Church attitudes being plumbed

Press, 20 August 1982, Page 9

Church attitudes being plumbed

Ms Sithembiso Nyoni. of Zimbabwe, and Mr Dietrich Affeld, of East Germany, are visiting Christchurch from the World Council of Churches.

They are part of a team of four lay persons attempting to plumb the mood of the member churches of the National Council of Churches.

The fact-finding mission is preparatory to the sixth assembly of the World Council of Churches in Canada next year.

Ms Nyoni. a rural development consultant, is active in the movement seeking sexual equality in Zimbabwe but is not “a women’s liberationism” She said that the Zimbabwean Government had recently passed equal pay legislation and that nine p’f the 100 members of the Parliament were women.

The opposition of the churches to the Springbok rugby tour of New Zealand had been “totally approved" by the churches in Zimbabwe, she said.

“We identified very strongly with the churches here. Most of Africa did. It was what we would have done ourselves if we had been here.” she said.

Ms Nyoni said, however, that the African States did not want to dissociate themselves entirely from South Africa.

“We just want nothing to do with her apartheid laws and with an economic system that serves the interests of the whites only instead of the whole population,” she said. The five southern States

were working toward achieving a greater degree of economic co-operation to lessen their dependence upon South Africa, she said. “It will not be easy but if we can co-operate, we will be a step nearer.” Mr Affeld was a prisoner of war in Russia for five years at the end of World War II and now teaches Russian and English in East Germany. He has had several opportunities, both before and after the borders were sealed, to defect to West Germany but chose not to.

“To leave would be to be a traitor and to oppose God's will,” he said.

Religious worship was tolerated by the State and the churches were able to conduct their affairs without interference from the Government, Mr Affeld said. Bible societies, religious pub-

lishing houses, and church newspapers flourished freely and had even exported Bibles to the Soviet Union.

Church groups in East Germany were actively promoting the cause of nuclear disarmament and had' received “a sympathetic hearing” from the Government on the issue. “Deterrents are no longer the right means of keeping the peace,” Mr Affeld said. The nuclear issue was particularly keen in both East Germany and West Germany, he said, because they would be among the first victims in a war.

Both Ms Nyoni and Mr Affeld said that disarmament would be the main item on the agenda at the World Council of Churches assembly. “The survival of mankind depends upon it,” Ms Nyoni said.