A shared process” “

“The light of Christ shines upon all. Hope for renewal and unity in Europe”: that’s the theme of the third European Ecumenical Assembly (Eea3), proposed by the joint Committee of the Conference of European Churches (Cec) and the Council of the European Episcopal Conferences (Ccee), meeting in Chartres (France) from 3 to 6 February 2005. The press release issued at the end of the meeting speaks of “an assembly in stages that will culminate in the meeting of Sibiu (Romania) from 4 to 8 September 2007, and that will be preceded by a shared process, at the national and regional level, to develop the common ecumenical commitment of the Churches in Europe”. In the next months the proposal of the Joint Committee – reports Sarah Numico, SIR correspondent at Chartres – will be submitted to the final approval of the various executive organs of the Churches involved. THE PLANNED STAGES. The communiqué explains the stages planned for Eea3 as follows: “a European meeting of the delegates of the Churches, Episcopal Conferences, ecumenical organizations and movements, which should take place in Rome from 24 to 26 January 2006″, final days of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity; a series of meetings at the regional and national level in the course of 2006; a second European meeting at the start of 2007, to be held in Wittenberg (Luther’s city, in Germany); and lastly, with the participation of 3,000 delegates, the final stage at Sibiu, for the first time at the centre of country of largely Orthodox tradition”. The number of delegates is limited to 3000, because, explain the organizers, “the accommodation available in the Romanian city is limited”. It is expected that in 2007 Romania will enter the EU as a new member country, while Sibiu will be European Capital of Culture during the same year. The Eea process therefore constitutes a kind of ‘pilgrimage’ to “meet the various Christian traditions of Europe, and to listen together to the Word so as to be able to offer responses to the demand for spirituality, the search for meaning, and the hopes and fears of men and women in our time, especially the young generations”, explains the press release. The title of the Assembly, “The light of Christ shines upon all. Hope for renewal and unity in Europe”, explains the Anglican bishop of London, Richard Chartres, expresses the hope that “it may be an event of trust for Christians”. THE CONTRIBUTION OF ORTHODOXY. Reviewing the assemblies organized jointly by Ccee and Cec, the Rev. Keith Clements, Cec general secretary said that “the themes of the three assemblies highlight the developments of the ecumenical movement”: Justice, peace and safeguard of the creation, in 1989, represented a new phase and “gave prophetic indications for ecumenism”; the assembly in 1997 went to the heart of the problem of reconciliation, identifying that it is the Gift of God and source of new life; now, with the third assembly, “the Churches are examining their common responsibility in the present context”. And while, in 1989, the Churches met in Basel, in a context with a Protestant majority, and in 1997 in Graz where the Catholic Church is the majority church, now, “with the forthcoming assembly in Romania, in 2007, we want to place in a particular light Orthodoxy and its contribution to the life of the Churches and to the ecumenical process”. Monsignor Aldo Giordano, Ccee general secretary, emphasized that the “promoters of the assembly will be on the one hand those responsible in the dioceses and churches for ecumenical relations and on the other the young, who must have an important role in the process”. We need, he said, “to network” the multifarious ecumenical experience that exist at the local and regional level. THE FUTURE AGENDA. During the Eea3 process the issues facing the Churches in our time, and contained in the “Charta Oecumenica”, signed by Ccee and CEC in 2001, will be tackled: from the visible unity of the Churches to the contribution of Christians to the construction of Europe, from the reconciliation between peoples and cultures to the safeguard of the creation, and dialogue with the other religions and world-views, beginning with Judaism and Islam. The Assembly will therefore be an occasion to examine in depth the avenues opened by the Charter and, as Giordano envisages, “may lead to the emergence of concrete projects and commitments, which could be gathered together in an action plan or annexed as a document to the Charter itself. In the message sent to the Pope at the start of the meeting in Chartres, the co-chairmen, Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor and Pastor Jean-Arnold de Clermont had expressed gratitude for his service to the reconciliation between Christians and entrusted “the ecumenical projects for Europe” to his prayer.