The Primate of South East Asia, Archbishop Moon Hing, reflects on the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.
“The Church cannot and must not be divided” was strongly emphasised and advocated at the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity held at the Crossway Community Lutheran Church in Kuala Lumpur this year. Christian Church leaders from 14 nations and from different denominations gathered for prayers. The Catholic Church were led by the present Archbishop Julian Leow, the retired Archbishop Murphy Packiam and the Cardinal Soter Fernandez.
The existence of slavery, poverty, discrimination, abuse, destruction of environment was amplified by the division of churches. Due to the division, the moral and upright arm of the Church was weakened and often compromised. The service reminded everyone of the theme from Deuteronomy 16: 18-20: “Justice, and only justice, you shall pursue.”
It is calling the body of Christ to pursue and embody justice which includes the promotion of the dignity of life and creation. At the prayer of repentance, we were reminded and repented of our failures of ignoring strangers, the poor and the least in society, fearing to defend the oppressed, misusing church resources, spreading falsehood, and building wall of hostility.
The speaker, the Revd Dr Hermen Sastri, the General Secretary of the Council of Churches of Malaysia, exhorted everyone to take Justice to the forefront and pursue it as priority to unite our churches regardless of ethnicity, language, nationality, theological persuasion, locality and status. “Is there anything greater than the desire of God for a united church of truth?” – “they may be ONE so that the world may believe” (John 17: 21).
He reminisced about a WCC Conference in 1983 in Vancouver, Canada, where Archbishop Desmond Tutu was asked at a press conference, “can the church make a difference in the world so filled with insurmountable injustice?” To which he said, “Tutu replied: ‘When the church is divided, injustice thrives and the world wins. When the church is united on Gospel imperatives of justice, the power of oppression will be dethroned in the name of Jesus Christ, the light of the world.’”
Archbishop Julian Leow exhorted the church to take and pursue restorative justice instead of retributive justice.
A Christian group of Indonesia descent, led by Pendeta Dinna Putranti, presented some beautiful songs in Indonesian urging all to love God and seek unity. A group of Myanmar refugee children presented two wonderful songs and testimonies of their struggles due to inhumane treatments and challenges of their lives as refugees. Some East Malaysians natives led in prayers for the people.
A mixed choir of Malaysians and foreigners known as Cantus Musicus presented two excellent meditative songs to magnify the Lord. Leaders from different denominations shared in various prayers of repentance and for the people and nation. The evening ended with a sumptuous fellowship dinner hosted by the host church and her pastor Marcus Leong.
