The Ethics of Solidarity and Human Rights: Insights from the World Council of Churches on United Nations Reform

2018 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
pp. 430-442 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irene Ludji
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
The World ◽  
World Council

scholarly journals Sårbarhet, mangfold og menneskerettigheter

2020 ◽  
pp. 129-151
Author(s):  
Hans Morten Haugen
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
People With Disabilities ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Enabling Technology ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
A Value ◽  
The World ◽  
World Council ◽  
The Church

The article examines recent understandings of vulnerability and exposedness, and studies proving that people with disabilities are more exposed to violence, discrimination, and various forms of exclusion. Diversity has been elevated as a value, both in societies and in churches. The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) is the only human rights treaty that names specific human rights principles, and one of these principles is diversity. There are also opposing trends to the enhanced recognition of diversity, summarized in three points: preservation of status quo; highlighting majority normality; and budgetary efficiency are given priority over empowering solutions. The Church of Norway, inspired by the World Council of Churches, wants to promote inclusion and empowerment, but is itself lagging behind, for instance in providing access to enabling technology.

World Council of Churches

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dagmar Heller
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Structural Organization ◽  
Environmental Issues ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
Mission Work ◽  
The World ◽  
World Council ◽  
Theological Study ◽  
Common Action

This chapter describes the World Council of Churches (WCC) from different angles, beginning with the description of it as ‘a fellowship of churches’ in its Basis, its purpose being to help the churches to call one other to visible unity, as formulated in its Constitution. Secondly, the chapter discusses the structural organization of the WCC, with its governing bodies and the working areas covering a variety of issues. That scope necessitates the use of a number of different methodologies, ranging from theological study of church-dividing issues and mission work to networking and advocacy with regard to environmental issues or questions of human rights. An outline of its history and main achievements leads to an evaluation of the significance of the WCC, highlighting its coordinating role for multilateral dialogue, and promotion of common action by the churches as of lasting importance.

scholarly journals Between Dialogue and Denunciation: The World Council of Churches, Religious Freedom, and Human Rights during the Cold War

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Bastiaan Bouwman
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Religious Freedom ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
The World ◽  
Christian Fellowship ◽  
World Council ◽  
The Third World ◽  
The Cold War

While the historiography on the religious Cold War has tended to focus on Christian anticommunism, the World Council of Churches (WCC) sought to transcend the Cold War while simultaneously advancing religious freedom in the Soviet Union. This article connects the WCC's ecclesiastical diplomacy to the wider story of human rights, from which religion has too often been excluded. The WCC's quest for Christian fellowship led it to integrate the Russian Orthodox Church into its membership, but this commitment generated tensions with the rise of Soviet dissidence. Moreover, the WCC's turn towards the left and the Third World contrasted with newly ascendant voices for human rights in the 1970s: Amnesty International's depoliticised liberalism, evangelical anticommunism, and the Vatican under John Paul II. Thus, the WCC, an early and prominent transnational voice for human rights, ran afoul of shifts in both the Cold War and the politics of protest.

HUMAN RIGHTS AS RADICAL ANTHROPOLOGY: PROTESTANT THEOLOGY AND ECUMENISM IN THE TRANSWAR ERA

2016 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 493-518
Author(s):  
TERENCE RENAUD
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Church Leaders ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
Human Rights Regime ◽  
The World ◽  
World Council ◽  
History Of ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Individual Human

AbstractFrom the 1920s through the 1940s, European and Anglo-American Protestants perceived a crisis of humanity. While trying to determine religion's role in a secular age, church leaders redefined the human being as a theological person in community with others and in partnership with God. This new anthropology contributed to a personalist conception of human rights that rivalled Catholic and secular conceptions. Alongside such innovations in post-liberal theology, ecumenical Protestants organized a series of meetings to unite the world churches. Their conference at Oxford in July 1937 led to the creation of the World Council of Churches. Thus, Protestants of the transwar era supplied the two main ingredients of any human rights regime: a universalist commitment to defending individual human beings regardless of race, nationality, or class and a global institutional framework for enacting that commitment. Through the story of Protestant thinkers and activists, this article recasts the history of human rights as part of a larger history of critical reappraisals of humanity. Understanding why human rights came into prominence at various twentieth-century moments may require abandoning ‘rights talk’ for human talk, or, a comparative history of radical anthropologies and their relationship to broader socio-economic, political, and cultural crises.

THE EMERGENCE OF RESISTANCE TO ECUMENISM IN THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH (ROC) IN THE POST-PERESTROIKA PERIOD OF RUSSIA

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 74-93
Author(s):  
V.A. LIVTSOV ◽  
◽  
A.V. LEPILIN ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Russian Federation ◽  
Russian Orthodox ◽  
Orthodox Church ◽  
International Level ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
Russian Orthodox Church ◽  
The World ◽  
World Council ◽  
The Russian Federation ◽  
Emergence Of Resistance

The main purpose of the article is to analyze the emergence of opposition to ecumenism in the Rus-sian Orthodox Church (ROC) in the post-perestroika period of Russia. The article examines the issues of interaction between the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) and the World Council of Churches (WCC), the aspects of opposition to the ecumenist movement in the Russian Federation in the post-Soviet realities. The author comes to the conclusion that in the post-perestroika period, a number of representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church were negatively disposed towards ecu-menism and considered this movement a heresy. The issues of this kind caused disagreement not only at the international level, but also within the structure of the ROC itself.

Presbyterian Ecumenism

2019 ◽  
pp. 251-264
Author(s):  
Louis B. Weeks
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
Biblical Authority ◽  
The World ◽  
World Council ◽  
Reformed Churches ◽  
Federal Council Of Churches

Most Presbyterians possess an ecumenical spirit. They recognize other denominations as parts of the Body of Christ just as surely as their own. They cooperate enthusiastically in service, worship, and witness with Christians in many different denominations. Their reliance on biblical authority and agreement with Christians in other communions on many theological issues have led American Presbyterians to be involved in practically every major ecumenical endeavor. Many Presbyterians have been leaders in these enterprises as well. The Old Light and New Light Presbyterian reconciliation, major revivals in America and Europe, the mergers of denominations and comity arrangements for mission have provided energy and vision for ecumenism. The planting of newer Reformed churches—in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and predominantly Catholic countries in Europe—embodied this ecumenism. Mainstream Presbyterians played an important role in numerous ecumenical organizations including the Evangelical Alliance, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, the Federal Council of Churches, the Faith and Order and the Life and Work movements, and the World Council of Churches. Those who left the larger Presbyterian denominations to create new Reformed bodies have likewise engaged in ecumenism. In recent years, however, the extensive formal ecumenical ties have been eclipsed by the extensive ecumenism of local Presbyterian congregations and their individual officers and members.

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