From Polite Ecumenism to Joint Prophetic Witness

The Ecumenical Movement is a Great Peace Movement

Paul´s letter to the Ephesians calls to “make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit” (Eph 4:3). As Paul writes this letter, he is in prison! And he asks the minority of Christians to keep “the bond of peace”, because this is the only way, they would be credibly witnessing to the Gospel of peace and justice.

At the beginning of the 20th century, born out of times of fast-growing nationalism and militarization in European societies, church leaders re-discovered that “bond of peace”: The credibility of the gospel depends on the quality of the relations we live within and among the churches – transcending all national borders. And even if that young movement was not able to prevent two World Wars, it certainly helped shaping the need of an international community, translated into political and juridical institutions, working for reconciliation among former enemies. 

Healing of Memories – from a Minority Church Perspective

Let´s focus briefly on the healing of violent memories and the coping with collective trauma from my own tradition – a minority church perspective: The Mennonites, a “historic peace church”.

Mennonites have engaged in ecumenical dialogues with the Vatican, the Lutheran World Federation, and the World Communion of Reformed Churches. Once, all of these traditions had legitimized the killing our fore-fathers/-mothers in the 16th century. Simply because those “radical reformers” were not willing to participate in war any longer, would not accept the corrupt church hierarchies, pleaded for a clear separation of church and state, and re-discovered the practice of adult baptism. – Labeled with hate speech, they were soon persecuted and killed – by state and church authorities, not just in the 16th century… In the 1920ies, my grandparents fled from the Russian empire (now Ukraine) to South America, in order to live this faith… Yet, all of this became a collective trauma in my tradition.

Now, through engaged ecumenical dialogues, we – former perpetrators and former victims – were able to re-visit this cruel history. Not focusing on dogmatic differences but trying to build a common narrative about those traumatic events. This has led Lutherans and Reformed to apologize for the cruelties of fore-fathers/-mothers – and processes of reconciliation have become possible. Because, together, we were able to listen to the gospel of peace in a new way, with the “other”.

What we did not foresee was the effect on ourselves: during that healing process, our identity was shaken. We realized that the original “collective trauma” had become a “chosen trauma” over the generations. Considering ourselves as victims, grounded in a martyr story, had provided a great, and actually comfortable self-narrative: Victimhood as identity. – Now, with the healing effect of ecumenical dialogue, that “privilege” is not possible any longer. It invites the former victims to re-visit their self-narrative – provoked to see, where we have become perpetrators ourselves. 

To consider the Ecumenical Movement as a peace movement, we shall be surprised about the transformative effects this might have on us – all of us. I call that a “costly ecumenism” – over against a “cheap ecumenism” which allows everyone to remain as they are. 

How to be and become a joint prophetic witness in a broken world

Within the WCC we see the need for decolonizing our theologies and ecumenical spaces. Ecumenical institutions – after some decades – easily evolve into nice playgrounds and stages for church hierarchies. They become a copy of that patriarchy and conformity, of territory claims and power temptations which we find within the individual churches. Keeping the status quo becomes more important than engaging in a prophetic witness, which requires true transformation of oneself. 

Decolonization is more than the friendly, yet indifferent encounter with the ‘other’. Decolonization confronts us with the question: “Can the subaltern speak?” (Gayathri Spivak).

There is the other, and then there is the sub-other, the sub-altern. These are the silenced voices, made invisible in the public spheres, including ecumenical spaces. The sub-alternes are the ones who are suffering from that intersectional discrimination based on ethnic background, gender, class, and often religion.

Of course, the subaltern can speak – says Spivak. But the real question is, if we have the “infrastructure” to listen and to see them. In order to practice ecumenism as a peace movement, we need to rethink our ecumenical infrastructures, we need to let go of positions and possessions, of confessional egos and indifference towards the other. Being reminded (by the imprisoned Paul) of the provided (!) “bond of peace”, we will have to allow the subaltern to shape our ecumenical discourses and spaces. And that will be transformative, on theological, political, and economic levels. – Yet, it holds the promise of restorative justice and nonviolent peacebuilding. 

The Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace – transformative Spirituality, and a Theology of Companionship

For the past ten years, we have been using a programmatic approach called “Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace” within the WCC. Central is a transformative spirituality, with three dimensions: via positiva, via negativa, via transformativa. Let me simply highlight the second dimension here: “Touching the Wounds” (gr. ‘trauma’). We have explained:

This pilgrimage will lead us to the locations of ugly violence and injustices. 

We intend to look for God´s incarnated presence 
in the midst of suffering, exclusion, and discrimination. 

The true encounter with real, contextual experiences of a broken creation and sinful behavior against each other might inform us anew about the essence of life itself.

It might lead us to repentance and – in a movement of purification – liberate us 

from obsession with power, possessions, ego, and violence, 
so that we become ever more Christ-like. 

And we have practiced this in many pilgrim team visits around the world. 

Out of these experiences grew a “Theology of Companionship” (com-pan-ieros/as – those who share the bread with each other on the way). It is a new way of living that “bond of peace” within the ecumenical family, becoming who we are called to be: credible communities of hope (peace) and transformation (justice). 

Fernando Enns