“Reflecting Light”
Tampere 2008
1
“ECUMENISM” –
A Prism or a Lens for the Light?
Tom Sherwood
Though different cultures, tribes and lands
use lenses ground to differing sight,
each colour of the prism’s bands
refracts from one all dazzling light.
from “In star and crescent” by Mary Louise Bingle, 2001
Tom Sherwood is the Ecumenical Chaplain at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada.
An ordained minister, he is also an Adjunct Research Professor in the Sociology of
Religion. He presented papers at the first two Global Campus Chaplains conferences:
Vancouver 2000 (“Professionalism in University Chaplaincy”) and Brisbane 2004
("Multiple Religious Belonging").
INTRODUCTION
A PRESENTATION AND A RESEARCH PROJECT
The first part of this paper was written in Canada before the conference and presented in
Tampere. It begins with a review of "The Many Meanings of Ecumenism" in history and
contemporary usage. The presenter spoke as a social scientist, a Protestant minister, and
an "Ecumenical Chaplain" – the only full-time religious professional at a very diverse
24,000-student university. Contemporary experiences were related to concepts of
"Deeper Ecumenism" and "Whole-World Ecumenism".
The second part is a report of research carried out at the conference. Those attending the
“Ecumenism – A Prism or a Lens for the Light?” workshop and other interested chaplains
were invited to complete a questionnaire on their understandings and experiences of
ecumenism. A summary of these questionnaires (N=32) comprises the second part of the
finished document.
PART ONE
THE MANY MEANINGS OF ECUMENISM
There is a lack of ecumenical agreement on the meaning of the word “ecumenical.”
As a minister in The United Church of Canada (UCC) since ordination in 1976, and as
the Ecumenical Chaplain at a secular university since 1999, I have been living in the
midst of a theological argument and a lexical confusion for several years.
The UCC has long been an advocate of what it calls “whole world ecumenism” – a term
that includes the full range of Christian diversity, but also includes other religions, other
spiritual world views and other individuals or groups whose activities and identities are
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
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not necessarily faith-based. In the 1990s, some UCC publications, especially “Toward a
Renewed Understanding of Ecumenism” (1993) and “Mending the World – an
Ecumenical Vision for Healing and Reconciliation” (1997), discussed interfaith,
multifaith and other cooperative engagements in terms of the word “ecumenical.” Other
Christian denominations found the publications to be of interest, but reacted strongly
against the use of the term “ecumenical” to describe coalitions and activities beyond the
range of Christian diversity.
Meanwhile, in 1999, I was appointed Ecumenical Chaplain at Carleton University in
Ottawa. Carleton was established in the last years of the Second World War as an
institution of higher learning that would be independent of “The Church.” There are
three negative or prohibitive references to religion on the first two pages of the enabling
legislation. When student enrolment began to grow quickly in the early 1960s, university
and community leaders appreciated the need to provide religious and spiritual advisory
services, but they found that the Carleton University Act seemed to prevent the university
from doing so directly. In 1965 they created a not-for-profit corporation, a charity, to
provide chaplaincy services. Since then, occasional letters of understanding between
Carleton University and the Carleton Ecumenical Chaplaincy (CEC) have defined a
relationship in which the university provides rent-free space and basic support services in
exchange for the “advisory services” provided by the CEC. In some literature, this would
be described precisely as a “campus ministry” to distinguish it from a “university
chaplaincy.” In this literature, a university chaplain is defined as a religious professional
employed by the university itself: the chaplain has a direct, accountable relationship to
the university. A campus minister, on the other hand, is employed by a church,
denomination or para-church organization; and the organization has a relationship with
the university – perhaps a memorandum of understanding. The minister is accountable to
the religious organization.
In 1965, it must have seemed to be a good idea to call this new charitable organization
“ecumenical” – attempts had been made to include other faith groups, but it became
established as a Christian cooperative effort, with formal financial commitments from
Anglican, Baptist, Presbyterian and UCC bodies. In 1965, the rise of Vatican II spurred
new ecumenical energy; the UCC and Canadian Anglicans were beginning serious
consideration of an organic church union; and other expressions of interdenominational
cooperation were in vogue.
Thirty years later though, when I was appointed in 1999, I quickly realized that there
were two problems with my two-word job title, the two words! “Ecumenical Chaplain”
says the sign by my door. “What does that mean?” say the students. Most university
students in this decade had grown up within secular family and educational systems. Few
know what a chaplain might be; fewer recognize the word “ecumenical” (or even how to
pronounce it). And yet, there it is, entrenched in legislation and decades of presence,
printed on my door, my business cards and the web site.
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
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Many conversations with students have begun when they stopped at my open office door
just to ask about the word. Many conversations have sought to define “ecumenical
chaplaincy” in contemporary terms or to develop alternative names for it. For example,
“caring without borders” is a popular translation in this cohort of students.
Part of the problem is ignorance and unfamiliarity: it is a church word in a secular
society, an arcane term, a bit of theological and ecclesiastical jargon. But another
problem is that the word has been and is being used in a variety of ways.
What follows is a brief review of the many meanings of ecumenical.
FIRST MEANING
“world-wide” or “global”
The following entry will be familiar to most students of biblical Greek:
In the New Revised Standard Version, some of these passages are translated in the
following ways:
“throughout the world”
(Matthew 24: 14)
“all the world”
(Luke 2: 1; Acts 11: 28)
“all the kingdoms of the world”
(Luke 4: 5)
“to the ends of the world”
(Romans 10: 18).
For Christians, the Church and western society, this is the starting point. “Ecumenical”
was originally a term used in contrast to terms like “local” or “parochial” to refer to all
the world or to people from all around the world.
SECOND MEANING
“including all of ‘The Church’ world-wide”
Early in church history, the term was used to refer to such geographic breadth within the
Church. At this point “ecumenical” and “catholic” are nearly synonymous. The first
ecumenical council, for example, was held at Nicea in 325. There have been 20 more
since, but not all are universally accepted as ecumenical. (The irony begins.) The
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
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Eastern church recognizes the first seven councils and the Trullan Synod (692); the
Roman Catholic church ignores the Trullan Synod, but recognizes 14 later councils as
ecumenical (including Vatican II, 1962-65). Protestants have a different theology of
church, view the councils as historic events, and have attended modern councils as
observers.
It is interesting to observe that the Second Vatican Council called itself a “sacred
ecumenical synod” because one of its chief concerns was the Unitatis Redintegratio
among all Christians. It also produced a separate Declaration, Nostra Aetate, which
discussed the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions. At this time, and
throughout the history of church councils, “ecumenical” refers to a measure of breadth or
diversity within a concept of the Christian Church.
THIRD MEANING
“the Christian world”
Matters are complicated by another historic, but very specific usage. The Eastern church
incorporated the word “oikoemene” into its official vocabulary in the term “Ecumenical
Patriarch” – first used by John IV, bishop of Constantinople (582-595), and still carried
by the present archbishop of Istanbul (formerly Constantinople).
The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople is the Archbishop of Constantinople, and
ranks as primus inter pares (first among equals) in the Eastern Orthodox communion,
which sees itself as the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. The current holder
of the office is His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I.
The Patriarch of Constantinople has been designated the Ecumenical Patriarch since the
sixth century. The exact significance of the style, which has been used occasionally for
other prelates since the middle of the fifth century, is nowhere officially defined, but the
title has been attacked in the West as incompatible with the claims of Rome
FOURTH MEANING
“inter-denominational Christian cooperation…
and/or church unity?”
The fourth meaning is the most familiar usage to Protestants and Anglicans who have
been professionally active in the late Twentieth Century. It is the meaning usually
associated with “the ecumenical movement” and such ministries as my own Carleton
Ecumenical Chaplaincy.
The World Missionary Conference held in Edinburgh in 1910 gave rise to three
cooperative movements among Protestant denominations:
1. the International Missionary Conference sought to coordinate missionary
work throughout the world;
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
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2. the Life and Work movement was organized in Stockholm in 1927 to foster
united Christian action in social and political justice; and
3. Faith and Order was set up to study doctrinal and ecclesiastical differences
among the churches.
In 1938, the Life and Work and Faith and Order Movements met together in Utrecht, and
proposed the formation of the World Council of Churches, which eventually held its first
assembly in Amsterdam in 1948. Representatives from 147 churches attended. The CCC
has since grown to 349 member churches in more than 110 countries, representing more
than 500 million Christians; and it has parallel or analogous national-level organizations
in many countries. Some of these, such as the Canadian Council of Churches, include the
Roman Catholic denomination as members. Others, such as the National Council of
Churches U.S.A., do not.
According to Vatican II, “the term ecumenical movement indicates the initiatives and
activities encouraged and organized, according to the various needs of the church and as
opportunities offer, to promote Christian unity.”
This meaning persists today in a variety of organizations, programs and activities; and a
literature review or a Google Alert identifies it as the most frequent usage by scholars and
journalists. This meaning of the word will be the focus for a centennial event, “Toward
Edinburgh 2010.”
FIFTH MEANING
“interfaith cooperation, multifaith activity”
However, a fifth meaning has complicated the conversation. For about 40 years there
have been occasional scholars, conferences and publications using the word
“ecumenical” with broader-than-Christian reference. In Canada in the 1990s, this
blossomed into a disagreement between the UCC and its ecumenical Christian partners in
the CCC. Several UCC publications used the term “whole world ecumenism” to describe
enterprises in which Christians, people of other religious and faith groups, and people of
good will
How old is this usage?
1968
Its roots are probably in the 1960s. Certainly “The Wider Ecumenism” by Eugene
Hillman (Burns and Oates, London, 1968) is the first significant scholarly, book-length
presentation of the concept.
In that same year, the UCC published “A New Creed” expressing the possibility of
faithful Christian cooperation with non-Christians. One of the internal debates among
Christian theologians in the 1960s and subsequent decades was about the exclusive
claims of Christianity with respect to revelation and salvation. Influential theologians
(Robinson, Kung) and significant church bodies (The United Church of Canada)
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
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expressed views opposing the One-Way theologies of traditional Catholicism and
American evangelicalism. In 1968, continuing its tradition of coining a contemporary
expression of the historic faith in each generation, the UCC adopted “A New Creed.”
Trinitarian in form, it expresses faith in God who not only “has created and is creating”
and” has come in Jesus” but “who works in us and others by the Spirit.” Others. The
church and Christians do not have a monopoly on God’s saving activity or the work of
the Spirit. This creed became very popular, was picked up by other denominations and
translated into other languages. It is still popular.
1983
By the 1980s, there are several places where the term “ecumenical” is used with a
broader-than-Christian reference. For example, in 1983, in his Preface to Willard G.
Oxtoby’s “The Meaning of Other Faiths” Hans Kung wrote, “We have irrevocably
reached the third ecumenical dimension, ecumenism of the world religions” (Kung, 1983:
10). Joseph H. Fichter cites this statement as significant in his paper, “Christianity as a
World Religion” (Chapter 5, pages 59-72, in Phan, 1990).
1984
There is a reference to a “larger ecumenical relationship” that would include other, nonChristian religions in the 1984 report of the Board of Mission and Unity to the General
Synod of Church of England. Titled “Towards a Theology of Inter-Faith Dialogue,” it
refers to “Christian Responses to Other Faiths (Section 3, paragraphs 14-23). There is a
review of the spectrum of “responses” – identifying three types: Christian exclusivist,
inclusivist and pluralist. The latter view, according to this report, is held by people who
are concerned with the way other religions are “brought into some kind of larger
ecumenical relationship where the truths of each are seen as complementary to each
other.”
1988
Later in the 1980s, Matthew Fox began publishing some of his thinking about the
essential unity of the various world religions. “The Coming of the Cosmic Christ” (1988)
was the first of these, followed by several books, including “One River, Many Wells”
(2000). A good summary of his concept of “deep ecumenism” can be found in an
interview he gave for educational television:
We're in a time of deep ecumenism. There's no such thing as a Jewish
ocean and a Lutheran sun and a Buddhist river and a Taoist forest and a Roman
Catholic cornfield. Once you move to the level of creation, you're into an era of
deep ecumenism, and I think for mother earth to survive we need this awakening
of wisdom from all world religions, and not just the five-thousand-year-old
patriarchal ones, but the goddess religions, the religions of the native peoples of
America, Africa, and Asia, and I think this and this alone is going to awaken the
human race -- this combination of mystical wisdom -- to its own salvation, if you
will, its own getting its act together. That's what we're working at in our program,
and so I have working with me scientists and artists and then Native Americans,
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
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native Africans, native European tradition people, goddess tradition people, along
with Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, Sufi people. I think this is where our education
has to take us….
Even the Vatican Council of the Catholic Church, the Second Vatican
Council, said the Holy Spirit has always worked through all religions and all
cultures. I think that statement is one of the most important sentences in that
entire experience that was the Vatican Council. I don't think it's been paid too
much attention to since, but it's very important that God works through all
religions, and that's why we have to draw forth the wisdom of all religions
today…
Eckhart says God is a great underground river. So we come to this
common ocean of being. This is why you have different wells of wisdom. There's
the Jewish well and the Sufi well and the Buddhist well and the Catholic and
Protestant, but they sink into one deep underground river. There's only one divine
source of all this wisdom… (Fox, 2008).
Also in 1988, the General Council of the United Church of Canada commissioned an
“Ecumenical Agenda Research Project” which led to two formal articulations of “whole
world ecumenism” – a broad use of the word to include Christians, people of other world
religions, and people of good will who did not necessarily self-identify in terms of
religion. The two published documents, read and studied in the UCC and shared with
other Christian denominations and other religious organizations, were “Toward a
Renewed Understanding of Ecumenism” (1993) and “Mending the World – an
Ecumenical Vision for Healing and Reconciliation” (1997). They both advocated for the
concept of whole world ecumenism, which went beyond multifaith boundaries to include
non-faith-based people and groups. (See “Sixth Meaning” below.)
1990
In 1990, an international conference on the expanding concept of ecumenism generated a
number of papers which were published later that year as “Christianity and the Wider
Ecumenism” edited by Peter C. Phan. In his introduction, Phan quotes an unpublished
letter by Professor Francis Clark, referring to “interfaith ecumenists.”
1995
Most of the major western denominations published new hymnals in the 1990s, and The
United Church of Canada was no exception. Seeking to help its members sing the
historic faith and their contemporary Christian spirituality in a multicultural society, the
UCC published “Voices United” and included not only such traditional hymns as
“Amazing grace” and “Jesus Christ is risen today” but also a number of songs that had
potential for use in interfaith programs and multifaith services: “Bring many names”
(268), “God is passionate life” (695), and “When I needed a neighbour, were you there?”
(600) with its repeated last line of each verse, “And the creed and the colour and the
name won’t matter, were you there?”
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
“Reflecting Light”
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2003, 2006
In 2003, the Canadian Armed Forces Chaplaincy Branch published an anthology of
essays about diversity in the forces and chaplaincy. Each of the articles addressed
Christian ecumenism except one, “Where we are today” by two UCC ministers who
expanded the conversation. “Ecumenism merges directly with interfaith issues,” they
wrote (Dawson and James, 2003: 21-31).
Three years later, the Canadian forces chaplains asked me to consult with them at their
annual June retreat, a continuing education event that is compulsory for those not
deployed overseas. It was obvious to me during that consultation that the term
“ecumenical” was being used in two different ways in the same conversations: older
chaplains (all of them males, who often used the word “padre” for “chaplain”) used the
term to describe Christian diversity; younger chaplains, half of them female, used it to
mean “multifaith.” (None of the women used the word “padre”.)
2007
In 2007, the UCC published “More Voices” as a supplement to the 1995 Voices United.
Campus chaplains and other religious leaders planning multifaith celebrations will find
many songs of interest:
2
“Come all you people”
3
“River”
29
“How lovely is your dwelling place” (Psalm 82)
30
“It’s a song of praise to the Maker”
41
“O beautiful Gaia”
44
“Shadow and substance”
63
“Long before my journey’s start”
88
“Over my head”
98
“Like a river of tears”
106
“I am the dream”
120
“My soul cries out”
130
“Rise up, rise up”
135
“Called by earth and sky”
141
“We are all one people”
159
“In star and crescent”
The last of these provided the quatrain at the beginning of this paper. It was written in
2001 by an American patristics scholar and poet, Mary Louise Bingle. The poetry not
only includes diverse spiritualities, it relates to the focussing theme of the Global
Conference in Tampere:
In star and crescent, wheel and flame, in rugged cross and empty tomb,
we image forth one matchless name, one holy matrix, fount and womb.
Though different cultures, tribes and lands use lenses ground to differing sight,
each colour of the prism’s bands refracts from one all dazzling light.
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
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In burning incensed, tithing gifts, in breaking bread and pouring wine,
each act of ardent worship lifts our human hearts to Love Divine.
In Buddhist chant and Muslim prayer, in shofar, drum and sacred song,
the music thankful spirits share give praise in voices millions strong.
With varied hopes and dreams and creeds, all tiles in one mosaic whole,
we serve our God in faithful deeds on pathways to one common goal.
No Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, no male and female set apart,
but all are one as family held close within our Maker’s heart.
2008
Another example of this broad use of the term appeared before my eyes while using the
internet to arrange my travel to the Tampere conference. Here is the news story as I
found it, accidentally, at
truthpatrol.blogspot.com/2008/04/hotel-goes-ecumenical-with-menu-of.html
Tuesday April 15, 2008
HOTEL GOES ECUMENICAL WITH A MENU OF SPIRITUAL FARE
At one hotel in Nashville, Tenn., when you feel like a bit of religious reading, you'll
have more than a Gideon Bible to choose from. The Hotel Preston has begun
offering a “spiritual menu” to its guests, including the Quran, the Bhagavad Gita
and additional versions of the Bible. “We also heard many travelers say, `Look, I
know that a Gideon Bible is available ... but have you considered including a book
of Scientology or have you considered including the Book of Mormon?” said Howard
Jacobs, chief operating officer of Provenance Hotels.
SIXTH MEANING
“cooperation between faith-based and non-faith-based
organizations”
The concept of “deeper” or “wider” ecumenism seems to refer to interfaith and multifaith
activity. The UCC chose to promote a concept of “whole world ecumenism” in its 1990s
publications cited above. The term was necessary to describe such activities as the
following programs I was involved with in parish ministry:
In the 1970s, in a small town, church leaders and community leaders were concerned
about the lack of positive programming or social space for young people. Incidents of
vandalism, mischief and other youth-related crimes were increasing. Leaders of the
United Church congregation suggested a concept to the Anglican parish, the Lions Club
and the municipal government that became a major fund-raising and capital project which
produced a youth drop-in centre, tennis courts, a swimming pool and other recreational
facilities. Faith-based people worked with other people of good will to accomplish a
particular goal. Religious institutions worked with political and other social institutions
in an area where their mandates and concerns overlapped. From a Christian point of
view, the United Church called this “whole world ecumenism.”
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
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In 1980 that same UCC congregation partnered with individual members of other local
congregations and with the local branch of the Royal Canadian Legion to form a refugee
sponsorship group which welcomed and supported nine Vietnamese “Boat People” from
two families in a three year period.
Ten years later, I was minister of another UCC congregation attended by a large number
of military families. In association with the Department of National Defence Family
Service Centre and a private business, The Body Shop, that congregation developed a
midweek “Tot Time” for military spouses (all wives, actually) whose partners were
deployed either as peace keepers or in the first Gulf War. The church supplied the
location, the DND Family Service Centre supplied a social worker who scheduled
interesting guest speakers and resource people, and The Body Shop simply seconded one
or two of it staff who were qualified to do child care while the moms met in the next
room. In practise, they were Early Childhood Education students working part-time at
The Body Shop. On Thursday mornings, they worked at the church looking after babies
and toddlers instead of going in to the store; but they were paid by the store as if they
were working retail.
SEVENTH MEANING
“openness and respect toward others”
The term “ecumenical” has developed so broad a reach that it is now appearing in
situations quite separated not only from Christianity but from the realm of religion. A
commentary on Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s changed attitude toward the opposition
parties is explained in a perhaps surprising way:
“In a minority Parliament the government needs to have
an ecumenical attitude toward the ideas of the opposition parties.”
Rather mundane breakthroughs and small triumphs over minor prejudice may be seen as
ecumenical:
“Uncle George used to be a real meat-and-potatoes guy,
but since that trip last year, he likes a more ecumenical menu.”
In its December 1999 issue, the periodical “Cooking Light” featured a plan for an
“Ecumenical Vegetarian Dinner” that seemed to be multicultural in the sense that the
recipes were drawn from several continents.
The website www.ecumenicalretirement.com provides information about “an affordable
retirement community of diversity and autonomy, where empowered residents of
different religions, cultures and races live together to make a difference inside and
outside of the community.”
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/
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References
Dawson, Capt. (Rev.) Leslie and Capt. (Rev.) Angela James
2003 “Where we are today” pages 21-31 in
The Ecumenical Model of Ministry in the Canadian Forces Chaplain Branch
Government of Canada, DND, Ottawa
Fichter, Joseph H.
1990
“Christianity as a World Religion” (Chapter 5, pages 59-72, in Phan,
1990).
Fox, Matthew
Fox, Matthew
1988
1995 Wrestling with the Prophets
1996 The Physics of Angels
1999 Sins of the Spirit
2000
One River, Many Wells
Penguin, New York.
2008
transcript of an interview with Jeffrey Mishlove, Ph.D. for the series
Thinking Allowed, Conversations On the Leading Edge of Knowledge and
Discovery on The Intuition Network, Thinking Allowed Television as
posted on http://www.intuition.org/txt/fox.htm
accessed June 10, 2008
Kung, Hans
1983
Preface to Oxtoby’s “The Meaning of Other Faiths
Westminster, Philadelphia.
Oxtoby, Willard G.
1983
The Meaning of Other Faiths
Westminster, Philadelphia.
Phan, Peter C.
1990
Christianity and the Wider Ecumenism
Paragon House, New York
See also the UCC website for
Bearing Faithful Witness
http://www.united-church.ca/partners/interfaith/bfw
and documents related to “Whole World Ecumenism”
http://www.united-church.ca/partners/interfaith/mtw
tom_sherwood@carleton.ca
www.carleton.ca/ecumenicalchaplaincy/