Editor EMILIO CASTRO

Guest Editor WESLEY GRANBERG-MICHAELSON

Managing Editors JEAN STROMBERG MARLIN VANELDEREN

Book Review Editor THOMAS F. BEST

Editorial Assistant JOAN CAMBITSIS

The quarterly of the World Council of Churches

Editorial

The delegates to the Canberra assembly of the World Council of Churches, meeting in February 1991, clearly wanted the “conciliar process on Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation” to be continued and deepened in future programme work. Less clear, however, was what form that should take, and what implications this had for the WCC’s structure and activities.

The following July, an advisory committee called to recommend a new pro- grammatic structure for the WCC set forth a bold proposal to establish an entire programme unit on justice, peace and creation, giving it largely the task of carrying out expectations for future work on JPIC. When the central committee adopted this proposal, it wrote a mandate for the new programme unit which explicitly grounded its work in the JPIC process - an effort begun at the Vancouver assembly in 1983, continued to the JPIC world convocation at Seoul in 1990, and reaffirmed at the Canberra assembly.

Even then, many in the World Council of Churches constituency, as well as its own staff, wondered how to implement this mandate. Did it simply mean that the WCC continued work in the four areas highlighted by Seoul - international economic justice, peace-making, defending the creation, and combatting racism? In truth, the WCC would have continued such programmes without a JPIC process. So then, did it mean that work was to be done in a new way which stressed the inherent connections between these areas?

Or does the JPIC process intend something deeper in pressing the churches for commitments, on the basis of our common confession of Christian faith, to act against these basic threats to life? Since the need for deepening the theological and ethical

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dimensions of JPIC frequently has been stressed since Seoul, does this point to the task of engaging the churches directly in issues of JPIC as matters central to the understanding of our faith?

Moreover, calling JPIC a “conciliar process” stresses its c lnnection to the churches’ search for unity. If this lies at the foundation of the JPIC e fort, then should not future work focus on how mutual commitments (“covenants”) of churches to JPIC open new doors to discovering our common belonging together as Christ’s body? And should not the JPIC process become directly engaged with the wider efforts of the World Council of Churches to foster the visible unity of the church - efforts historically carried out by the Faith and Order Commission?

These questions, and many more, formed a backdrop for the work of the commission of forty people appointed by the WCC central committee to develop, prioritize, and monitor the work of Programme Unit 111 on “Justice, Peace and Creation”. Together with the commissioners for the other three programme units of the WCC as well as other advisers, they met together for the first time in May of 1992 at Evian, France. Their work helped shape answers to some of the questions surrounding JPIC, and provided directions for how the WCC will carry out its JPIC mandate.

First, the Unit I11 commissioners at Evian strongly emphasized the connections between the specific areas of work. “Just as justice, peace, and creation are inter- related, so must all programmatic concerns be addressed in their inter-relationships.” So while specific areas of focus were identified (racism, including indigenous peoples and issues of ethnicity , poverty/economy/environment, human rights/conflict resolu- tion, women, youth), the commissioners insisted that “work in one area must be pursued in a way which is linked to and is aware of consequences for other areas within the unit”.

Then, the commissioners underscored that “work must be governed in theological reflection on justice, peace, and creation”, and that the experiences and insights from this work should contribute to a “theology of JPIC”. Certain specific areas were identified, such as developing an ecumenical statement on racism, pursuing the theology of creation and justice, the theological issues related to peace, theological reflection on perspectives of indigenous peoples, and the “opened windows” contri- buted by women’s theology. In the words of the Evian report: “We approach theology in this commission as an essential means within the Christian community of com- municating among and with the churches. Doing theology is a matter first of faith, but it has clear ethical implications for the churches and for society. Theology will be a continuing, integral part of the task of this commission.”

The ethical questions and implications of JPIC, intrinsic to its theological efforts, were also underscored as central to future work of the programme unit. Here the commission spoke of its broad goal as affirming the “culture of life”, and the “search for alternative structures”. Since the JPIC Seoul convocation, many voices have urged that the JPIC process address more directly the questions of how to envision and work concretely for societies to be characterized by justice, peace, and the integrity of creation. In his opening address to all the commissioners at Evian, WCC general secretary Emilio Castro stressed that Canberra’s reaffirmation of JPIC came with the expectation it focus on seeking “viable alternatives” for societies which are “potentials in history”.

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By the end of its week of work, the Unit I11 commission underscored this challenge, and called for the “strengthening of community bonds at all levels and the search for social, ethical and environmental values that sustain life”. This stress on community comes from a recognition that the churches’ work for JPIC at local levels must build together bonds of commitment, spirituality and faith in an alternative future rooted in God’s redemptive love. Our task is to nurture such communities of faith where space can be found for such values and life to flourish, in the face of a modem world culture which undermines spiritual values and erodes community.

This also led to the commission’s stress not only on what programmes Unit I11 should do, but on how those efforts should be undertaken. And the first stress was placed upon empowering the churches themselves in their commitments to JPIC. “In the conciliar process for justice, peace, and the integrity of creation the churches have now reached the stage in which empowerment has become the key challenge. We are thinking here first of the self-empowerment of the churches themselves while con- fronted with the dominant cultures of death and destruction.” This promises to be a creative step in how the WCC can focus its work and resources in advancing the JPIC process. Past work has often assumed that solidarity implied a support of social and political movements as over against churches. But the Evian commission stated the WCC’s task was “to empower churches as parts of or together with movements for justice, peace, and creation”. And in this context, the commission stressed the responsibility of the churches in contributing to the self-empowerment of women and youth.

Finally, the commission specifically recommended that ecumenical perspectives and efforts working for justice, peace and integrity of creation be directly related to the WCC’s 1993 world conference on Faith and Order, to be held in Compostela, Spain. This underscored the need for integrating the understanding of JPIC as a “conciliar process” into the WCC’s definition and search for unity.

The authors in this issue of The Ecumenical Review include three persons who serve on the Unit I11 commission (Larry Rasmussen, co-moderator, Elias Crisostomo Abramides and Margot Kassmann) as well as others who have been directly engaged in the JPIC process. Their articles demonstrate fresh theological and ethical issues arising from JPIC, and point to the challenges which address the ecumenical move- ment in sustaining a commitment to justice, peace, and integrity of creation.

The future agenda of the World Council of Churches features the conciliar process of JPIC as a central priority.

Hopefully, this issue of The Ecumenical Review will help to clarify the meaning of this commitment, and demonstrate the questions and expectations which await responses from throughout the ecumenical movement.

WESLEY GFUNBERG-MICHAELSON Programme Secretary WCC Unit I11 on “Justice, Peace and Creation”

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