An Ecumenical Report
The following is the 2007 report by the Rev. Scott Axford, pastor of First Universalist in Providence, Rhode Island, as the Council of Christian Churches within the UUA (CXCUUA www.cccuua.org) Representative to the National Council of Churches’ Faith and Order Commission:
The National Council of Churches’ Faith and Order Commission, which meets annually in March and October at various venues across the country, convened in Indianapolis at Christian Theological Seminary on 11-13 October 2007, and I attended for the CXCUUA. (I had not been able to attend the last two sessions, in San Diego and in Abilene, Texas, for lack of funding in the CXCUUA budget.) As some of you know, I also co-chair the Rhode Island State Council of Churches’ Faith and Order Commission here in Providence; two of our CXCUUA members churches’ (the Universalists) are Rhode Island Council members and the CXCUUA is a RISCC contributor.
It was good to pick up on the current,m ongoing ecumenical conversations as they came to a close. National Faith & Order works on a quadrennium schedule: its officers and three ecumenical theological projects operate for four years and then issue their formal Papers. Sometimes a topic is demanding enough to be continued into the next quadrennium, and a couple of these were in evidence.
Concluding were: Full Communion, an eight-year project about to be published in two volumes (plus many pages of responses from the churches); and The Authority of the Church in the World, which also needed eight years. (On the latter, they told us it took them two years to decide what they meant by “Authority,” a year on “Church” and another year on “World”; then, in true graduate student fashion, they got an extension.) We officially commended the A.C.W. paper to the Churches for study (and response): you can pull off a copy on www.ncccusa.org (then search Faith & Order Study Groups).
We are taking this up in Rhode Island Faith & Order, and I suggest the CXCUUA (at least through its monthly clergy group) do the same–and then send in our response. Remembering that the purpose of all this is to work through church-dividing issues, it is very important that we who are the Body of Christ on our statewide levels and in our various traditions take these hard-won documents seriously in our local situations, in service of the ecumenical reconciliation to which Christ calls each of us.
My own project, Justification/Theosis/Sanctification/Justice (”JJ”), has proved to be so large that we will go another quadrennium, and I will request our CXCUUA Chief Ecumenical Officer, the Rev. Mr. Burke, on our behalf, to re-send me to the next NF&O Quadrenium and on this Study Group. The range of “Churches and sending bodies” was so vast (from Greek Orthodox to an amazing array of Anabaptists and Pentecostals), and the topic so breaking of new ground, that we haven’t even got its name settled. One glimpse: We mainline types assumed, in light of the historic 1999 Roman Catholic-Lutheran Joint Declaration on Justification, that we’d just pick up the question there. Fat chance. Many traditions present not only said they didn’t think in those categories, some of them were offended that we’d even try to! In any case, it’s a good study subject for a Universalist pastor.
The next three topics (including the continuing “JJ”) are: Unity in Mission and The Nature and Mission of the Church. It’s significant that these come from polling the Member Churches, not from staff, and that our input (which I sent in after a U.U. Christian Clergy discussion) was part of the process. If we are mindful of our own UUA’s struggle with sectarianism, and our own Christian sense of marginalization within it, these kinds of connections (so vital to us) remind us critically that we are not alone–we are part of the Church.
Many other issues circulated, not only in National Council business itself, but in the many informal conversations we had with each other throughout the weekend. An Irish Methodist was wide-eyed to hear of our Universalist Founder John Murray’s having been a Class Leader for the Wesleys in Dublin; a Dutch Reformed colleague asked about (and was promptly given) my Universalist logo pin (”Christ will conquer”). Others were happy to hear of continuing Christian Churches in the UUA, and of how we know (more than most) that a Gospel witness can’t be taken for granted; and so on.
The National Council itself has had its hands full (its coffers being depleted) with downsizing and restructuring. The good news is, with the recent election of the Reverend Dr. Michael Kinnemon (present with us) as General Secretary, all this will occasion a renewed focus on the work of Christian Unity, especially after July’s very successful 50th Anniversary Faith and Order Celebration at Oberlin. Dr. Kinnemon, who has met with us in Chestnut Hill and at Providence (he’s Brown, ‘71), is Professor at Eden Seminary, St. Louis, a former World Council staffer, a Disciples of Christ minister, and (says a well-informed local colleague) the best ecumenical mind in the country. His book Vision of the Ecumenical Movement (Chalice Press, St. Louis, 2006), on which we spent a year at Rhode Island Faith & Order, is highly recommended reading (and program material) for all of us.
I regret that notice of Convocation XXVI at King’s Chapel coming less than a week after I got back from Indianapolis, made it difficult to report in person then. I thank the Council for the support which makes possible a continued, sustained, and deepened presence and connection to the wider Church which is our lifeblood. I can assure my fellow-members that our CXCUUA participation in National Faith & Order has been communicated orally and in writing by others as welcome and even consequential.
Which is only natural–we, too, are part of the Church.
Faithfully,
The Rev. W. Scott Axford, M.Div.
CXCUUA Representative to NCCC F&O