The full name of the World Alliance of which we speak is World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC for short). Thi s organization, which throughout its history has existed under a variety of names, dates back to the year 1857. It is a world–wide organization of churches which, historically at least, trace their origin to the Reformed and Presbyterian tradition and faith. Its present membership totals 157 churches. Far the greater number of these are found in the Third World, about 100 of them. At the Alliance’s General Council meeting held in Ottawa, Canada, in 1982, there were also 36 European and 10 North American churches present.

The organization is financially in very dire straits. The media reported that last year there was a prospect of drastic curtailment of staff because of this. It appears that the Ottawa meeting has proved to be such a drain upon the Alliance’s coffers that the bottom is showing.

A Committee Hobby

It is this non-descript, confessionally ill–determined Alliance which has long been looking in the direction of the Christian Reformed Church to swell its ranks and hopefully, we may assume, to replenish its treasury. Not only was the W ARC looking in the direction of the Christian Reformed Church; this denomination, through the agency of its Interchurch Relations Committee, has also cultivated its relationship with WARC. Stated more accurately: The Interchurch Relations Committee has been prodding the Christian Reformed Church to give serious attention to membership in W ARC. T o the best of the present writer’s knowledge, at no point during the last 13 years-the time of our “courtship” with WARC—has there been even the slightest groundswell in the churches in favor of our joining theWARC. All that the Acts of past Synods reveal is that the initiative has come from the Interchurch Relations Committee.

It aU started in 1972 when upon the initiative of the Committee the Synod authorized a study of the “desirability and feasibility” of joining the Alliance. Between the years 1972 and 1981 one could read in the Acts of Synod that the Committee was mindful of this task, a task which it actually imposed upon itself, but that the time to accomplish it had not arrived.

Then, suddenly, in 1981 the Committee seemed to have forgotten completely what already had happened in 1972. It approached the Synod of that year with the request to “encourage” the Committee “to engage in concentrated study of this organization,” i. e., the WARC. The Synod of 1981 dutifully obliged. What the Committee wants, the Committee gets.

A Proposal to Join?

It may well be that in the forthcoming report to the Synod of 1985 the Committee will have a definite recommendation regarding this matter. Knowing the composition of the Committee and having seen the reports of those who attended the 1982 meetings in Ottawa, this writer fears that the Committee report will recommend joining the WARC, though he hopes that his fears are ill-founded.

The unfortunate thing about this whole affair is that for 13 long years the Interchurch Relations Committee has passed up the opportunity to inform the membership of the church, its ministers, elders and informed participants in church affairs, as to the true state of affairs with theWARC. True enough, the Committee has many tasks, and of some of them it has acquitted itself well. Yet, one is at a loss to explain the Committee’s failure to provide the Church with at least some basic facts and figures.

As matters now stand the procedure will be the usual one. The Synod Agenda will be in our hands some time in April, probably May. One month will be allowed, to digest its many and weighty reports, including, possibly, a report favoring membership in WARC. This report, will likely contain a “charter and principles off ecumenicity” in the Iight of which the Committee will have made its decision. In other words, matters of far-reaching consequence pertaining to inter-church cooperation may well come before us. Yet , the time to digest all this is negligible compared to the bigness of the issues involved.

   

Look at the History

In an effort to get at least some discussion started we wrote an article for the May, 1983 Outlook, to which readers may wish to refer. The editor himself also has written on this subject.

Let us briefly review the main points. As far back as 1924 the Christian Reformed Church has considered possible affiliation with the Alliance. This issue was again weighed by the Synod of 1959. The Synod of 1959, acting upon advice of its interchurch committee, decided not to join. The reasons were:

1. The Constitution of the Alliance is indistinct. 2. The Alliance has a relation to the World Council. 3. Its membership I theologically mixed.

Here are a few other matters which those coming to the

Synod might be interested in knowing. The Alliance’s activities are divided over five (5) areas:

1. The administration of scholarships. 2. Being of service to the member churches. 3. Engaging in theological discussions. 4. Conducting interchurch dialogues. 5. Keeping an eye on theological colleges and seminaries.

No Creed

The Alliance has no doctrinal statement. It only has some sort of “preamble.” This preamble was judged to be too indistinct by the Synod of 1959 to be of much use. Yet it is this doctrinally ill-defined organization which engages in inter-church dialogue with no less than eight different church groups. We shall mention some of them: The Anglicans, Baptists, Roman Catholics, World Methodists, Lutheran World Federation, the Eastern Orthodox and the Christian Church—Disciples of Christ.

One of the participating churches, the United Reformed Church in the United Kingdom, has recently effected some sort of union with a Baptistic church. This may well be a triumph for theological accommodation. It augurs ill for the distinctly Reformed nature of an organization of which this church is a part.

All these facts—which we hope to have reasonably correct—will possibly be presented in the Committee’s forthcoming report to Synod . Along with the facts there will, we assume, be a rationale for joining the WARC. At the time of writing, the Church is still in the dark as to what this rationale may be. Will it run along the lines of the advice of those who in 1967 argued that the Christian Reformed Church could well join the World Council ofChurches? Two of the present members of the Interchurch Committee were also signatories of the 1967 minority report. In matters  “ecumenical” our Church has witnessed a surprising degree of continuity of committee personnel in spite of the rule of mandatory retirement from committees after six years of service.

The Church Must Know

What we need, in the light of the above tale of 13 years of missed opportunities to inform the Church, is a much more open and ongoing forum for the discussion of ecumenical concerns on the part of the whole Church. The Interchurch Committee could have stimulated such but failed to do so. Those best in position to inform the church membership do not write. Moreover, where in the present structures could one best carry on such a continuing dialogue? The monthly periodicals are too infrequent to bring about much clarity by means of a give-and–take of authors with differing viewpoints. The weekly organ of the Christian Reformed Church, the Banner, has not been suitable for this purpose either.

We have said and written these things before. We know that note has been taken of our lament. But things have remained the way they were. In the meantime, if the scenario we have sketched above proves to be correct , members of the 1985 Synod will be asked to face a major question of ecumenical cooperation with a minimum of discussion within the wider forum of the Church. More than a dozen years of “ecumenical” baiting have gone by without the Church getting even the most elementary information in the light of which it could make up its own mind.

Is not the ecumenical question of far too great an importance to let it be the domain of a few committee members? Proceedings at Synods which the undersigned has witnessed indicate that the membership of the Church is not well informed about even some of the most elementary matters of interchurch cooperation on which Synods are asked to pass judgment. This is regrettable and an affront to the very cause of ecumenicity, which is a worthy cause. May the story of thirteen years of inexcusable silence with respect to the World Alliance arouse enough of us to solemnly vow that from this time forward things will change for the better. 

Note: Dr. Marten H. Woudstra is Professor of Old Testament at Calvin Theological Seminary at Grand Rapids, Michigan.