10-day WCC Assembly, Philippa Hitchen put those questions to the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, a member of the Catholic delegation and outgoing co-moderator of the Joint Working Group of the Catholic Church and the World Council of Churches. 

Archbishop Martin began by discussing the documents the Group has produced since the last Assembly in Porto Alegre, Brazil seven years ago:

“The document I like best – we produced 3 documents on reception, on young people – the one I like is looking at the spiritual roots of ecumenism….the more we understand the saints we have in common, then we come closer, I think, to the fundamental roots of ecumenism…

Looking in the same way at liturgical texts, hymns and Christian literature, from before the division of Christianity – these are aspects of what we share and we don’t give enough attention to them..

What happens when I go home, what sort of message do I bring as a diocesan bishop, how do we ensure the experience we’ve had here can become part of the day to day life of a Christian in my and other countries….

The experience of this Assembly on a human and spiritual level is quite remarkable, there are very few other worldwide Christian gatherings which are like this….for all of us, to see the variety that’s there, that Christian unity shouldn’t end up with uniformity, it should end up with respecting a lot of this diversity and liturgical practice in the life of the Church….

There’s a certain vitality in the Assembly, a lot of it due to the fact that there are younger people there….I wonder that, for example, at our Synod of Bishops, is there a way in which we might be able to include some of this diversity, some of this joy of the young people…even the freedom to be provocative at times….I think that’s important too..”