September 22, 2004
News Feature
By John P. Asling

It was the stories from around the world, particularly Africa, that gave poignancy to the challenging statements emanating from the 24th General Council of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC).

The Alliance is a fellowship of 75 million Christians from 215 churches in 107 countries. Four hundred delegates from around the world met in Accra, Ghana, July 29 to August 12.

It was the stories that put flesh and blood on its declarations that neoliberal economic globalization has shut out much of the world's population from the fullness of life that God intended for all.

Some worth remembering:

. Malawian Fulata Lusingu Moyo talking frankly about her husband's sexual infidelity, how she now has to cope with hepatitis B, meaning she can't eat red meat or use nicotine and how she sticks to this regime because, "I told myself I want to live."

. Nathalie Maxson telling delegates how her social activist friends in Canada have been "battered and beaten by the police for sleeping in abandoned buildings or for non-violently demonstrating against government cuts to social services."

. Roberto Jordan of Argentina placing a handful of bullets on the table in front of him as he addressed the council, saying, "Bullets were very much present in the recent history of Argentina in the years 2001-2002."

. Kamal Hassan, a U.S. student revealing his deeply personal reflections on the trip to the Cape Coast slave dungeons, writing, "I was here before, so long ago. Stolen, shackled, beaten, hip deep in my own filth. Only slivers of light. Forsaken by the holy?"

. Indian delegate and now executive member Nissa Surling Kallamthattil talking about the struggles for justice in her country, saying, "Although we bleed, all of us march towards the fullness of God's plan."

. Paul Haidostian of Lebanon speaking frankly about the violence in the Middle East, including stone throwing by young, powerless Palestinians, saying, "We in the Middle East have become experts in what peace is not."

. Delegate after delegate telling stories: of the havoc that HIV/AIDS is wreaking in Africa; the limits to religious freedom in Asia; church asylum in Germany; and the dangers of global warming for island nations in the Pacific.

Keynote speaker Vandana Shiva of India, a leading figure in the environmental movement, challenged council to reclaim some of its own Christian story by taking back words like "creation" and "reformed."

"Creation is being defiled in a way that robs people of the fullness of life," she said. "This war between economics and full life needs to end. We have to stop this war of everyone against everyone."

She challenged the churches as a global network to become centres that promote biodiversity, water harvesting and sustainable farming. "Start to become the source of the renewal of life." In other words, help create a new story for a planet badly in need of it.

This was echoed in the address of WARC general secretary Setri Nyomi. "We should tell our leaders today in no uncertain terms: stop playing games. The games that have brought death, destruction and lack of dignity for decades, yes, for centuries, must come to an end."

The games have a particular relevance for Africans, added Nyomi, a Ghanaian. "Having depleted Africa of our best resources, the countries which benefited are now simply content to ignore us and then point fingers of blame at us - falsely perpetuating the notion that 'it is those Africans who cannot get their act together.'"

Council took the stories to heart articulating a new mission in a time of new kinds of empires. "The groaning of creation and the cries of the poor and the marginalized are calling us to conversion for and commitment to mission. Economic globalization challenges Christian mission and the integrity of the church," council agreed.

The Accra confession on the economy and the earth took aim at the source of many of the stories. "The root causes of massive threats to life are above all the product of an unjust economic system defended by political and military might. Economic systems are a matter of life or death," council stated.

"We live in a scandalous world that denies God's call to life for all. The annual income of the richest one per cent is equal to that of the poorest 57 per cent, and 24,000 people die each day from poverty and malnutrition.

"Resource-driven wars claim the lives of millions, while millions more die of preventable diseases. The HIV/AIDS global pandemic afflicts life in all parts of the world, affecting the poorest where generic drugs are not available.

"The majority of those in poverty are women and children and the number of people living in absolute poverty on less than one U.S. dollar per day continues to increase."

Delegates left Accra with fresh stories to tell. American Clifton Kirkpatrick, the newly elected president of the Alliance, remarked in his closing service homily how profoundly he was moved by the Sunday morning service at Independent Square in Accra when 10,000 people sang and danced to the glory of God and by the trip delegates took to the Cape Coast to visit the slave dungeons.

The threats to life persist, he said: a neoliberal economic system that leaves many in desperate poverty; war and violence that protect the powerful; the abuse of women and the young; the raping of the planet. Yet they need not be the end of the story.

"We are indeed called at just such a time as this to turn the world upside down for the gospel, to be a strong, loving and dynamic force for life in its fullness," Kirkpatrick said.

"God is calling us to use this time that we have shared together in Accra not just to create pleasant memories, but also as a launching pad for a movement of Reformed Christians around the world."

In other words, create a new story for the world.

World Alliance of Reformed Churches
John P. Asling is Executive Secretary, Communications.