Symbol of unity, division

Press, 2 August 1983, Page 10

Symbol of unity, division

NZPA-Reuter Vancouver About 4000 people on Sunday celebrated the Eucharist at the World Council of Churches assembly in a service symbolising the unity they seek and the divisions among the main Christian churches. Dr Robert Runcie, the Archbishop of Canterbury, told worshippers that the service, “brings pain as well as joy that we are still separated in the sacrament of unity.” Catholic and Orthodox churchmen officiated during scripture readings at the service, held in a huge tent on the University of British Columbia campus. But they did not receive the communion bread and wine since their churches do not allow intercommunion with Protestants.

Dr Runcie, who celebrated the Eucharist, was assisted at the altar jby Protestant ministers from several countries, including

ordained women from the Lutheran Church of Denmark and the Reformed Church in Indonesia. Dr Runcie, who opposes ordination of women to the priesthood in his own Church of England, pronounced the words of consecration alone.

In his sermon he said that despite the differences between churches the ecumenical Eucharist, “creates the possibility of new relationships in faith,” expressing the hope that it may, “point to our future unity.”

The service was the first public celebration of a liturgy suggested for use by ecumenical Christian groups around the world. It is an outgrowth of the council’s document on Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry published last year. In it theologians of different churches agreed about their understanding of these doctrines, which they said could be used as a model for reconciling differences between Christian churches. The liturgy included traditional elements of Catholic and Orthodox worship and hymns from the Eastern and Western traditions. It made use of the

original text of the Nicene Creed, written at the Council of Nicaea by the undivided Church in 381 AD. The wording of the Creed has often been a sore point among Christians, because different versions are used by Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant churches, while some denominations use no creed at all. Such divisions were referred to in a homily by the Most Rev. J. Jesudasan, Moderator of the Church of South India. He said that where Communion was concerned Christians must, “painfully . .. still sit at separate tables in the ecumenical upper room, excluding each other in the name of Him who invited all to His table, painfully propping up our differences with theological arguments.” But even as a sign of unity the Eucharist could be meaningful “only when it points to a sharing of our’ lives,” Mr Jesudasan said.