| |
||
The annual conference of the British AIF was held 28-30 August at Swanwick, Derbyshire, on the theme of ‘Vision for the Future’. It worked on how the Association needs to develop, and what human and other resources are available, in the light of responses to a questionnaire that had previously been sent to all members. After thirty-four years on the job Martin Reardon handed over as Anglican co-chair to Chris Bard, and was elected a President of the Association. The completion of an embroidered wall-hanging of the interchurch families triptych, made at Turvey Abbey, was celebrated there in a service of dedication and blessing on 10th August, and hung at Swanwick during the conference.
A particularly impressive celebration of baptism was held for two interchurch family children, Bethanie and Grace-Marie, on 29th September 2002. It took place in the Catholic church where the family worships, which, most unusually, has a baptistery designed for baptism by immersion. The ceremony was shared by the Catholic priest and the family’s Anglican minister. Bethanie at six was old enough to answer for herself before she stepped down into the baptistery, and her resounding ‘Yes’ to the questions she was asked will long stay in the memories of those present. Two-year old Grace-Marie followed her sister joyfully into the water, and the large congregation of Catholics, Anglicans, other Christians and AIF members rejoiced with the family.
The Saskatoon group of interchurch families celebrated its tenth anniversary with a weekend at Camp Kinasao, Christopher Lake, Saskatchewan, 19-21 July 2002. This is a Lutheran camp-site, and it was the first time that mass had been celebrated in its chapel. Members from the slightly older Calgary group came to join the Saskatoon group. Bernie and Shirley Karstad handed over as co-chairs of the group to Mark and Colleen Stoecklein. Canadian AIF is mainly a federation of local groups; there was some discussion of whether a more formal national structure should be created. Young people in Saskatoon have been active. On May 21st Monika Stoecklein was confirmed at the age of twelve in a service with her Catholic peers; afterwards the bishop and her Lutheran pastor gave her a special blessing in a brief ceremony as a recognition of her upbringing within the two church communities. Juanita Karstad, who last year affirmed her faith within the Lutheran community, six years after her Catholic confirmation (Interchurch Families 10, 2, Summer 2002, p.8), was Monika’s sponsor. Juanita herself, who graduated from high school in June, was given the Christian Service Award, presented each year to a school-leaver who has given outstanding Christian service to school and community. In Juanita’s case it was given for her ecumenical contribution: ‘This year’s recipient represents the future of our faith. She has demonstrated by her actions and words the meaning and hope that lies in the ecumenical example of Jesus and the message of ecumenism put forth by Pope John Paul’.
The September 2002 number of Ecumenism published by the Canadian Centre for Ecumenism, Montreal, is entitled ‘Living the Path to Christian Unity’ and is almost entirely devoted to the texts of the Edmonton International Conference of Interchurch Families held in 2001. Ray and Fenella Temmerman, to whom the Edmonton conference owed so much, and who received the Centre’s 2001 Ecumenical Leadership Award, contribute a guest editorial.
Two meetings of foyers mixtes were held in 2002, one for the south at Sommières, Nimes 1-2 June, and another for the north at the Centre du Haumont, Lille 12-13 October, where Melanie Finch and Martin and Ruth Reardon from England joined them. Lille prepared for Rome 2003 by taking the theme of ‘double belonging’ (double appartenance). First Fr René Beaupère OP set the Rome World Gathering in the context of French-speaking interchurch family groups and meetings. In the early 1960’s a group had first met at Lyon; then other local groups began to meet. Later the local groups came together in regional meetings held in different parts of France and also in French-speaking Switzerland. The first ‘national’ meeting was in Versailles in 1995, although it was conceived as a francophone conference for all French-speaking interchurch families, rather than as a national French conference. The next stage was Geneva 1998, with its wider vision, more ‘catholic’, more diverse, making contact with the headquarters of the World Council of Churches. In its turn Rome 2003, still more diverse, would try to make similar links with the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. We hope, he said, for closer collaboration with these world bodies charged with working for unity, to understand their perspectives better, and to bring to them our experience of a living dynamic ecumenism.
Lille took an unusual approach to double belonging by asking a sociologist from the university, Bruno Duriez, to introduce the theme of the weekend and to give some reflections at its close. His introduction ranged widely over questions of belonging and identity in many different kinds of social and religious groupings. Then in workshops and plenary sessions couples focused on four topics: Eucharist and Lord’s Supper; one Bible for the churches, Christian initiation for our children; fidelity and freedom. This had been a totally new experience for him, said Bruno Duriez at the end. ‘You are not ordinary Catholics and Protestants. You don’t represent all foyers mixtes’, he said. You are committed, you feel identified with your separate confessions, but you are Christians first, surmounting the differences. I spoke earlier of Catholics and Protestants as two ‘religions’; I accept your ‘one religion, two confessions’. Your children do not want to choose between them; they are in a difficult position. You feel you have a mission to the churches; I heard ‘we’ and ‘the churches’ many times. You have chosen a particular model of the life as couples and families: you want to live and practise your faith together; others are happy to go two separate ways. Bruno Duriez raised a number of questions about community, choice, respect, identity, recognition. His outstanding question was: Who are ‘we’? What are the limits of the ‘we’? What about extreme traditionalist Catholics? What about extreme fundamentalist Protestants?
So who are the ‘we’ who have been caught up in the interchurch family movement, who are preparing to go to the World Gathering of Rome 2003? A leaflet issued by the Lille group explained that the foyers mixtes network based on Lyon exists ‘to allow couples to deepen their faith and to work for Christian unity’. The British Association has defined itself as a support network for couples and families, and as a voice in the churches to express both the kind of pastoral care such families need and also the specific contribution they believe they can make to promoting Christian unity. German-speaking couples call themselves ‘binding-the-churches-together-families’. For all of us the call to ecumenical work is strong, an important part of the definition of who ‘we’ are.
In 2001 the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant churches in Hungary came to an agreement on the celebration of mixed marriages. This was the first mutually agreed statement in Hungary on the subject of mixed marriages, and as such of considerable ecumenical importance. In 2002 therefore the Hungarian Christian Ecumenical Fellowship (KOT) decided to devote part of its annual conference to an explanation of the document, to a wider consideration of mixed marriages, and to a panel in which interchurch couples themselves spoke of their own experience. Other topics during the three-day conference in Budapest (19-21 September) included shared schools and joint social action.
A Lutheran professor of theology, Károly Hafenscher, spoke first. He pointed out that this was the first agreement on any form of shared worship since the sixteenth century. The wedding would follow the liturgical form of the church in which it takes place, but the service would be shared by priest and pastor. The agreement is an important indication of the common will of the churches to work together. Neighbouring countries had been consulted about their practice, the territories of the former Hungary. It was well known that in Germany and France shared celebrations are common. Now it is urgent to make the possibility better known in Hungary, so that more couples can benefit from it. Of course an agreement on the wedding service is only a beginning, and should be followed up by continuing pastoral care.
A Roman Catholic professor of theology, Attila Puskás, followed. He agreed that ‘ecumenical marriage’ was a better term than ‘mixed marriage’. The most important value for the Roman Catholic Church is the unbreakable unity of marriage and stability of family life; it is for this reason that it is no longer obligatory to bring up the children as Roman Catholics, although the Catholic should do all he or she can for this. Ecumenical weddings should be fraternal events linking the churches together, and occasions to exercise ecumenical sensitivity in respecting different customs (a guest does not re-arrange the furniture). It is often possible, however, to adapt and share (for example, the Roman Catholic can put his hand on the cross, and the Protestant can hold the partner’s hand while he does so). It is important that shared pastoral care should follow the marriage. The Protestant partner can request admission to communion with his partner, for example at Christmas, Easter and other festivals. The Roman Catholic Church prefers that Catholics do not receive communion in their partner’s church (but it is not a sin to do so).
The panel of Catholic/Lutheran and Catholic/Reformed couples, ranging from a recently-married couple to one with six children, spoke in practical terms of the joys and tensions of living an interchurch marriage. They had not met one another before being brought together for the panel; they were delighted to meet, and spoke of their hope of meeting again. Martin and Ruth Reardon, who were at the Budapest meeting, spoke to them of Rome 2003.
In 1993 an agreement on interchurch marriages was made between the Roman Catholic Church and the Malankara Syrian Orthodox Church in South India (see Interchurch Families, 2,2 Summer 1994). In December 1994, when the Commission for Dialogue met again, a positive welcome for the agreement on both sides was reported, but it was necessary to make the agreement better known; there had been difficulties because the local clergy were not sufficiently aware of it (Interchurch Families, 4,1 January 1996).
At the sixth meeting of the Commission for Dialogue, held in Kerula in October 2001, an attempt was made to assess the agreements that had been reached, particularly regarding mixed marriages. A mainly positive evaluation was made of the practical application of the Agreement between the Catholic Church and the Malankara Syrian Orthodox Church on Interchurch Marriages. However, it still needed to be better known and more consistently applied. In order to spread knowledge and understanding of the Agreement it was decided to re-publish the full text, this time accompanied by a short commentary, in local church publications or as a separate pamphlet (PCPCU Information Service, 108, 2001/IV, p.163).
An AAIF ‘mini’ conference (mainly the committee elected in 2001) was held in Omaha, Nebraska 12-14 July 2002. The co-chairs, Lynne and Doug Wragge, are members of the Omaha chapter. They are involved in marriage preparation in the Archdiocese, and a new programme called Bridges, developed following the Creighton University research project, was presented. The AAIF constitution was updated, a publicity pamphlet revised, and attendance at Rome 2003 discussed. The next national meeting will be held in 2004, possibly at Albuquerque. The Ark is now edited by Lamar and Diane Burton of Louisville. The Burtons visited the Albuquerque group on 24th August; a few interchurch couples have been meeting there for two years with Fr Ernest Falardeau SSS, Santa Fe Archdiocesan Ecumenical Officer, and the Family Life Officer. The purpose of the Burtons’ visit was to help the group to feel that they are part of a wider national an international network as they seek to grow and to support other interchurch families. It was a rewarding and enriching visit all round. The former AAIF co-chairs, Barb and Michael Slater, are now concentrating their efforts on California, and produced the first number of Together, for interchurch families in California, in December 2001.
There were joint meetings of the Conference of European Churches (CEC: this includes Anglican, Orthodox and Protestant churches) and the Council of Catholic Bishops’ Conferences in Europe (CCEE) in Basel in 1989 and Graz in 1997 (for the interchurch family presence in Graz see Interchurch Families 6,1, January 1998 p.3). Following up these meetings, CEC and CCEE issued joint Guidelines for Growing Co-operation among Churches in Europe in April 2001 in Strasbourg. This Charta Oecumenica, signed by Metropolitan Jeremias and Cardinal Vlk, presidents of the CEC and the CCEE respectively, is commended to all European churches for their national and local commitment. It contains the statement: Couples in interdenominational marriages especially should be supported in experiencing ecumenism in their daily lives (from section 4: Acting Together).
Vol 11# 1, January 2003
If you find any broken links, are having problems with any page in this site, or would like to suggest a page to link to, please contact the |
Go to Top |