Welcome and Introduction by Dr. Keith Clements, General Secretary, Conference of European Churches
It is my pleasure to welcome you all on behalf of the four organising bodies for this Round Table meeting: the Conference of European Churches (CEC), Eurodiaconia, the Churches Commission for Migrants in Europe (CCME) and the European Contact Group on Urban Industrial Mission (ECG). It is very much a collaborative event, and to this aspect I will return in a moment.
Others will talk about the thematic background to the meeting, and how it has evolved. Suffice it to say here that it is a long story, of which this meeting is but the latest chapter. As far as CEC is concerned, we have a particular reason to be glad about it, for it is the fruit of a lot of thinking since our 11th Assembly in Graz 1997. After that Assembly, it was intended that most of our work should be placed under the responsibility of three commissions: Church and Society, Churches in Dialogue, and Churches in Solidarity. the first two have certainly come about. But when we looked further into how a commission on "Churches in Solidarity" might operate it soon became apparent that it would have to encompass such a wide range of concerns and activities - including migrants and uprooted people, racism and xenophobia, women's concerns, youth and diaconal work of all kinds - that it would be unmanageable under a single umbrella. We had intensive discussions during 1999 with the organisations representing this range of concerns (including several present here today). On the one hand, those especially concerned with the areas of racism, refugees and migration wanted to ensure the preservation of a tightly-knit, integrated structure capable of concerted advocacy work. On the other hand, a number of agencies in the diaconal field loked for a "light" structure, a forum or round-table, which could at appropriate intervals bring them together at the Europ-wide level for information sharing and joint strategising. It was agreed that we needed to diversify along these two main lines, and CEC Central Committee endorsed these proposals. The former concern developed into the new arrangement between CEC, WCC and CCME whereby CCME is recognized as the lead agency for those concerns in Europe with support from CEC and WCC. Of the latter idea, this Round Table is the fruit. Looking at this gathering of 100 or so people, it does not at first sight seem particularly "light"! But it is certainly different from a heavily bureaucratic structure such as an attempt at a single "commission" would have become. We are here to meet, to interact, to share and to develop new ideas together.
I want, again, to emphasize its collaborative nature and to say why this is especially important for us in CEC. At our Assembly in Graz, CEC was challenged by the member churches and associated organisations to develop a new methodology of ecumenical work in Europe. We were asked to recognized the significance of bodies already in being, of work already being undertaken, to utilize them and to develop networking among them. This Round Table is the prime example to date of our attempting this way, which seeks to increase the value and enhance the effectiveness of what each of us is doing, by working together. But I do not think thre is only a pragmatic reason for this, a desire for greater "efficiency." For us as churches and church-related organisations there is a deeply theological reason. It stems from the understanding of ourselves as being members of the body of Christ, each with our distinctiveness but none of us completely independent of each other, each called to bring something for the good of each other in the body which serves the world in the ministry of Christ.
Of course, we each come with our particular interests, our particular experience and expertise - which in sum total in this room is very considerable. It's natural that we shall each wish to see these recognized - and protected from what might threaten them. But I hope that we can look upon our diversity as a positive feature, and look beyond anxieties for ourselves and ask: What new thing can we achieve by our mutual affirmation, collaboration and resourcing? At heart, we are all in the business of building community in Europe. We should exemplify what we are aiming at, by how we do it.
This is therefore an exciting moment in ecumenical life in Europe. But I cannot forbear to mention another reason why this event is specially important for us in CEC. We are already starting to prepare our 12th Assembly which will take place in 2003 in Trondheim, Norway, with the theme Jesus Christ Heals and Reconciles - Our Witness in Europe. I especially want to emphasize the word heals in the title. "Healing" is a rather new word in our public ecumenical vocabulary. Its entry here testifies to the way in which the church's ministry of healing and role in health-care is steadily moving up the mission agenda, in Europe no less than in the Third World. I strongly recommend the recent (January 2001) issue of the International Review of Mission, entirely devoted to healing and health-care, as an example of this new attention. In Europe we are rediscovering that health and healing are not just metaphors for what we are about in Christian mission, but are very concrete realities of what we are to witness to as we face broken societies, communities, families and personal lives, minds and bodies. I therefore look to this meeting on diaconia as a source of input for the challenge and inspiration the churches will need at Trondheim.
Finally, no word of introduction to this Round Table would be complete without mention of the sense of world crisis in which we meet, a sense which has been afflicting us in the two weeks since the tragic events of 11 September in New York and Washington. Maybe we shall look back upon this meeting as somehow strangely providential in its timing, an occasion for reflecting upon the demands that may be made upon us, and upon what we can offer, in face of this new challenge. For the moment we live in great uncertainty. I expect we have all been asking, "What if. . . ?" Will there be a huge refugee and humanitarian crisis? If so, will it spill over into Europe? Or if it is largely confined to other regions, will it nevertheless create a new pressure for dierting resources from European work to those regions? In any case, we must be ready for new challenges within our own communities. What new xenophobia and racist hostility may yet be unleashed? So far, all the riht people are saying all the right things about not stigmatizing Muslims as violent extremists. How far that consensus will hold if and when hostilities escalate, is an open question. Already it is apparent that many people, in Europe as much as anywhere else, since 11 September are manifesting a new level of insecurity, vulnerability and disorientation. Nowhere seems safe anymore.
We are indeed living in a time of the shaking of foundations. The biblical perspective should make us, as people of faith, prepared for this. The Letter to the Hebrews, chapter 12, has a great deal to say about the shaking of not only the earth but heaven also. But following the dramatic description of God shaking earth and heaven once more, of fire and earthquake, how striking is the way the letter continues as it enjoins how those who believe in a kingdom that cannot be shaken, should live: "Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. Remember those in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured. . ."(13.2ff)
When the foundations shake, the agenda of diaconia goes on.