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Christian Conference of Asia
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About CCA
Program Clusters: Special Programs:
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Asian National Youth Secretaries' Meeting, we meet, dream and act together!!Vision in Action “For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose is to create in himself one new man out to the two, thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near.” (Eph 2:14-17) Ecumenism, the whole Christian world, has been a movement to bring back the “one” Christianity since late of 19th century. It started with our young people who struggled for their daily life and saw our society had been getting worse and worse, the barrier among different denominations of Christianity had been expanded by us. 200 years after the reformation movement of Christianity, young Christian firstly brought out the issue of “unity of Christian”, ecumenical movement has been widely spread by the action of young people. Obviously, Peace is our vision for the unity of Christianity. What Jesus Christ had shown us the purpose of his sacrifice for us is the Peace (Eph 2:14-17). It’s the peace from his sacrifice and the peace from God’s grace. Peace means freedom from war or civil disorder, quite, calmness, public security, serenity etc. No natural disasters, no exploitation, no discrimination on all levels, no sexual harassments, no poverty, no displacement, love each others, be good to our motherland, living as family and so on, are also expressed as a part of peace. However, where the peace is: 1. God of Peace (Phil. 4:9) and Peace with God (Rm. 5:1) 2. Christ the Peace (Jn. 16:33) and to build the communities with others (Jn. 14:27) 3. Peace with neighbors (Lk 19:8) and Peace with poor (Mt. 19:21) 4. Peace with nature (pm.8:18-25) and the whole concept of the creation (Gen. 1-2) (adapted from Dr. Ahn Jae Woong’s report to the CCA 12th Assembly) What peace means to you is the peace for all human beings. Hence in the 12th assembly of Christian Conference of Asia the theme is, “building the communities of peace for all”. It’s not something far away from our young people but a real need for us, since Asia is a continent with variety culture, ethnics, also with a long history of colonization by people outside of Asia. Young people, the leaders “Now”. With creative thoughts, critical eyes and brave hearts, young people are the dreamers and executors in the pass, now and future. From observation of previous presidium of CCA, a crucial deficiency of our leadership of ecumenical movement is the lack of youth. Nevertheless ecumenical movement was initiated by youth. The absence of young leadership is greatly felt especially when the future of ecumenism is at its stake. As youth leaders from our respective churches, we should be reminded that the search of “new” ecumenism will make none sense without the presence of young people. Thus to spread ecumenism to local youth and equip young people for the ecumenical movement will be our vision as youth leaders. Ecumenism should be contextualized and practiced in all levels of ecumenical movement. It’s not a thought but a daily life practice. We as Christian, the vision of our ecumenical movement should be practiced in every moment of our life. As Jesus Christ, who is a dreamer but also an executor. The sacrifice from him is not only a dream but indeed an action. James reminded us: “You foolish man, do you want the evidence that faith without deeds is useless? ... you see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did,… you see that a person is justified by what he does and not by the faith alone. ” (James 2:20-24) Vision in Action, dream and work at same time, so that peace will come to us and through us to others who are far way from peace.
With this vision, CCA Program cluster, Ecumenical Formation, Gender Justice and Youth Empowerment(EGY) combines all concerns regarding to these three main issues, has been giving its efforts to make sure and provide opportunities to our young women and man for their empowerment of leadership and the formation of ecumenism. Aside from this, EGY executive team has also been working jointly with our Program Area Committee (EGY PAC). EGY PAC meets at least twice between assemblies. It helps EGY executive team to identify issues and plan action plans according to mandates which are provided by assembly. The main issues for CCA EGY are: 1. Ecumenical Formation 2. Intervention in many aspects of violence 3. Issues of gender justice 4. participation of women and youth in decision making body 5. awareness on youth issues among churches fro action The purpose of EGY PAC aims to empower youth leadership; to promote gender justice; to facilitate the promotion of ecumenism and to advocate networking. With these aims and key issues, we seek an alternative of collaborations within program clusters of CCA and with CCA member churches and councils. Hence the ecumenical movement will be neither only within CCA, nor institutionalized in the regional ecumenical organizations. Accordingly CCA EGY has its program plan from 2006-2009 as below: 1. In responding to “need for ecumenical formation”: School for Ecumenical Leadership Formation, SELF 2. for “Awareness raising on Gender Justice for women and man” 1) Trainers training on Gender Justice (new) 2) To make sure the participation of women and man in all programs of CCA, and promote gender justice among our member churches and councils. 3. In order to “Raising awareness on youth issues in churches and society”: NCC Youth Coordinators’ meeting 4. Building Bridges of Peace: Youth SALT- sharing and learning together (exchange program, new) 5. Capacity building: Youth internship program, Young woman internship program 6. Supporting local ecumenical youth leadership development: Rural Youth Project (Funding Program) 7. Sub-regional cooperation initiatives: World Youth Program, WYP (supporting specific issues according to sub-region to sub-region, new) 8. Networking: 1) Networking with NCC youth, and among NCC Youth in sub-region 2) Ecumenical Asia-Pacific Student and Youth Network, EAST NET 9. Advocating Asia Youth Ecumenical Movement: 1) CCA EGY Webpage, link with other youth ecumenical movements’ webpage (new) 2) Publications CCA EGY PAC has started to play a very important role of implementation on EGY programs. In addition, if we recall back to the very beginning of youth ecumenical movement in early 1900s, the students had been the main power and have been pushing our society to reflect and analysis what we have done. Thus the early beginnings of the Joint Program between CCA and WSCF AP tracing its roots from the early 60’s, when the representatives of then EACC (East Asia Council of Churches) and WSCF met in Hong Kong to identify their common vision for ecumenical student ministry in the region. The CCA-WSCF AP joint consultations has reflected the need to expand the discussions of ecumenical campus ministry and respond to actual needs of the SCMs and Churches to dialogue and identify issues of common concern in the national level. In last CCA-WSCF AP Joint Program Committee meeting (CCA-WSCF JPC), we have identified the challenges which are faced by our youth today are: there is a relative weakening of the ecumenical youth movement in general; the Ecumenical Movement has become too “institutionalized” and structured, preventing it from growing and moving forward; the ecumenical youth groups should have to work in dialogue with the evangelical youth movements; The growing movement towards confessionalism and fundamentalism; the worsening economic condition of the youth brought about by economic globalization; The growing number of out-of-school-youth due to the rising cost of education and the growing poverty in many countries. CCA-WSCF JP have agreed from both ecumenical organizations will keep our efforts on promoting ecumenism as well as the peace together. Coming year action plan of CCA-WSCF JPC are: 1. Baseline Research Project on the Churches Campus Student Ministry in Asia Pacific. This Research Project will provide the necessary information on the situation and the needs of Campus Student Ministry, and hopefully, assist the Joint Committee in identifying appropriate strategies in providing support to the Churches and SCMs in Campus Ministry work. 2. The National Consultations between the Churches and the SCMs will continue in the countries of Austalia, Thailand in 2006, and Sri Lanka, Cambodia and Timor Leste in 2007. The national planning committees will be encouraged to focus these activities on the theme” The Challenge of Campus Student Ministry in the Context of Pluralistic World”. 3. The Committee also affirmed an earlier recommendation for a Joint CCA and WSCF Youth Secretaries and Coordinators Meeting in mid 2007, focusing on Interfaith Dialogue. 4. The School for Ecumenical Leadership Formation (SELF) in October 2007 will once again be a joint undertaking between the two organization. 5. The Committee also agreed that the Joint meetings should be held at least once a year or in conjuncture with any joint activity. 6. They also affirmed the importance of inviting a representative from each organization to attend as an observer in the organizational meetings of each group such as the Regional Committee Meeting of the WSCF AP in July 2006, and the CCA Youth Secretaries Meeting in March 2006. The presence of the representative will enhance the partnership by being aware of the realities, priorities and concern, limitations, as well as the dynamics of each organization. Besides these action plans, the role of youth in the leadership of CCA should also be addressed by us in our action. Youth voice will be heard by our youth representatives in all levels of CCA decision making body. How will the youth network of ecumenical movement be carried out efficiently, it must be done from local to national, and from national to regional. Hence the role of youth leadership shall be supported by local, national as well as regional youth movement. CCA EGY will advocate it by every program we plan and every project, which we support or join. I believe that how did our young people make this ecumenical movement true, was because of their one mind and one heart. If Peace is the eager for us in this challenging 21st Century, let us work for peace together! “Faith without deeds is useless”, I again remind all of us to reflect what we have done for our youth ecumenical movement, should be always have faith in God and have action for our vision. Dream without action is only “Fancy”; Vision without action is “Illusion”. While we are worry about the lack of young people in future ecumenical movement, why not we make ourselves the instrument of bring our young people in ecumenism. “Now if we are children, then we are heirs-heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” (Rom. 8:17) Let us give glory to our Lord, and start to act for our youth ecumenical movement. posted by chungchih on Monday, May 01, 2006 |
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