Protestant Ecumenism

PROTESTANT ECUMENISM. - I. TENDENCIES. - The pseudo-reformation of the 16th century gave rise among Protestants to two divergent and opposing tendencies that still endure in our own day: one openly anticatholic, founded on the principle of free examination, which drags toward division and fragmentation; the other pro-Catholic, founded on Our Lord's prayer to his Father "Ut unum sint" (Jn. 17:21), which attracts them and urges them toward the ancient and ecumenical union. Of the first tendency the many sects into which Protestantism has divided are witnesses, so numerous that today (1940) in South Africa alone there are about 800 of them. Of the second tendency witness not only the unionistic writings of worthy Protestant authors such as H. Grotius (1642), R. Baxter (1680), S. Werenfels (1720), but the continual efforts that the sects have made to unite, whether partially, e.g., Zwinglians and Calvinists (1546), Anglicans and Easterners (1716-25), or totally, as Protestants and Catholics (1661-97). At times the intervention of the civil government also occurred to impose such unions, as, e.g., the king of Prussia did in 1817 with the Lutherans and the Reformed of his Kingdom. These attempts have been increasing in number and importance down to our own days.

A step forward, or if one prefers a new aspect, was given to the ecumenical movement in the 18th and 19th centuries by the intersectorial or interdenominational societies. It was a movement sui generis, which scarcely merits the name ecumenical.

Such societies welcomed any individual of any sect without regard to the doctrines that the individual members or candidates professed: it was enough that they wished to work directly and indirectly for the goal that the society pursued. Thus, with the sole aim of evangelizing the pagans, the London Missionary Society arose in England (1799) and the American Board in the United States (1810). With the aim of translating the Bible into all languages, printing and spreading it, the British and Foreign Bible Society arose in England in 1801 and the American Bible Society in North America (1825). The English Religious Tract Society (1799) and the American Tract Society (1825) had no other aim than to publish every sort of religious and moral printed matter. To unite all the Churches, except the Catholic, the World Evangelical Alliance was founded in 1846. In the same year the Young Men Christian Association was organized in Paris to procure the religious, physical and intellectual well-being of young people, followed later (1895) by the World or ecumenical Confederation of Christian students, which dedicated itself especially to students.

All these societies, which still endure, by their universal or almost universal character (some clearly or covertly exclude Catholics) had a certain semblance of ecumenicity, since they implied some form of universal government over the members, exercised by one or several leaders; but by showing themselves indifferent to or prescinding from the faith and religion of the individual members, they took away from ecumenicity its principal pivot, the unity of faith; in practice, however, they had good success as regards the goal they claimed to reach.

In the 19th century and especially at the beginning of the 20th the Protestant sects, moved not only by the anxiety of "Ut unum sint" but also by the continual divisions that in this time increasingly crumbled Protestantism, devised a new kind of union, not of isolated individuals, as in the intersectorial societies mentioned above, but of entire sects or Churches, forming the so-called federal or federative unions. Into such unions all the sects can enter, preserving their own doctrines, their own regime and their own worship.

There is a common board or secretariat that cannot promulgate laws, but only give norms and suggestions to protect and foster common interests, but the

3. - ENGIOLOPEDIA CATTOLICA. - V.

individual sects are free to accept or reject them. To this board each sect sends two of its delegates, who together with those of the other sects form the supreme council; it also sends other deputies, more or less numerous according to the greater or lesser number of affiliates to the sect. About 30 American sects united in 1908 in this manner to form the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America; but these unions had better success among the sects of the same origin and separated from one another rather by questions of discipline or regime. The Anglicans and Episcopalians hold the Lambeth Conferences (v. LAMBETH CONFERENCES) every 10 years since 1867; the Presbyterians in 1877 founded the "Alliance of the Reformed Churches throughout the world holding the Presbyterian system"; the Methodists even assume the epithet "ecumenical" when in 1881 they established the Ecumenical Methodist Conference; in 1905 the Baptist World Alliance was formed among the Baptists, and finally among the Lutherans, in 1923, the Lutheran World Convention. The federative union, in practice respecting the independence of the individual sects united only by a weak bond, was quite in use among many sects even of different origin.

The 20th century can be called the century of Protestant ecumenism. In fact this aspiration of ecumenism is derived from publications, from the new theory of organic or corporate union, from the pan-Christian conferences that culminate in the great Ecumenical Congress of Amsterdam in 1948. In all this ecumenical movement the two primitive tendencies still stand out: the tendency toward union, always and everywhere hindered by the tendency toward free examination.

The new theory of organic and corporate union recognizes the Church of Christ in a society in which all have the same faith in the same Lord, the same Sacraments, the same ministers. This union would not be attainable in the present state of Protestantism but perhaps in the future: and to this they add that the Church resulting from this union would represent in the future what existed at the beginning; the organic and visible unity of the redeemed human race (cf. K. Mackenzie, Union of Christendom, London 1938). When it was presented, this theory immediately found serious opponents: some wanted absolutely to exclude Catholics or Quakers or Antitrinitarians (who in fact were excluded from the Ecumenical Congress of Amsterdam) or the Churches composed of Negroes. There was no lack of those who wanted to make the experiment at least among some sects, and thus the so-called united Churches were formed. In Canada the United Church of Canada arose among Presbyterians, Methodists and Congregationalists, but the long negotiations (1908-25) that took place revealed its difficulties. In China there united in 1927 Baptists, Congregationalists, Presbyterians, Reformed, "united brethren" and some others. The doctrines on which all must agree are: faith in Christ as Redeemer; faith in his Kingdom; inspiration and authority of Holy Scripture; the Apostles' Creed as the fundamental expression of the faith. This new Church still stumbles upon various difficulties and cannot be considered as a model of corporate union. Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Wesleyans and some Anglican dioceses of South India were to make the experiment of uniting from 1929 to 1959; the independence of India was the occasion by which, instead of ending the experiment in 1959, they ended it in 1947: but serious difficulties still remain among them and not all the conditions for a solid and true organic union have been observed.

All these obstacles foreseen in the experiment induced some to adopt an original solution: to suppose that organic union already exists, but hidden, with the firm conviction that in due time it will manifest itself. The Anglo-Catholics suppose the Church of Christ to be formed by the three great Churches that have preserved the episcopate, namely the Catholic, the Oriental and the Anglican. Such a union is not accepted by the Catholic Church, nor by the East, nor by the majority of the Anglican Church, but it is considered as existing by the Anglo-Catholics, who without hesitation call themselves Catholics and give to their supposititious Church the name of Catholic and even ecumenical Church. The Pan-Christians, broadening the field of the Anglo-Catholics, enclose within their "Holy Catholic Church," which they say exists although hidden, all the Christian Churches, that is, those Christians who profess the fundamental truths (Incarnation, etc.), believe the secondary truths to be free (whether the Sacraments are 7 or only 2) and reject the lateral truths (the Immaculate Conception, pontifical infallibility). This theory was condemned by the supreme pontiff Pius XI with the encyclical Mortalium animos of 6 January 1928. Such a conception, which supposes the union of all Christian Churches to be already existing, seems to be assumed by the Pan-Christian conferences, which start from the principle that the sects gathered in the conferences represent the Una Sancta, and in the name of this Church they speak in their manifestos to all Christians (v. CONFERENZE PANCristiane).

To find organic union among the Protestant sects is an impossible undertaking as long as they do not renounce their fundamental principle of free examination. Other reasons make the problem arduous. Many sects, for example, even though perhaps living a languid life, nonetheless communicate to their members what they have: doctrine, piety, love of Jesus Christ, esteem for the Bible, direction, external and internal aids, so that the faithful feel offended if one speaks to them of a change in the religious field. Not a few sects moreover are persuaded that God himself wills a diversity of doctrines in his Church, so that each sect may bring into prominence in itself some special revealed truth that is instead neglected or forgotten by the others, and they believe that each one has at least a part of the revealed truths and to these it clings with all its strength. Furthermore many Protestants believe they are justified, and that this justification should manifest itself in a good and moral life that floods them with a joy and a freedom which makes them independent of everything that is historical and external contingency. Therefore they fear that organic union might disturb the interior and tranquil union which they say they feel with God, and they reject the idea of having to subject such an intimate union to the laws of a rigorous unity of doctrine and government. To all this must be added the natural inertia that opposes any change, especially in religious matters; the ignorance that the individual sects have of the doctrine, history and life of the others; the inevitable train of polemics and prejudices, systematically preserved and periodically revived, of one sect against another and of all against the Catholic Church; the many schemes of union and the ambiguous language employed in them, which many have no time to examine and on which they cannot reach agreement: all this constitutes an obstacle to organic union among Protestants.

The Pan-Christian conferences (v.) were the most important fruits of the whole unionistic movement of the 20th century. The Protestants foresaw that it would not be prudent to deal immediately in their first general meetings with doctrinal questions, which would have stirred up a hornets' nest; therefore at the first Edinburgh conference of 1910 they occupied themselves only with missions, "world missionary conferences"; in 1925 they gathered again at Stockholm, calling this union "Conference on Life and Action," and discussed only social questions; then, animated by the relative success of the two previous conferences, they decided to meet at Lausanne (1927) to confront doctrinal questions, "conferences on Faith and Order." By prudent agreement, the fruit of experience in the last two conferences of Oxford "Life and Action" and of Edinburgh "Faith and Order," held almost in succession one after the other (1937), it was determined to unite the two movements in the World Council of Churches, of which a fuller notice is given.

IV. AMSTERDAM ASSEMBLY

The pan-Christian Assembly held in Amsterdam (Aug. 22–Sept. 4, 1948) is known by the name of Ecumenical Council; but its official title is World Council of Churches (W.C.C.) or World (Ecumenical) Council of Churches. Although called "world-wide," in fact it was not such. Indeed, the anti-Trinitarian sects, expressly excluded, were absent from it, as were some important groups, such as the Baptists of the southern United States, the Lutherans of Missouri, etc. The Russian Church officially refused to take part in it, and the Catholic Church abstained completely.

At the two preceding procrastinating conferences of 1937 (Oxford and Edinburgh), held separately, the advisability appeared clear of uniting the two movements called "Life and Work" and "Faith and Order," so as not to separate religion from practice, the Creed from the Commandments.

In fact, "Life and Work" ran the risk of being reduced to practical and social achievements to the detriment of religion; "Faith and Order" to limiting itself to doctrinal discussions alone without paying heed to practice. But since the missions movement was intimately linked with these two movements, the International Missionary Council (I.M.C.) was included in the council of churches, on which — although it was not a "Church" but a simple "society" — practically the entire Protestant missionary movement in the world depended.

The Ecumenical Council was to meet in 1941, but because of the war that broke out in 1939 it had to be postponed until 1948. During the interval the provisional committee developed great activity in relief work and carefully prepared whatever could serve the successful outcome of the undertaking entrusted to it.

The purpose was to find the Church (the "Una Sancta") among the Churches, that is, to find among all the doctrines professed by the convened Churches those that must be held by the "Una Sancta."

Very grave difficulties did not escape the intelligent and fair-minded secretary of the Council, W. A. Visser 't Hooft: "We all believe — he wrote — that there exists a Church within the Churches, but we do not agree how and where it exists, how and where it is realized"; and on another occasion he wrote: "The Ecumenical Council must not claim to represent the 'Una Sancta,' but it can and must proclaim that it is a body in which and through which, when it pleases God, the 'Una Sancta' will manifest itself."

The general theme of the discussions was summed up in this motto: man's disorder and God's design. This broad subject was divided into four main points, to be studied by competent men and then examined by four commissions: 1) the universal Church in God's design; 2) God's design and man's witness; 3) the Church and the disorder of society; 4) the Church and international questions. On the four topics profound and careful studies were presented; some on the Catholic Church were also fairly favorable (K. E. Skydsgaard and F. H. Villain); they were all diligently examined by the four commissions to which they belonged, and from them the conclusions were drawn which were then presented to the discussions of the general assembly. The Council was inaugurated with great solemnity on the appointed day (Aug. 22), and together with the 400 official delegates of 150 Churches, about 3,000 people attended, as many as could enter the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam. Everything proceeded with order and peace, disturbed only slightly by the debate between the American G. Foster Dulles, who attacked communism, and the Czechoslovak Hromadka, who discoursed on the benefits derived from it by religion, and by Barth's outbursts, inside and outside the meetings, against the Catholic Church. A few words on capitalism left an impression that was little appreciated by some. The Council concluded quietly and, a thing noted and deplored by all, the Churches gathered to unite could not celebrate the Lord's Supper together.

From the reports and conclusions of the Council it emerges that the Ecumenical Council of Churches has been formed, that is, a body of collaboration among the Churches that came together, a collaboration that extends to the missions, to the various philanthropic works, and to fostering the Christian life. The Churches indeed proclaimed their unity in Christ, but they confessed that they do not have unity of doctrine in the priesthood, in the Sacraments, in the Church and in its visible Head. The whole affair has caused optimism in some, discouragement in others: optimism for the love and submission that were manifested toward Christ, for the humble confession of the many divisions, for the desire to seek the "Una Sancta." Discouragement because it was unfortunately foreseen that this will be found only in heaven.

The Council in its final message, among other things, expresses the wish that the Church which it envisages and hopes to see born from the Amsterdam Conference may be the house in which all find their home. For us Catholics such a thing already exists, it is open to all, it is that of Jesus Christ, it is his Church founded on the rock of Peter.

Camillo Crivelli