In the following composite article, the three staff members of WARC highlight some of the major trends and decisions at this year's meeting of the executive committee of the Alliance, Saint Andrews, August 19-22, and 29, 30, 1977.

The general secretariat

Matters of general interest for the Alliance are so different and numerous that they can only be reported in telegraphic style!

Attendance at the executive committee was good: out of a total of 42 members, only three of the old and two of the new executive committee had been prevented from coming. Fraternal observers were present from the World Council of Churches, the Lutheran World Federation, the Baptist World Alliance and the secretariat for promoting Christian unity of the Roman Catholic Church, and our local organizing committee as well.

Usual reports were submitted by the WARC president, the general treasurer, the general secretary, area secretaries, etc. providing the executive committee with the necessary facts, comments and suggestions about the regular life of the Alliance.

Three new churches were received into the WARC fellowship:

1) the newly constituted Uniting Church of Australia confirmed the affiliation of two of its constituent bodies which were already members of our organization, ie the Presbyterian Church of Australia and the Congregational Union of Australia;

2) the Presbyterian Church of Northeast India, which originated in the work of the Presbyterian (Calvinistic/Methodist) Church of Wales;

3) the Lithuanian Evangelical Reformed Church in the USA. New officers appointed were: Prof Dr James I McCord, USA (president), Rev Samuel Habib, Egypt, Dr Chung Hyun Ro, Korea and Bishop Karoly Toth, Hungary (Vice-presidents), Prof Dr Jan Lochman, Switzerland ( Chairman, department of theology) and Mrs Jackie Mattonen, USA (Chairman, department of cooperation and witness).

A procedure was adopted to fill the vacancy of the 21st seat on the executive committee after the election of a new executive committee by the member churches, due to a tied vote. It is suggested that the vacancy be filled by someone from a French-speaking church. Without limiting the field of choice, attention is drawn to the under-representation of youth and women in the new executive committee. According to our constitution, when the executive committee has received the nominations, it will make the election.

The member churches in Asia and the Pacific region, including New Zealand and Australia, have been authorized to explore the possibility of forming an Alliance area and to report to the next meeting of the executive committee.

As one can expect in these days of worldwide monetary and economic crisis, special attention was given to the WARC financial situation:

1) expressions of thanks were recorded for the faithful support from many member churches; it was also said that an effort should be made by all churches to contribute, in one way or another, to the Alliance budget;

2) the 1978 budget to the amount of Swiss francs 439.000. was adopted, after having been carefully prepared and discussed. Compared with the latest available accounts, ie 1976, which showed a total expenditure of Swiss francs 448.376.25, the budget for 1978 can be described as conservative and prudent;

3) as a consequence of the adoption of the 1978 budget - what was in fact at stake was whether or not the present staff would be kept at the same number - the committee renewed the three contracts of Messrs Perret, Smith and Kaan for two years (1978-1980) only, in order to permit a review of the total WARC financial position by the committee in 1979;

4) one way our member churches can help the Alliance is to host the executive committee in their own country; this would also help the receiving churches to be better involved in the whole work of the Alliance, as a consultation could be attached to the meeting of the executive committee with a rather large participation of representatives of the WARC member church or churches in the country or the area.

The committee on the future programme of the Alliance presented its final report, which provides guide-lines for the years to come, when the new executive committee is in power. Some factors were underlined: no programme can be drawn up without taking into account the present economic situation of the Alliance and its own member churches; there are new directions developing in the ecumenical movement; the continuing reality of the world families of churches, such as ours, and the need for the Alliance of a global strategy. Out of these considerations emerged three points of agreement:

1) "the Alliance has a continuing theological function... (which)... involves coordination, consultation, partnership in bi-laterals, and the stimulation of research and publishing;

2) "the Alliance is necessary for fellowship, cooperation, mutual sustaining among member churches" (such as commitments to religious liberty, to churches in a minority situation);

3) "the Alliance is necessary in the present ecumenical situation to bear witness to an ecclesiology that lives from the inside out."

Since 1974, the former John Knox House, in Geneva, has worked in cooperation with WARC. This institution, now known as the John Knox International Reformed Center, has been able to operate without any deficit. Plans have been prepared, and others pending, in order to improve the services of the house and to make of it a significant instrument for all who use it, without restricting its field of operation to Reformed people or churches.

As a whole, the 1977 St Andrews executive committee can be described as a good, responsible introduction to the work of an executive committee which is composed of 4 (out of 21) members of the past executive committee, plus the two honorary members, Dr William P. Thompson (USA, past president of the Alliance) and the Rev Dr R. Stuart Louden (Scotland, General Chairman of the St Andrews WARC consultation).

Edmond Perret

The department of theology

The department of theology, under its chairman, Prof Jan M Lochman, brought to the executive committee a series of recommendations. Some of the actions of the executive committee are cited, in abbreviated form! Hopefully the reader may catch something of the width and direction of our theological concerns.

Theological Education: - Mindful of the key role of theological education in the life of the church and in particular the relationship between theology and ministry, the executive committee... requests the department to plan for a specific consultation on theological education for clergy and laity...

Human Rights: - The executive committee registers its pleasure at the very considerable interest roused on all sides by the WARC study on the Theological Basis of Human Rights... and the considerable response from the member churches throughout the family... urges all member churches to be continually alert to those dangers which threaten a Christian understanding of human rights and do violence to God's claim for all humanity and where necessary to resolve upon appropriate action in the name of the Christian gospel.

Orthodoxy: - Aware of the long history of misunderstanding between Reformed and Orthodox the executive committee hears with deep appreciation reports of our Reformed/Orthodox engagement in several areas and countries, in the North American and Caribbean area, in eastern Europe with reference to the Moscow Patriarchate, and in regard to possible developments with the Ecumenical Patriarchate Constantinople. The executive committee records its gratitude for the evident signs of the new spirit of dialogue in the search for understanding...

Roman Catholic Church: - The executive committee hears with approval that relations with the Roman Catholic Church in many countries continue to reflect the new ecumenical climate... The executive committee voices its concern that in many countries there is still no agreement between the Roman Catholic Church and the Reformed on many basic issues, eg the mutual recognition of baptism, and the failure of the Roman Catholic Church to recognize the validity of mixed marriages celebrated according to the order of the Reformed churches...

On receiving the official final reports of two major dialogues with representatives of the Roman Catholic Church on the world level,

The Presence of Christ in Church and World, sponsored by WARC and the secretariat for promoting Christian unity of the RCC;
The Theology of Marriage and the Problems of Mixed Marriages, sponsored jointly by WARC and the L WF with SPCU of the RCC;

...the executive committee recognizes that the release of these dialogue reports now does not mark an end but rather a beginning. The elements of consensus and dissensus in these reports must be tested by the thinking of the Reformed family as a whole...

Baptist World Alliance: - The executive committee, aware of the affinities as well as the distinctive differences between the Reformed and the Baptist positions in theology and church practice, receives with pleasure the report of the theological conversations officially sponsored by WARC and the BWA, 1973-1977...instructs that this report be sent to all churches, and that careful study, reaction and comment be requested.

Lutheran/Reformed: - On the world level the Executive

Committee welcomes the initiatives now emerging...which envisage the setting up of Lutheran/Reformed Consultative Teams to be made available to our member churches throughout the world.

Church Union: - The executive committee rejoices in the consummation of union negotiations in Australia, when in June 1977, the Uniting Church in Australia (Presbyterian, Methodist and Congregationalist) was constituted...

Anglicanism: - The executive committee records its pleasure that the standing committee of the Anglican Consultative Council at its meeting on May 10-12, 1977 approved a possible Anglican/ Reformed consultation... The mandate of the Anglican/Reformed consultation to include; an assessment of church union conversations... the analysis of the specific Anglican and Reformed theological questions which require further examination...

World Families of churches and the WCC: - The executive committee... recognizes the crucial significance for the witness of the gospel and for the advance of the ecumenical movement as a whole of every attempt to go beyond the divisive nature of fragmented ecumenical action at every level... and therefore approves the consultation now being planned between the WCC and the World Families of churches on questions of common concern.

Church Unity: - The executive committee of WARC in this centennial year of the Alliance wishes to restate the attitude of the Alliance towards the unity of the church.

The unity of the church is based solely on the reconciling death and resurrection of Jesus Christ... But the present divisions of the church obscure this... It may well be that we are not truly reflecting the rhythm of the gospel when in church union negotiations we insist upon a consensus in all matters of faith and practice before koinonia.

The scope of this unity must be total - embracing every aspect of the life of the church... As God reconciles all by grace alone, so He reconciles churches... In this context we should see the issue of intercommunion. In order to be healed, should we not together expose ourselves to the grace of Christ made present by his Spirit through word and sacrament?..

Future Studies: - The executive committee recommends that the Alliance take up the following issues as possible themes: (I) The study of the Covenant - an attempt to work out in the contemporary ecumenical context the main aspects of this biblical concept which has received special emphasis in the Reformed tradition... (2) The priesthood of all believers: the biblical basis of mission... (3) The study of human rights (see the recommendations of Workshop Four).

Richmond Smith.

The department of cooperation and witness

The younger of the two WARC departments has often been described as the "life and work arm" of the Alliance. Most of the implications of this description are therefore bound to be of a very practical nature. And so, when in Saint Andrews the members of the department reflected on the ministry that has been entrusted to it (for this is the word they would deliberately use when talking about the department's mandate), they identified communication in all its forms - press, radio, visitation and correspondence - , mutual caring, women's concerns, and alertness to situations where human rights are being violated as the major lines in the cooperation and witness programme.

One of the main emphases in this year's discussion was, of course, on matters related to human rights and civil and religious liberties. The interest aroused by the document a Theological Basis of Human Rights is certainly not of an exclusively theological or academic kind. WARC past-president William P. Thompson said at an Edinburgh press conference that the denial of human rights has reached "almost epidemic proportions". For many churches and individuals within our worldwide Reformed family, harassment, oppression and persecution belong to the grim facts of daily life. Any ongoing study on the theology of human rights needs, therefore, to be accompanied and matched by an effective alertness on the part of the whole WARC administration and constituency to situations where practical help is needed and public opinion has to be mobilized.

The department of cooperation and witness has hitherto tried to identify so-called priority areas; these have usually been associated with geographical specifications, like South Africa, Latin America or eastern Europe. This time, the department asked the executive committee to recognize two priority areas without geographical specification: the violation of human rights, and "the support and encouragement of member churches which, because of their minority position find themselves in situations of oppression and hardship, and in which their Reformed identity is hard to maintain."

The department also provided an opportunity during the Saint Andrews event for participants to sign an Amnesty International petition for the release of all prisoners of conscience. The same petition had earlier been made available to the readership of the Reformed Press Service; the secretary general of Amnesty International has written to say that the RPS initiative has already brought in a vast number of completed petitions from all over the world.

The WARC constituency is to be asked to associate itself with the observance in 1978 of the 30th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the new president of WARC has been requested to "issue a call to prayer to the churches to underline the Alliance's deep disquiet at all that threatens the survival of humanity, and to urge them to combat according to the means at their disposal and in ways most appropriate to their respective situations, hunger, poverty, war and deterioration of the environment."

In addition to all these actions and recommendations, the department asked the executive committee to adopt one new geographically determined priority area, namely the member churches in the Middle East.

Women's concerns featured prominently on the department's agenda. With the resignation of Miss Paulette Piguet, who has rendered such excellent service in the area of maintaining contact with the women in the Alliance, it was especially necessary for the executive committee to reaffirm that the department continue to be responsible for "encouraging and facilitating communications among women in the member churches and for bringing women's concerns to the attention of the constituency." It was, I believe, a wise and delightful decision to ask Mrs Shanti Solomon to continue to be Coordinator for women's work, despite the fact that she is no longer a member of the executive committee. The department also expressed its concern at the "serious under-representation of women on the executive committee", and recommended that "every precaution be taken to ensure adequate representation of women in every aspect of the life of the Alliance."

A very important department recommendation accepted by the executive committee was that in future an existing WARC by-law be implemented whereby both departments can bring in advisers at their meetings. This is not only important in that it may help "redress the imbalance of representation by women and youth", but also because it would create significant opportunities for relating more closely to member churches in the regions. It is not envisaged that advisers be brought from long distances and at great expense, but that they be drawn from the vicinity in which the executive committee happens to meet.

The fulness of the department's agenda necessitated much overtime at Saint Andrews, but it also provided us with an opportunity for creating among the new members the same kind of real fellowship and solidarity that had so clearly marked the life and work of the "old" department during the past seven years.

Fred Kaan.