WCC accused of theological promiscuity African woman calls WCC 'polygamist' By Parker T. Williamson The Presbyterian Layman Wednesday, December 16, 1998 HARARE, Zimbabwe - At a World Council of Churches gathering titled "Evangelicals and the Ecumenical Movement," Mrs. Joyce Nima, a delegate to the WCC Assembly from the Anglican Church in Uganda, compared the WCC's Forum Plan to African women's experiences with polygamist husbands. In an attempt to increase participation by groups that are not - and do not wish to be - members of the WCC, assembly officials have proposed the WCC's sponsorship of forums, meetings where non-WCC members can gather and dialogue with representatives of the WCC. Ideas and proposals generated by such forums would be channeled into the WCC's program by WCC forum participants. The plan is designed to achieve participation without membership. Avoiding accountability But Joyce Nima sees flaws in the plan. She believes that it opens the door to associations that have no accountability. Pointing to tensions between the WCC leadership and Orthodox Christians, Nima says the WCC has not been able to get its own house in order. It should do the hard work of debating differences within its present family before it seeks to enter other, less accountable relationships, she said. Comparing the Forum Plan to Africa's experience with polygamy, Nima said, "After a marriage of 50 years [the age of the WCC] the husband fails to get consensus in his homestead and he goes for a soft option. He marries another wife … but since he is the same, weak-willed coordinator, the problems of the first marriage will resurface as soon as the honeymoon is over." Nima called on WCC leaders to turn away from their preoccupation with secular concerns, "go back to the foot of the cross, and see what the Bible has to say." She said that the forum idea was simply another way to accelerate the WCC's secular "globalization agenda" in lieu of concentrating on the organization's first love, the gospel of Jesus Christ. Polygamy Ironically, the illustration chosen by Mrs. Nima appeared before the WCC assembly two days later in a different context. The Celestial Church of Christ of Nigeria applied for membership in the WCC. During plenary discussions, it was disclosed that some members of the church's clergy engage in the practice of polygamy. That led Metropolitan Anba Bishoy of the Coptic Orthodox Church to move that the application be rejected. Membership was denied by a vote of 329 against, 234 in favor, with 57 abstentions. Delegates who spoke in favor of admitting the Celestial Church argued that the taking of more than one wife is a long-standing African tradition that Christian missionaries - imposing their western values on Indigenous People - tried to destroy. Densen Mafinyani, general secretary of the Zimbabwe Council of Churches, said "We don't want our Christian faith to be limited by the mindset of Europe, where it came from." Mafinyani called the missionaries' faith and ethics "too narrow to accommodate what God has done with Africans long before the missionaries, who threw out our ancient religious experiences and sacred beliefs as pagan." Mafinyani also said that he thought the very open African practice of polygamy was more honest than the practice of many non-African clergy who are married to one wife but keep a secret girl friend on the side.

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