Workshop presentation

23 Conference and General Assembly IAMCR/AIECS/AIERI

Barcelona, Spain, 21 to 26 July 2002

Ecumenical Space and Communication

by Karin W. Achtelstetter

I. Components of ecumenical space

Component no. 1: Sokoni

Imagine a church with doors that can’t be shut, or a huge tent with many entrances – open
and letting the wind blow through, but keeping out the rain and offering shelter. If we
had to draw ecumenical space we might choose pictures like this. And if ecumenical
space could be made to speak, then perhaps it would be stories like this one about Sokoni
that I want to tell you to begin my presentation.

It is five years ago: people are gathered in a wide circle, seated on the ground, in a large
round hut. They are free to come and go. Everyone can join this circle – it has no limits
and it sets no limits. Some people talk about their lives, sing songs, recite poems, act
scenes; others listen, peeling potatoes, sewing or cleaning shoes. Sitting in a circle on
the bare ground, titles, status and hierarchy are forgotten – for a time, at least - a Sokoni
time. Which one is the Sudanese refugee and which the theology professor, which the
cook and which the pastor?

Three to four hundred people gathered every day for a week for this Sokoni. Sokoni is
the Swahili word for a traditional market place where exchange takes place – not just of
goods, but also of thoughts, ideas and news. It is a place for meeting, sharing and telling.
In Kenya they say that a Sokoni is only a real Sokoni if there is a drunkard, a madman and
a fool – if the addict, the mentally ill and life’s casualties are also part of the circle.

The Commission of the World Council of Churches' (WCC) former Unit III held its
meeting in Sokoni-style in Nairobi, Kenya in 1997. The German Bishop Margot
Kässmann, then still general secretary of the German Kirchentag and a member of the
Unit III Commission, summed up her experiences as follows:

“The experience of people at the local level and an approach at the international level
were closely linked. The Sokoni was not a meeting taking place in an artificial
conference centre, but the global agenda being discussed among the local people. Local
experience, the experience of the people, was the mirror for the worldwide programme -
here we found a new methodology. The Sokoni was different because it did not try to ...
decontextualize local experience. Rather, the findings of case studies in other parts of the
world were re-contextualized ... experience could stand in its own right. The local
context in Kenya became the framework for reflecting the concept. The differences
became a medium to see one's reality in a new way … . In order to do that, there is one
elementary presupposition: we have to learn how to listen. Learning how to listen
includes creating a safe, protected space for others to talk. Be it that a woman has to feel
protected in order to be encouraged to speak, be it that a man needs the role play in order
to express his thoughts. What is different can stay different. We do not have to force it
into our own paradigms in order to give it validity. This includes the courage to dare to
encounter. Do not underestimate that. Diversity in itself is not the goal. Nobody leaves
the encounter with the other unchanged.”1

As I searched for the components of ecumenical space, Sokoni was one of the things I
discovered. Sokoni offered the ecumenical movement a new style of working, one that
left room for new visions, profounder analyses and more creative methods of working
together in the fellowship of ecumenical networks.
Let me quote Margot Kässmann again. She sees Sokoni as a successful attempt to link
ecclesiology and ethics: “The church as an open space where life has space. The church
as a safe space where women are encouraged to speak instead of being silenced.”2

Open space – safe space - sheltered space – a circle – inclusiveness. In Sokoni , the
place for exchange, a number of elements are combined which make Sokoni a practical,
living example of what constitutes ecumenical space.

But what is ecumenical space, in fact? More and more colleagues in the WCC are using
this expression without any clear definition having so far been given. I use it myself in
my work in communication to describe new, alternative ways for the WCC to
communicate - but more of that later.

As I searched for components and definitions of ecumenical space, I worked through

WCC documents of the past few years and came across various images of what the
notion ecumenical space tries to describe. In fact, the notion can perhaps better be
described in the interplay of these different descriptions than by a more general
definition.

In what follows I shall present three of these descriptions in greater detail, to add to
Sokoni:
- the understanding of ecumenical councils – international, regional or national – as
theatres of ecumenical space and time
- the welcoming, extended table as ecumenical space
- padare as ecumenical space

1
Margot Kässmann. Glimpses of the New Ecumenical Movement in Echoes 12/1997. Reproduced in
Working on a Theology of Life. A Dossier, WCC, Geneva 1998, p. 114 f.
http:/wcc-coe.org/wcc/what/jpc/glimpses.html
2
ibid. p. 115
Component no. 2: Ecumenical Councils as theatres of ecumenical space and time
In a lecture on “The ecclesiological Understanding of Ecumenical Councils”, my
colleague Dr Alan Falconer, the director of “Faith and Order”, recently described
councils as “dramatic theatres of ecumenical space and time”.

Falconer sees ecumenical councils as affording “unique opportunities to the churches to

grow together towards the fuller manifestation of their koinonia by providing space in
which divisive issues can be explored”;3 a space that allows for new insights and new
common visions.

This immediately identifies an important feature of ecumenical councils, namely, the fact
that they exists because of the disunity of the churches. Councils therefore create spaces
in which issues that divide the churches can be addressed and discussed without
destroying the fellowship that exists among the churches grouped together in an
ecumenical council.

Falconer writes, “The fellowship of churches does not assume the unity of the church, but
works towards the resolution of conflicts – doctrinal and ethical - so that communion
(koinonia) can be strengthened on the way towards the manifestation of visible unity.”4

Resolution of conflicts as strengthening of communion assumes the intention of staying

together. It assumes openness to change. It assumes willingness to be vulnerable
ourselves, recognizing others and otherness and allowing them to become part of our
lives, our culture. In this way councils become dramatic theatres of ecumenical space,
spaces for renewal and transformation, and this is true whether at local, national, regional
or international level.

In the Ecumenical Council of Churches local, national and regional initiatives and
councils come together and find there a space where they can question one another and

3
Alan Falconer. An Ecclesiological Understanding of Councils of Churches, Geneva 1999 (unpublished
manuscript, p. 3)
share ideas about their witness to the gospel in a specific context or at a specific time, be
it of conflict or of social change. This space for solidarity reinforces the awareness of
interconnectedness and interdependence of the churches in each space and each time. 5

Component no. 3: the welcoming, extended table

Ecumenical space is also quite concretely experienced and shaped in everyday life, for
instance, in inter-church families, who experience the disunity of the churches in a very
real and sometimes painful way, and who are at the same time models for unity lived in
diversity. “The experience of an inter-church family,” said the general secretary of the
WCC, Dr Konrad Raiser, in an address to an international conference of inter-church
families,6 “is therefore not only the place where the separation and dividedness of the
churches is most painfully manifested, but it could - and in many cases does – become
the ground where a new reality is being shaped, where ‘ecumenical space’ is being
opened up ... . The two partners become one, but their very union remains alive and
viable only as they grant each other the freedom to remain themselves and distinct.”7

Let us stay for a moment with this - for some perhaps rather idealized - image of the
inter-church family, the foyer mixte, as it is called in French - a mixed household. A
foyer mixte is in some ways ahead of the church : It “transcends the barriers of the
institutional captivity of the church”8 and “develops a praxis of unity in diversity”9 , it
“provides an ecumenical space of hospitality in an open house”10 . This image of the
“house church”11 includes the welcoming table, that is pulled out and extended when
guests come, when a festive meal is being prepared, and fellowship celebrated.

4
ibid.
5
cf. ibid., p. 4
6
Konrad Raiser. Opening up Ecumenical Space. Address at the International Meeting of Inter-Church
Families at the ecumenical centre, Geneva, 25/7/98 (unpublished manuscript)
7
ibid. p. 2
8
ibid. p. 3
9
ibid.
10
ibid.
11
ibid. p. 2
The image of the welcoming, extended table, the circle widened to make way for new
relations, could also be an important one for ecumenical space - albeit more as an
ecumenical challenge than as an ecumenical reality. One concrete way in which the
extending of the ecumenical table, the opening up of ecumenical space is reflected is in
the proposal for an ecumenical forum to provide space for churches and communities
which do not belong to the WCC - be it the Roman Catholic Church, or Pentecostal,
Evangelical or Independent churches.12

The extended ecumenical table is characterized by the desire “of developing a praxis of
fellowship without structural limitations and conditions”.13 The World Day of Prayer is
one example to prove that this is possible.

Component no 4: Padare

Since the WCC assembly in Harare in 1998 the World Council has developed a tradition
of Padare events. In the Shona tradition of Zimbabwe, Padare describes a place of
meeting, deliberation and decision-making. The Padare is a place where community can
be experienced, strengthened and celebrated.

“Participants will be overwhelmed but also enriched by the encounter of so many

different forms and expressions of Christian faith which have taken shape on the long
journey of Christian communities through history,”14 we read in the Padare preparation
book for the Harare assembly. It goes on to say, “The Padare will be a chance to realize
how the Spirit leads the community of faith far beyond any individual horizon.”15

Many of the participants found the five-day Padare during the assembly very
challenging. People from different cultural contexts, from completely different worlds of
experience and realities found themselves together, talking, listening, sitting in silence,
sharing their feelings.

12
ibid. p. 9
13
ibid.
14
Padare, ed. WCC, Geneva 1998, p. 1
These intensive encounters called for preparation. Let me again quote the Padare book:
“Some may be tempted to try to dominate and control the space (so that it feels more like
‘home’); others to take their distance, perhaps even condemn those who are ‘not like us’.
In either case, the opportunity to engage in dialogue, enquiring about and probing one
another’s opinions, practices and beliefs will be missed. It is important for all who want
to participate in the Padare to prepare themselves for such a gathering of Christians with
sometimes divergent and even contradictory convictions. The space for dialogue and
deliberation created through the Padare requires an ethos of humility and respect for
others which can perhaps best be described as the ethos of a common journey of faith.”16

Padare understood as ecumenical space requires rules in order to be protective and at the
same time open. In order to safeguard this open, protected and protective space a padare
advisory group was formed during the assembly, with the following tasks amongst
others:

- “to be present in and around the Padare event, especially where controversial
issues or other reasons for tensions are likely to arise;
- to provide mediation in situations where misunderstandings and conflicts arise.”17

II. Ecumenical space as social space

It is clear from these different elements that the discussion surrounding ecumenical space
concerns ways of creatively shaping social space, and creatively shaping relationships. I
deliberately say creatively shaping and not just shaping, as mis-shaped or un-shaped
relations also constitute social spaces.

15
ibid.
16
ibid. p. 1
17
ibid. p. 2
The four examples I have outlined here as components of ecumenical space - Sokoni,
ecumenical councils as dramatic theatres, the welcoming table and Padare - show that
ecumenical space can be expanded in several directions.

Sokoni and Padare are each in their own way attempts to find creative methods of
analysing and interpreting the challenges of globalization, and dealing with the difficulty
of communicating the global and the local, and the complexity and interdependence of
global and local connections.

“Padare like Sokoni creates an environment for a decision making body of the World
Council of Churches which reflects and represents diversity and many dimensions of the
ecumenical movement. Moving from an international paradigm of the global context to
the discourse on globalization it becomes more obvious how much the World Council of
Churches depends on a vital web of churches and ecumenical groups ... . The strength of
the ecumenical movement depends on existing and functioning linkages between
churches all around the world, ecumenical groups and others who are concerned about
just relationships between human beings and the future of life on earth. So far these
linkages form a thin and fragile web.”18 It is therefore essential that the WCC continue to
develop, strengthen and expand this web.

Padare and Sokoni stand as examples of many attempts by the WCC in recent years to
develop “an ecumenical space for dialogue, providing a platform for common processes
of ethical discernment and facilitating practical steps for common action in solidarity.” 19
At the same time, they offer an alternative to globalization by providing a vision of the
oikos - the whole inhabited earth - the goal of which is “the up-building of just and
sustainable communities (oikodomé)”. 20

Looking back at the Harare assembly and the Padare events, Klaus Wilkens, the editor of
the German version of the Assembly Report, comments that “the … hidden conflicts and

18
Working on a Theology of Life. A Dossier, ed. WCC, undated, p. 3
19
cf.ibid. p. 8
crises affecting the ecumenical movement are to be understood, at least in part, as
consequences of the cultural confrontations and tensions in a globalized world . The
continuous effort to ‘stay together’ and to work on a culture of ‘convivencia’ would then
appear indeed as a central ecumenical responsibility in an age of globalization.” In his
opinion “the Harare assembly has shown that the WCC has potential energies, means and
possibilities in this regard which might become more important in future than its
inherited programmatic profile around issues of unity, mission or justice.”21

This assessment, says Konrad Raiser in his report to the WCC Central Committee in
September 1999, raises new questions about the process, shape and style of work of
WCC governing bodies (and I personally would add, of future WCC events). “If the
WCC is to be understood as a fellowship of churches committed to stay, move and grow
together in a situation where they encounter profound differences of culture and
tradition” Raiser says, then the WCC must face this issue.22 The concept of the Padare -
as ecumenical space – is an attempt to respond creatively to this quest. Another aspect is
the discussion about “creating a space for genuine deliberation and reconsidering the
method of decision-making by majority rule.”23

As was clear from the foregoing paragraphs about Padare, a certain environment needs to
be created to enable ecumenical space to become a reality. In 1997 a Faith and Order
working group tried to draw up a list of the conditions, characteristics, opportunities and
obligations of being together, some of which were taken up in the Padare book for
Harare. Let me outline them for you:

a) Presuppositions of ecumenical space

- recognition of common baptism in Christ
- search for theological understanding on the basis of scripture, tradition and
experience

20
cf. ibid. p. 9
21
Report of the General Secretary to the meeting of the WCC Central Committee, 26 August – 3
September 1999, in Geneva. Document No. GS2, para 7
22
ibid., para. 8
- commitment to search for unity, to seek to transcend former divisions
- commitment to processes of dialogue, and thus to transformation and renewal in
the light of the common quest
- maintenance of fellowship in the situation of divergent affirmations, thus
demonstrating commitment to the process.24

b) Characteristics of ecumenical space

- frank and serious discussion, including search and discovery, questioning and
listening
- mutual respect, so that no church - and I would add, none of our partners in
dialogue - is required to deny its identity or heritage;
- restraint from judgment, thus excluding a purely negative attitude on the part of
one church to another25 - and here let me add from the Padare book - but also
confronting as clearly as possible anything that threatens the very basis of faith.26
- the Padare book also adds: continue the dialogue even when disagreements seem
incapable of resolution. 27

c) Opportunities of ecumenical space

- reconciliation of memories;
- conversion and renewal;
- common witness;
- guidance into the will of the Spirit;
- discernment of what will advance the visible unity of the church.28

d) Obligations of being together in ecumenical space

- compatibility of attitude and behaviour within and outside this ecumenical space;

23
ibid.
24
Faith and Order Paper No. 183, Group Reports – Episkopé and Episcopacy and the Quest for Visible
Unity: Two Consultations. Reports from the Strasbourg Consultation, 2-9 April 1997, Geneva 1997, p. 43
f.
25
ibid. p. 44
26
Padare, ed. WCC, Geneva 1998, p. 2
27
ibid.
28
Faith and Order Paper No. 183, loc. cit.
- avoidance of actions inconsistent with brotherly/sisterly relationships;
- mutual support, forbearance and accountability. 29

A milieu like this makes it possible to broach topics which some people regard as taboo
and potentially conflictive, such as the subject of human sexuality, which is being
discussed in the WCC at present. Or again, the Special Commission on Orthodox
Participation in the WCC, which likewise needs a safe and protective space.

Before statements of interest to the press can be made, a basis of trust and mutual
understanding has to be created among the participants. The first meetings of the Special
Commission were held in a good atmosphere - though away from the public eye and not
open to the media.

Which brings me to the challenges facing the work of public information and
communication in ecumenical space.

III. Public Information and Communication in and about ecumenical space

One of the aspects addressed by Konrad Raiser in his assessment of the Harare assembly
at the 1999 meeting of the WCC Central Committee was the different communications
needs:

“... the assembly as a whole should be considered as a communication event, as the

supreme occasion where the WCC communicates itself. This goes beyond preparatory
efforts and the communication of actions and results. The whole process of the assembly
should serve the goal of fostering communication of the member churches with one
another. The delegates, then, are to be seen not only – and perhaps not even primarily –
as ‘legislators’ or ‘decision-makers’, but as ‘communicators’, mediating the flow of
communication among the member churches, which is of the essence of a ‘fellowship of

29
ibid.
churches’ . This would call for a different form of preparation and a new profile of what
it means to be a delegate. Of course, the WCC will also have to rely in the future on
professional communicators and on the public media to carry its message. It has become
increasingly clear, however, that the interests and criteria, especially of the secular media,
do not necessarily correspond to the communication needs of the WCC (– and here I
would extend that to the communication needs of some WCC member churches or
participants).

How can an assembly become an event and resource for a self-reliant form of
communication which focusses on connecting different life stories rather than on
controversies; which invites participation in an ecumenical dialogue on themes and
crucial questions rather than only reporting and evaluating results?”30

It is clear from these remarks, despite some critical considerations, that the WCC has no
intention of withdrawing from public information or public communication work – quite
the opposite. This is borne out by the restructuring which took place in 1999 after the
assembly. Despite staff reductions the WCC has consistently – and, in my own opinion,
if I may say so – creatively backed communication and developed the communication
“cluster”, adding a second team, the Public Information Team. This change of direction
in communication was guided by the statement of principle “Towards a Common
Understanding and Vision of the World Council of Churches” (CUV), which sets out the
WCC’s new self-understanding.

From the discussion surrounding the CUV document it was clear that churches, national
councils of churches, ecumenical groups all wanted more communication, more
transparency and greater involvement in the work of the WCC. Note, they wanted more
communication, not just more information. So simply increasing the number of press
releases was not the answer. It was more a question of putting across the content of
programmes and projects at all levels, and of facilitating lo cal, national, regional and

30
Report of the General Secretary. loc. cit. para. 10
global relations in which the WCC itself would take a back-seat and simply offer a
platform.

In this scheme of things communication cannot be consigned to one cluster or

department, it has to become an integral part of all ecumenical work. Whether in “Faith
and Order”, “Justice, Peace and Creation”, International Relations” or “Mission and
Evangelism” - to name but a few WCC teams - the issue of communicating and
communicability is consistently addressed in the new structure.

To ensure that these often rather uncomfortable questions did not come to be treated as a
tiresome side-issue for some teams, two new positions were created, to be known as
Cluster Communications Officers (CCOs), each working with one cluster and
accompanying the teams in their programme work. The two CCOs support team
colleagues in their programme work by looking with them for appropriate ways to
communicate the content. Not everything needs to be turned into a brochure; not
everything need be the subject of a press release.

One of the things we have begun to learn in our first years of existence as the “Public
Information Team” is that, while our work evolves in ecumenical space, it must also at
the same time place itself outside the ecumenical space if we are to report on it ourselves
or enable and encourage others to do so.

a) Public Information in the ecumenical space

As I have said, during the discussion surrounding the CUV document, churches, national
councils of churches and ecumenical groups asked for more direct involvement in the
work of the WCC. It was a question of communicating contents, programmes and
projects at all levels and facilitating local, national, regional and global connections.

How can this be translated in the public information and communication work of an
international organization? The various projects and services we have been trying to
develop with our partners over the past years have one thing in common - the WCC is
actively involved in the planning and execution stages but then as far as possible steps
back. The WCC acts, so to speak, as a platform or as an intermediary between WCC
partners and the media or, increasingly, also between the media and WCC partners. In
this way we are trying to create a space where local, national or regional concerns and
themes can be brought to an international public.

Over the years this form of enabling has become an integral part of our communications
work. It now makes up a good quarter of our work as a team - and the proportion is
rising.

The result is new and hitherto largely unexplored possibilities for cooperation, new forms
of partnership and partner-relations, new levels of understanding and exchange, and new
forms of communication and strategies adapted to the cultural context and the needs of
our partners.

Looking at it from the opposite angle, one could ask how far Alan Falconer’s idea of
local, national and regional theatres, or Konrad Raiser’s metaphor of the welcoming,
extended table can be translated into the public information and communications work of
local, national and regional church organizations and groups. Or, let me ask you a direct
question: Could you imagine doing communications work in ecumenical space and
placing your communications space at the disposal of others?

b) Communicating about ecumenical space

As the assembly in Harare showed, the idea of ecumenical space is very difficult, not to
say impossible to convey in journalistic terms - at least in the northern hemisphere.

A journalism that deals in hard facts and results or controversial issues - and I do not
intend to be in any way disparaging – is not likely to do justice to a Sokoni or a Padare
event, NOR, to put it the other way round, are Sokoni and Padare events likely to satisfy
the demands of today’s journalism.
To ensure that future WCC assemblies and central committee meetings can continue to
be a communication event for journalists and not simply for communication among WCC
member churches, delegates and participants, we are trying to develop the services we
offer to journalists in and around governing body meetings.

To accompany the Padare events, which are a continuing feature, we supplement the
traditional press conferences with press briefings on topical Padare issues and events.
These provide journalists with useful facts and materials and attributable and reliable
quotes and comments and give them the opportunity to inform themselves in detail about
the subject, in conversation with representatives of the worldwide ecumenical movement.

In fact, we prepare a programme of our own, picking up the themes of the meeting but
packaging them for journalists. This was welcomed by all the accredited journalists at
the last two central committee meetings.

I believe we have still not done enough; we shall have to keep looking for new ways of
communicating ecumenical space for the media. This will include improving and
developing support and orientation for journalists, paying more attention to the special
needs of the different media and the cultural contexts in which they are working. Also,
encouraging journalists to turn from the tried and tested form of news and reporting, to
more subjective forms like features and commentaries.

We also have to reconsider the traditional view that a church business meeting - be it a
WCC assembly or a synod meeting - is a media event per se and ask ourselves whether
this is still the case, or whether such meetings should simply be seen as a framework for a
parallel programme tailored to the needs of journalists. I think we shall continue along
the line I have just described and this will take the strain off both sides. Ecumenical
space can continue to be a protected and protective space where communication can
happen for those taking part, while targeted news and media relations work will relieve
journalists of the pressure of having to force ecumenical space into a journalistic mould.
The author Mag. theol. Karin W. Achtelstetter M.A. is Director of the Office of
Communication Services and Editor-in-Chief in the Lutheran World Federation, Geneva;
until July 2002 she was Coordinator of the Public Information Team in the World
Council of Churches and WCC Media Relations Officer.