Critical Imbalance

The main product of most church conferences is a flood of documents, position papers, and resolutions. Since the World Council of Churches (WCC) assembly in Vancouver this August involved almost every Protestant and Orthodox church in the world, it is no surprise that the deluge of paper it produced amounted to an ecclesial tidal wave. Numerous resolutions were presented relating to the internal life of the world Christian community, including a particularly significant one aimed at lowering the theological barriers to church unity. But as at past assemblies, the most attention and controversy focused on resolutions regarding international political issues.

Most of the political stands taken by the WCC were commendable and reflected a firm Christian commitment to establishing justice and making peace. The assembly passed an unconditional condemnation of apartheid, which included a call for disinvestment from South Africa.

The assembly also declared its opposition to U.S. policy in Central America in very forceful terms, calling on the United States to cease its efforts to "contain the aspirations of the Central American peoples." And the WCC adopted its strongest statement yet on the nuclear arms race. It called the "production, deployment or use" of nuclear weapons "a crime against humanity" and urged churches to oppose the arms race through "nonviolent protest including civil disobedience."

But the moral authority of the WCC's proclamations on these important issues was seriously damaged, if not completely undermined, by the assembly's failure to utter a similar unconditional condemnation of the Soviet war in Afghanistan. The Afghanistan resolution approved by the assembly took note of the suffering caused by the war, but without allocating blame. And it called for a Soviet troop withdrawal, but only "in the context of an overall political settlement."

An amendment that called for the immediate withdrawal of all Soviet troops failed by a vote of 306 to 278 with 35 abstentions. The matter was complicated somewhat by the fact that the amendment offered would also have deleted a sentence in the original that urged "an end to the supply of arms to the opposition groups from the outside."

No resolution was offered that condemned all outside involvement in Afghanistan's internal affairs. But, despite this complication, it should be remembered that the U.S. and Chinese subsidy of the Afghan rebels is a mere drop in the bucket compared to the Soviet commitment of about 100,000 combat troops.

As was widely noted in the secular press, the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan got away with a mere slap on the wrist when compared to the WCC's strong language on Central America. WCC's official explanation of this imbalance was one they have used before in similar circumstances. They claimed that a strong condemnation of Soviet actions might force the USSR's Russian Orthodox Church to either withdraw from the council or face government reprisals that would further limit the church's freedom.

This explanation is difficult to accept, especially when compared to WCC statements about other countries where the church is persecuted. In South Africa, for instance, it is illegal to urge, as the WCC assembly did, that foreign companies and governments pull out their investments. Bishop Desmond Tutu, head of the South African Council of Churches, had his passport taken away for some months last year for that very offense.

But Bishop Tutu and other South African church leaders were present in Vancouver and supported the anti-apartheid resolution. They did so because the majority of the South African churches have made a decision to stand against apartheid regardless of the consequences. They have accepted the possibility of banning or imprisonment, or even death, as the cross they must bear to bring the good news of liberation to their people. And the world Christian community, including the WCC, has supported them in that stand.

Admittedly the position of the Russian Orthodox Church in Soviet society is a complex and difficult one. And it is hard to preach to its leaders about the sufferings of Christ from the safety and comfort of the United States. But it is also hard to see how the church of Christ anywhere can maintain the vitality of the faith by averting its gaze from the kind of suffering being inflicted in Afghanistan. There have now been enough independent reports of Soviet atrocities against Afghan civilians that they cannot be written off as Western propaganda.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan is an international crime whose only current equal may be the slaughter the United States is funding and overseeing in Central America. And the causes of both wars are essentially the same: the desire of a large and powerful nation to "contain the aspirations" of its smaller and weaker neighbors. A far more faithful course for the WCC would have been to condemn both wars equally, perhaps even in the same resolution, and then accept any subsequent risk as the risk of the cross.

Danny Collum was an associate editor of Sojourners magazine when this article appeared.