Towards the Twelfth General Assembly
Dr. Michel E. Abs
General Secretary of the Middle East Council of Churches
As the invitations to the heads of churches to appoint their delegates to the General Assembly were sent, the timer has been set on ticking until the Assembly convenes between May 16 and 19 of the year 2022, in order to elect the Executive Committee entrusted with the task of managing the Council of Churches until the year 2026.
This Assembly comes one year and eight months later than its regular meeting date, which had been set in September of the year 2020. It has been delayed for two years due to the pandemic that confronted humanity with new challenges.
The General Secretariat asked the churches members of the Council to appoint their delegates eight months before the date of the meeting, contrary to what is required by the constitution that sets six months before the meeting as a benchmark, and this in order to allow enough time for consultancy as we live in an area pregnant with surprises that threaten to be generally unpleasant.
The Executive Committee, held on August 3, 2021, decided, in addition to the date of the meeting, that the twelfth ceremonial wedding of the ecumenical family in our region be celebrated in Egypt, the gift of the Nile, at the kind invitation of His Holiness Pope Tawadros II, Pope of Alexandria and Patriarch of the See of Saint Mark. This will be the first general assembly of the Council to be held on the beloved land of Egypt. His Holiness has placed the Papal Logos Center, a quintessence in engineering, architecture, and high performance, at the disposal of the Middle Eastern ecumenical family in order to revive in its midst the renewal of its commitment to ecumenical work and social service through its various branches.
At this stage it is important for us to lay down a few clarifications pertaining to the set-up of the Council in general and of the General Assembly in particular, and this for the sake of those who did not have the opportunity to get acquainted with the Council’s Constitution as well as with its internal statutes.
The General Assembly is composed of 64 members equally representing the four ecclesial families and distributed by consensus among the churches affiliated to any one family. This body is the supreme authority in the Council, and it is the one that approves its work policy and plans and amends its regulations. This general body - or assembly - meets once every four
years in order to elect a General Secretary for the Council as well as an Executive Committee consisting of 24 members representing the various church families according to the same proportions set up by the constitution for the general body. Members of the General Assembly have the right to speak, vote, submit proposals or amendments, and ratify them.
As usual, the General Assembly has an opening session, inaugurated with prayer, followed by allocutions by the assembly’s host, His Holiness Pope Tawadros II, about the theme of the assembly, as well as by the Presidents of the MECC, His Beatitude Patriarch John X, His Eminence Cardinal Mar Louis Raphael Sako, His Holiness Patriarch Aphram II, and the Right Reverend Dr. Habib Badr, who also holds the responsibility of the Council Treasurer. This is followed by words from the See of the Vatican as well as from the World Council of Churches in addition to a welcoming speech by the Secretary General of the Middle East Council of Churches.
Moreover, it is worth noting that the daily sessions open and conclude with prayer, the text of which is currently being prepared by the Prayer Committee set up within the Theological Affairs and Ecumenical Relations Department in the Council. These sessions also include reading greetings from partners and friends who are unable to attend this great event with us.
At the beginning of the General Assembly meeting, the Executive Committee forms a Credentials Committee, which studies the papers and documents presented by those coming to the General Assembly. The recommendation relating to the designation of members who have the right to vote are submitted by the President in the first working session of the General Assembly.
As for the Management Committee, it is composed of the presidents of the Council, in addition to one member of each church family chosen from among its representatives and elected by the executive committee by an absolute majority, as well as from the present general secretary, and the associate general secretaries. It also includes representatives of the church families, the members present, as one for each family. The Management Committee coordinates the day-to-day work of the General Assembly.
As for the Nomination Committee, it is elected in one of the first sessions of the General Assembly, in which ecclesiastical families are represented by four members from among the delegates of each family to the General Assembly.
What is mentioned in this regard is that the attendance includes not only church delegates, but also those invited to the assembly from honorary general secretaries and representatives of Western churches and ecumenical bodies that support the work of the Council, in addition to the experts invited due to their knowledge and experience. These invitees are listeners only, as discussions and voicing out recommendations is entrusted exclusively to church delegates. However invited experts participate in working sessions on themes determined by the Council, where they can express their opinion and make their suggestions.
In the coming General Assembly, there will be five discussion panels/working sessions going concomitantly, namely one panel on social service and development, one on advocacy and media, one on ecumenical relations, one on religious relations and one on the management and sustainability of the Council.
As for the main lecturers, they will be three, a theologian, a researcher in sociology and a researcher in political science, and their lectures will focus on the theme of the assembly “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”
After that, things will proceed as usual, from a reading of the recommendations of the working groups to the elections of the Executive Committee, to the ratification of the election of the Secretary-General, which took place in September 2020, hosted by the Patriarchal See of the Maronite Syriac Church of Antioch, and hosted by His Eminence Cardinal Patriarch Mar Bechara Boutros Al-Rahi in Bkerke.
At the end of the assembly, the Secretary-General invites the elected Executive Committee to a preparatory first meeting in order to plan its work for the next four years.
What is striking about this preparatory course is that all of Egypt felt concerned about the matter, as all the churches, with their capabilities and resources, contributed to this great event, which comes about two years late. In this context, I will not name people in order to avoid offending their modesty. They know themselves and everyone knows them.
In the coming days, a delegation from the General Administration of the Council will leave for Egypt in order to coordinate preparations with those concerned locally, who are highly qualified and with proven dedication. Another visit may be required, a few weeks before the actual assembly meeting, in order to ensure that coordination between what is planned and what is being implemented is perfect.
This is just the tip of the iceberg of the preparations for the Twelfth General Assembly, which corresponds to the number of apostles, and the Preparatory Committee for the General Assembly, as well as the MECC staff, are not sparing efforts for this global ecumenical meeting to rise up to the expectations of those who sustain us by their love, whether in terms of performance or in terms of content or in terms of outcomes.
God is the guarantor of success for the benefit of the ecclesia.