Whither the WCC? A concluding commentary By Parker T. Williamson The Layman Online Wednesday, March 8, 2006 LENOIR, N.C. – A week of reflection has allowed me to sort through several observations made in Porto Alegre, Brazil, during the 9th Assembly of the World Council of Churches. (1) Why we covered the event. The Presbyterian Church (USA) is heavily invested in the WCC. In 2005, the General Assembly per capita budget included $449,414 for the WCC, but that was just the beginning. Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick's office also allocated $834,292 for "Ecumenical Agency Relations" and another $75,000 for ecumenical meetings. The General Assembly mission budget included $3,737,731 for "ecumenical partnerships," some of which (it would take a Philadelphia lawyer and a fleet of accountants to ascertain the amount) moves through WCC linkages. Finally, several of our General Assembly staff persons perform work for the WCC and the NCC, but the cost of their salaries, office and travel expenses does not show up on the books as a contribution to the WCC. Taken together, the Presbyterian Church (USA)'s direct, tangential, and hidden contributions to the WCC are huge. (2) The WCC serves as a mouthpiece for Presbyterian Church (USA) leaders. General Assembly Stated Clerk, Kirkpatrick, his fellow staff members and carefully chosen delegates can say things through statements of the WCC and other ecumenical bodies (the NCC and WARC) that they might have difficulty saying openly among the Presbyterians whom they purport to represent. The WCC's sharp attacks on capitalism and the "economic imperialism" of the United States is a case in point. When the U.S. delegation offered its "confession" to the WCC, expressing shame for being citizens of a country that it said operates an unjust economic system and is conducting an "illegal, unjust, and ill-considered" war "against" the people of Iraq, Kirkpatrick was not required to sign the letter since it was the work of a committee. Had an independent reporter not asked him directly, we may never have known that he endorsed the message of that letter as a representative of the Presbyterian Church (USA). (3) The WCC statements on poverty are embarrassingly naïve and largely untrue. In an instructional flyer that the leadership used to prepare participants for a "peace march" in downtown Porto Alegre, the marchers were encouraged to bring "mantras and slogans." I found that instruction indicative of the shallow socio-economic analysis rendered by WCC leaders on the subject of poverty. When engaged in economic analysis and advocacy, the WCC appears unable to consider anything other than a statist, redistributive approach. The focus is entirely on unequal slices of the economic pie and the proffered "solution" consists in formulas for re-slicing it. Missing from WCC pronouncements is any consideration of mechanisms that might increase the size of the pie itself. In fact, the WCC has positioned itself as intractably opposed to free-market, free-trade economic systems that have proved themselves capable of growing the pie. Considering its multiple failures in recent history, Marxist economic analysis is taken seriously in very few places today. WCC headquarters remains one of those places. (4) Poverty is real, and effective remedies that incorporate opportunities for Christian compassion are possible. Regrettably, the WCC is insisting on statist solutions to poverty that have actually exacerbated poverty. Development is a proven economic model for getting a country out of the poverty cycle, a fact that is increasingly recognized by developing countries. But the transition from statist systems to free-market economies can be painful. When a government lifts price controls, for example, poor people may find that the cost of food surges initially. Eventually, the market will correct this problem because higher prices will attract food producers who were unwilling to enter the market when the government artificially depressed prices. Higher food production will, in turn, drive down prices. This transition period is precisely an area where Christian compassion, intelligently focused, can make a difference. Christian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) – Samaritan's Purse and World Vision, for example – are able to target segments of the population that suffer transition pains, offering ministries that mitigate that suffering in the short term. NGOs are particularly well positioned to carry out that function because they – often far better than governments – know the poor in the affected countries and can develop effective, people-to-people distribution systems that provide help for those who have the greatest need. Having mired itself in anti-capitalist slogans and ideological outbursts, the WCC is missing a glorious opportunity to make a real difference in the lives of poor people whose countries are working their way out of the slums caused by statism. The WCC should invest its efforts toward inspiring and empowering Christian NGOs to offer well focused ministries to the needy in the midst of economic transition. Sadly, there was no evidence of such thinking during the WCC event in Porto Alegre. (5) The WCC is in danger of losing its soul. No official action was taken, but the trend of WCC leaders and their primary platform speakers was undeniable. In a clear departure from its charter, the WCC is moving from "ecumenical" to "interfaith" forms of unity. WCC president Aram I expressed it in terms of discovering the "hidden Christ" in other religions. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams encouraged interfaith dialogue in which Christians might "recognize" spiritual feelings in a non-Christian faith that are akin to Christian spiritual feelings. South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu told WCC delegates that "God is not a Christian," and he expressed profound admiration for and identification with the "spirituality" of the Dalai Lama. "Ecumenical conversations" during the WCC assembly focused on "interfaith commonalities" and on minimizing faith distinctions. Platform speeches often referred to a generic "God," to "The Sovereign," and to the "Spirit of the Universe." Although Jesus was mentioned, particularly during sessions in which WCC leaders recognized the presence of visiting evangelicals, it seemed to this observer that the singular saving role of Jesus Christ was largely minimized throughout the assembly. This drift toward a generic "spirituality" represents a distinct departure from the WCC's founding faith. Largely an outgrowth of world evangelization, in which churches on the mission frontier discovered unity in their common proclamation of the gospel that transcended denominational differences, the WCC now appears to be taking a lowest common denominator approach toward forging relationships with those who do not believe the gospel. By encompassing "other gospels" (or, as some expressed it, "seeking the gospel in other faiths"), the WCC is abandoning its founding conviction and is in danger of losing its soul. (6) Sending our worst. What I saw in Porto Alegre was an amalgam of the most non-evangelical from its supporting denominations. WCC leaders represent the infrastructures of their member denominations. Yet, these are the very persons whose policies and programs have resulted in their own communions' massive membership and contribution losses. Thus, it should come as no surprise that the WCC is similarly infected. Its ideology and its resulting financial crisis are merely reflections of its constituency. (7) Where do we go from here? The breath of life is rapidly leaving the WCC as it clings to the corpse of its secular ideologies. In the ideological world, the fall of the Soviet Union and several of its puppets was a crushing blow to this organization, leaving only a handful of failing Marxist states with which it can pursue a relationship. In the world of the churches, the WCC's dependence on denominations that are dying has done little to maintain its own life support. Presbyterian budget builders could help that process along by pulling the plug on inordinately large contributions that the denomination has pumped into the WCC. Alternatives abound that are truly ecumenical, and there are viable Christian international relief agencies that pursue thoughtful and effective approaches to the challenge of poverty. It is neither faithful nor reasonable for the Presbyterian Church (USA) to continue its financial transfusions into the WCC. (8) Ecumenism is alive and well. The approaching demise of the WCC should not be viewed as the death of ecumenism. To the contrary, strong ecumenical currents are flowing through rapidly growing evangelical and Pentecostal communions, not only in the developing world, but in the United States as well. One of the most impressive plenary presentations in Porto Alegre was made by Rev. Norberto Saracco, vice president of the National Council of Evangelical Churches in Argentina and international deputy director of the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization. Saracco spoke of the powerful and rapidly growing wave of Pentecostalism that is spreading through Latin America, bringing hundreds of thousands of people to a saving faith in Jesus Christ. He described this "movement of the Holy Spirit" as solidly evangelical and "ecumenical" in the best sense of the word. Saracco contrasted this new ecumenism with the dying brand that has been fostered by the WCC, primarily a cluster of something he called "institutional alliances." This way of doing ecumenism, he said, "has gone as far as it can." Calling on the WCC to carefully discern "the limits to diversity that we are prepared to accept," Saracco said, "We need to be clear. Latin America needs Jesus Christ, and we should come together in mission to declare that truth." (9) Concluding comments Saracco's appearance before the WCC assembly showcased a dramatic contrast between two different faiths. He was addressing an organization of oldline denominationalists whose assembly consisted primarily of repeating the "mantras and slogans" of what they admitted was liberation theology. Defining salvation as liberation from unjust socio-economic structures, the WCC has shared the fate of failing socialist systems. History has not dealt kindly with such utopians. Saracco, however, symbolized a radically different reality. Like the Apostle Paul who addressed an Athenian marketplace where every imaginable faith was welcomed, Saracco voiced one truth. Before an assemblage of ceremonial dress, multicolored robes, gilded crosses, PLO scarves, hippie attire, smocks, dreadlocks, tiaras and business suits, this man spoke no "lofty words or wisdom." Instead, he preached as simply as did Paul centuries ago: "For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in much fear and trembling; and my speech and my message were not implausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God." (10) The evidence of new life I left Porto Alegre convinced that I had been observing a terminally ill WCC. There was some talk about the next assembly, scheduled for seven years from now. But a lot can happen in seven years. In the past seven years, since the WCC met in Harare, Zimbabwe, the organization has run serious deficits, suffering an income loss of 30 percent and draining its reserve funds from $8 million to $1.6 million. Its budget for 2006 includes another anticipated deficit. Meanwhile, major contributor denominations, like the Presbyterian Church (USA), are themselves in deep trouble, increasingly unable to bail out the WCC. Maybe the WCC will survive to see another assembly seven years from now, but the prognosis is not promising. But in the midst of this decay, there was also evidence of new life. In Africa, the place where the WCC last assembled, evangelical churches are bursting at the seams with converts to the gospel. Many of these new Christians have few of the world's goods, but they have Jesus, and He has filled their lives with joy. And in Latin America, the place of this assembly, multitudes are lifting up and praising the name of Jesus. Oldline structures are dying, but in their place is a powerful movement of vibrant faith. The contrast serves as a graphic reminder that although the kingdoms of this world may wax and wane, the Lord continues to be powerfully at work among his people, and his truth will find a voice in every generation. The prophet Isaiah expressed the Lord's promise: "The Word that goes out from my mouth will not return to me void, but shall accomplish that for which I purpose it."

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