c. 1997 Religion News Service

GRAZ, Austria _ The quest for reconciliation and unity among European Christians remained as elusive as ever at the end of the Second European Ecumenical Assembly, and the gathering did as much to highlight tensions as it did to foster repeated calls for peace.”It has become clear that we in the East and West are moving with different speeds in the ecumenical movement,”said Cardinal Miloslav Vlk, archbishop of Prague, in what many participants would regard as an understatement.

The assembly, which ended Sunday (June 29), was sponsored by the Conference of European Churches and the Conference of European Bishops’ Conferences. But far more than two disparate sides emerged during the week.

While some 700 delegates to the conference agreed on a common front to address the many political, social and economic issues facing Europeans, they expressed doubt that Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox Christians could walk the same path or even speak the same language.

Catholic women complained their voices were being muffled by the church hierarchies. The Orthodox churches of the East expressed a lack of interest in communion with the West and reiterated its attack on proselytism at home among Protestants and Catholics.”We’re talking on two different levels,”said Line Skun, a Norwegian delegate and member of the Lutheran Church of Norway.”All the things we want to do to improve peoples’ lives are nice but if we ignore cultural issues among us, reconciliation will not happen.” The conferees agreed. The assembly’s formal message, adopted by the delegates, states that”our divisions and enmities still provoke conflict and are a serious obstacle to making visible the gift of reconciliation.””We are sadly aware that these divisions exist not only between our churches but also between women and men in the church,”it adds.

Visible unity, cooperation among all churches and reinvigorated interfaith dialogue are among its recommendations. Beyond the ecumenical questions, it calls for outlawing all forms of violence, promoting equality of women”in all fields,”guarding the sanctity of human life and championing the rights of refugees.

The recommendations of the approved platform document call on Christian churches to resolve liturgical differences so that Easter can be celebrated jointly among the churches by the year 2000.

It also calls on the bishops’ conferences and the European churches to develop guidelines on proselytism, which emerged as one of the most contentious areas of debate. The standoff came after Russia’s lower house of parliament, at the request of the Russian Orthodox Church, approved legislation that would bar religions not recognized by the government from owning property, publishing religious books or manufacturing religious objects until they have operated with official acknowledgment for 15 years.

The measure, which is expected to win approval in the upper house, represents a backlash across Eastern Europe to the growing influence of Protestants and Catholics in those nations.”What we want is for them to change their aggressive strategy against the Orthodox Church,”said Archbishop Vosskam Kalpakian, primate of the Armenian Orthodox Church of Greece.”Bilateral dialogue with the Catholic Church will not go forward if the question of proselytism is not resolved,”warned Auxiliary Bishop Vasilios Karayiannis of Cyprus.”The Protestants and Catholics know very well the sensitivities of the Orthodox regarding proselytism.” The conference document called the issue”more difficult and painful than virtually any other area.”It said the ecumenical community”prohibits any form of proselytizing”and said conversions should”never be brought about by pressure or manipulation.” But Catholics and Protestants alike defended their practices, saying their missionaries were not using aggressive tactics in Russia, Ukraine or other areas where the issue has emerged.

Still, the depth of antagonism was palpable.”I’m shocked by the differences between the churches that are coming to the surface,”said Elizabeth Dieckmann, a Catholic theologian from Munich, Germany. She said one Russian priest told her that communion with the West was not possible.

The Orthodox, she said,”fear our power, our economic influence, the role of the free market. They favor freedom, of course, but are afraid by the loss of economic security they are witnessing. I think this is in part a response to that.” Women’s participation in the churches also emerged as a difficult issue, with some contending their voice was being muffled at the assembly.

A session in the full assembly on the role of women in religious life that had been scheduled was canceled in the final days leading up to the conference. Women also complained that just 4 percent of the assembly delegates were female. And they said there was no recommendation in the final message or document on the need for reconciliation with women.”We’ve got to take our quarrel back to our own churches, because the church leaders from both sides are not ready to take this up here,”said Jean Mayland, a delegate from the Church of England.

The Rev. John Arnold, president of the Conference of European Churches, acknowledged the churches needed to improve the rights of women.”There are some signs of improvement (for women) but what you have noticed is how far we have to go,”he said at a news conference following the conference.”We’ve got a long way to go.” But Vlk, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conferences, said women were readily included in the conference.”You cannot say that they were pushed to the side,”he said.

Some delegates and many of some 10,000 participants at the assembly during the week, however, felt they were pushed to the side.”Our delegates are disappointed,”said Jacques Tuinder of the Netherlands.”Their expectations were high. These informal contacts with people from other churches are helpful. I think there’s a lot of hope. But I don’t expect changes from the top, especially the Catholic Church.”

MJP END HEILBRONNER