AUSTRALIA
Bev Hincks from Newcastle, New South Wales was unable to attend the Rome Gathering as she was in hospital for an operation, but earlier in July was able to meet Cardinal Kasper when he took part in the Conference of the Australian Catholic Diocesan Ecumenical Commissions in Melbourne. ‘We shall both be fortunate not to be in Rome in the late-July heat!’ joked the Cardinal. She organised a display for the Conference, including the Preparatory Paper for Rome, the Australian report for Rome and information about a possible English-speaking Conference in Australia in 2005/6.
AUSTRIA
The Arbeitgemeinschaft konfessionsverbindender Familien in Austria moves around the country for its annual conference. In September 2002 this was held in Innsbruck, on the theme of baptism, and in September 2003 moved to Feldkirchen in Carinthia and studied ‘Europe and the Charta Oecumenica’. Building on the tradition of international contacts at national conferences, there were participants both from England and Switzerland. The Austrian group at Rome brought little bags of salt with them – enough for all the families at the Gathering to take home.
BRITAIN
The Association of Interchurch Families’ annual conference in August 2003 gathered people responsible for the ecumenical work of their churches to discuss Christian initiation in interchurch families. Both Swiss foyers mixtes and the Northern Ireland Mixed Marriage Association were represented at Swanwick. The office of the Association is moving with Churches Together in Britain and Ireland to a new address (see back cover). This move coincides with a reduction in the work of the office and more reliance on volunteers around the country and on electronic communications.
CANADA
Craig Buchanan of Montreal contributed an article on interchurch family experience to a number of Ecumenism devoted to catechetics (December 2002, pp.27-29). The Calgary group carried on the tradition of a weekend summer meeting, begun by Saskatoon in 2002, by preparing a weekend in Alberta in August 2003.
FRANCE
Many foyers mixtes were present at the celebration of the 50 years of the Centre Saint-Irénée at Lyon in mid-October, to pay tribute to its Director, Fr René Beaupère OP, who has led interchurch family groups in France since the early 1960’s. The Comité francophone permanent was formed after the First World Gathering of Interchurch Families in Geneva in 1998; following Rome the Comité may develop into an association, both in France and Switzerland. The quarterly review Foyers Mixtes, published at Lyon, is run by a Franco-Swiss editorial group.
GERMANY
The annual conference of the German Netzwerk konfessionsverbindender Paare und Familien (a network that comes under the umbrella of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Ökumenisher Kreise, with no formal membership of its own, but with its activities organised by a committee of nine) was held in February 2003 at Burg Rothenfels. The theme was ‘Differing Understandings of Authority’. A couple from England took part. A great deal of effort went into an interchurch families stand at the Ecumenical Kirchentag held in Berlin in June 2003, and the Netzwerk now has a greatly increased number of people on its address list.
IRELAND
Mixed marriages (Catholic-Protestant) in Northern Ireland have a high profile because of the nature of the two communities there. The Northern Ireland Mixed Marriage Association (NIMMA) has its place in research work (as in the international conference run by the Initiative on Conflict Resolution and Ethnicity and the Institute for Conflict Research in November 2001). In 2003 the Community Relations Council again promised NIMMA funding for another three-year period, although the terms were more restrictive than before. A third edition of NIMMA’s booklet Mixed Marriage in Northern Ireland is in preparation.
Working together at European level
Following the Rome Gathering Jean-Baptiste Lipp of the Swiss foyers mixtes organised a meeting in October 2003 with the Secretary of the Council of Catholic Bishops Conferences in Europe (CCEE) to see how contacts between interchurch families and church authorities at European level could be developed. He was joined in St Gallen, Switzerland, by representatives from Austria, Germany and England. Interchurch families had been encouraged by the reference to them made in the Charta Oecumenica, signed jointly by the Presidents of CCEE and the Conference of European Churches (CEC) in 2001 (see Interchurch Families 11,1, Jan.2003 p.10). A meeting took place a few days later with the Secretary of CEC in Geneva. CCEE and CEC are planning a joint Assembly in 2007, probably in Romania, a follow-up to the Graz Assembly of 1997. At Graz the French- and English-speaking interchurch families, who had got together to run a stand at the agora, found themselves next to the Austrian and German stand. This began the relationship that led to the preparation of the Rome Gathering by four language groups (including Italian).
Vol 12, # 1, 2004