Financially shaky ecumenical
groups to plan their merger
The Layman, May 14, 2009
Two financially shaky ecumenical groups – the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and the Reformed Ecumenical Council – will meet at the John Knox Centre in Geneva May 21-28 to put the final touches on a merger agreement.
Their leaders say the meeting in the city of 16th-century Reformer John Calvin is intended to bring about the “visible unity” that Calvin urged. But another, perhaps more pressing, issue is to combine the financial resources of the two movements to ensure their “sustainability,” a term used by WARC President Clifton Kirkpatrick, retired stated clerk of the Presbyterian Church (USA).
Peter Borgdorff, president of the Reformed Ecumenical Council, made a similar comment: “We will be looking at ensuring the financial base of the new organization in light of the current financial climate.”
But the money problems of WARC long preceded the current financial climate. In October 2005, during a meeting of the WARC executive committee in Evian, France, Kirkpatrick said, “Unless we take dramatic steps to find new financial resources and to build a new sense of ownership and responsibility for the Alliance in our member churches, we will have no future.”
Neither WARC nor the Reformed Ecumenical Council has publicly released financial statements.
The PCUSA’s contribution to WARC, $232,731 in 2008, was one of the most generous it received.
Evangelical commissioners to the national General Assemblies of the PCUSA have tried repeatedly – and unsuccessfully – to get the PCUSA to reduce its payments to liberal ecumenical groups or end them altogether.
The new organization will be named the World Communion of Reformed Churches. The Uniting General Council is scheduled June 18-28, 2010, on the campus of Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich. Previously, Kirkpatrick had invited the World Lutheran Federation to meet (and share expenses) with the merging bodies. The Lutherans declined.
The joint executive committee of the two bodies will receive proposals for the staff structure for the WCRC, the location of the organization’s offices and the budget. Program discussions will include decisions about the future of WARC’s flagship initiatives – “Covenanting for Justice in the Economy and the Earth,” “Mission,” and “Theology and Ecumenical Engagement.”
WARC has been one of the most controversial of the ecumenical groups, particularly with its condemnation of worldwide capitalism and attachment to liberation theology.