The head of a Europe-wide group of Anglican, Orthodox and Protestant denominations has proposed the creation of a Council of European Churches that would include the Roman Catholic Church.
The President of the Conference of European Churches (CEC), the Rev Jean Arnold de Clermont, put forward the proposal at a recent meeting of the CEC and European Catholic leaders, reports Ecumenical News International.
De Clermont, the recently retired president of the Protestant Federation of France, told the meeting, "I would... suggest that we find the ways and means to come out of our present institutional structures and set ourselves the task in the next 10 years of creating a Council of European Churches, bringing together Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants."
He said he was making the proposal based on his experiences at the Third Ecumenical Assembly, which brought together 1,500 Christians from the Orthodox, Protestant, Anglican and Roman Catholic traditions in Sibiu, Romania, for nearly a week of ecumenical discussions.
The CEC leader said that denominatinal leaders at Sibiu had allowed institutional and doctrinal barriers to cause them to abandon "any expectation of a patient resolute quest for unity".
"I had the feeling that I was hearing pleas justifying ecumenical stagnation, arising out of a desire not to expose oneself to challenges from others," said De Clermont.
"The status quo is all the more pleasant when it is between friends, but it does not seek full visible unity," he told the London meeting.
"It is not within our competence to make a decision without having a whole process of consultation with our churches," he said about his proposal for a Council of European Churches.
"But I would at least wish to check with you whether you consider that placing such a challenge before us would serve the cause of Christian unity."
The Caribbean Conference of Churches, the Middle East Council of Churches and the Pacific Conference of Churches are all regional church bodies which already include the Roman Catholic Church.
