GENEVA — Kenyan songs
and African drums heralded the official installation on Wednesday
of the Rev. Sam Kobia, a Methodist from Kenya, as the new general
secretary of the World Council of Churches.
“Serving the churches and the ecumenical vision will sustain
my life and work,” Kobia, 56, the first African to hold
the WCC’s top executive post, pledged at an installation
service at the council’s Geneva headquarters, attended by
his two immediate predecessors — Konrad Raiser of Germany,
and Emilio Castro of Uruguay.
The Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick of the Presbyterian Church (USA)
reminded worshippers in his sermon how Kobia, an ordained minister
in the Methodist Church of Kenya, had quoted an African saying
on his election last September: “Those who want to go fast,
go alone. Those who want to go far, go together.”
Kirkpatrick also quoted the U.S. civil rights leader Martin
Luther King who once said that “Eleven o’clock on
Sunday morning [when many U.S. churches hold their services] is
the most segregated hour of the week.”
King had been referring to churches segregated between black
and white congregants, but Kirkpatrick suggested the saying could
be applied more generally to the importance of ecumenism for churches
segregated in separate denominations.
“Our spiritual health is at risk indeed because this is
the case,” said Kirkpatrick.
“The fastest growing segments of Christianity seem to
be those least related to the ecumenical movement,” noted
Kirkpatrick. “The rise of fundamentalism in all religions
is literally tearing the world apart through violence and mistrust.”
And “even among those of us most deeply committed,”
ecumenism seemed to be increasingly difficult, said Kirkpatrick,
noting tensions in the WCC between Orthodox churches and Protestant
and Anglican denominations.
The WCC was founded in 1948 and has more than 340 member churches
from virtually all Christian traditions apart from the Roman Catholic
Church.
A reminder of the challenges that now face Kobia, who took up
his new WCC post on Jan. 1, came from the Rev. Thomas Wipf of
the Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches.
“We are concerned about recent developments in the WCC,”
said Wipf, citing recent changes in worship at WCC events introduced
in an attempt to accommodate the differences between Protestants
and Orthodox. “The ecumenical truth of our time is rather
painful and it is not without sadness that we have to accept the
divergence between our confessional families.” |
