WCC General Secretary Recalls Anti-apartheid Movement

Thursday, 12 January 2012 17:12

WCC News

In his sermon at the chapel of Ecumenical Centre in Geneva on 9 January, the World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit paid respect to the anti–apartheid movement in South Africa, which was born in a church, one hundred years ago.

Tveit was referring to the 100th anniversary of the African National Congress (ANC) on 8 January, founded in 1912 at the Waaihoek Wesleyan Church.

The ANC is currently South Africa’s ruling political party, and has its roots in the liberation movement formed by Christian pastors and civil society actors to challenge racial segregation among the South African people.

“ANC, the movement which started in a church in South Africa, became the leading party in the process to overcome apartheid,” said Tveit.

In his sermon, Tveit honoured the sacrifices of thousands of people, who fought against apartheid and did not “live long enough to experience this freedom with apartheid falling, and the first black president of South Africa being elected,” he said.

In the 1970s and 1980s, the WCC Programme to Combat Racism coordinated churches’ response against apartheid in South Africa, as well as challenging racism elsewhere.

“The ecumenical movement in a very special way has been shaped by this process of fighting racism. The Programme to Combat Racism has given identity to the ecumenical movement, as a movement of honouring God’s creation and affirming the equal dignity and rights of every human being,” Tveit pointed out.

He commended the spirit of the South African liberation movement, and people’s “courage to dream”, which he said was necessary to start “the process of bringing an order of justice and peace, followed by realistic words, protests, tough decisions, sacrifices and actions.”

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The World Council of Churches promotes Christian unity in faith, witness and service for a just and peaceful world. An ecumenical fellowship of churches founded in 1948, today the WCC brings together 349 Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 560 million Christians in over 110 countries, and works cooperatively with the Roman Catholic Church. The WCC general secretary is Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, from the [Lutheran] Church of Norway. Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.