The Hidden Agenda of the Ecumenical Movement- Part 1 (taken from an article by Alan Morrison) Many Christians do not realize that in the World Council of Churches there has been, over the years, a subtle shift from exclusively inter-denominational ecumenism to syncretistic multi-faithism. This extension of ecumenical fellowship began in earnest with the retirement in 1966 of the first General Secretary of the WCC, Dr. Willem Visser t Hooft. He was an ardent lifelong opposer of syncretism and, ironically, wrote a passionate book outlining its dangers — one of the best treatments of the subject available. In this work, he was at pains to point out that syncretism poses a far more dangerous challenge to the Christian Church than full-fledged atheism is ever likely to be. Shortly before his retirement, Dr. Visser t Hooft had expressed his firm conviction that the Gospel is to be given in its purest form...in accordance with the biblical witness and unmixed with extraneous or cultural elements.26 However, once he had left office in 1966, the way was opened to all those within the World Council of Churches who wished to see the word ecumenical used more broadly, so that it would embrace all people of any religion rather than the narrower world of the Christian believer. 1.Universal dialogue This was first apparent at the Fifth Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Nairobi in November 1975, when representatives from non-Christian religions — Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Sikhism — were for the first time invited to present papers. After hearing the plea from the new Secretary of the WCC for a dialogue with people of other faiths, people of other ideologies or of none, a handful of members walked out (including the Bishop of London, Graham Leonard), protesting their impotence to change the syncretist direction in which the WCC was heading. To aid us in our understanding of the occult connections in these events, let us open up a most revealing association here. The Hindu representative who was invited to present a paper at this 1975 World Council of Churches Assembly was Professor K.L. Seshagiri Rao, the editor of a magazine called Insight, published by a syncretist organisation known as the Temple of Understanding. This was in stark contrast to the situation thirteen years earlier when the World Council of Churches had refused a request to sponsor this Temple of Understanding on the basis that it was dangerously syncretic.27 This global multifaith group, branded by its founders as the Spiritual United Nations, was set up in the U.S.A. in 1960 to represent all the religions of the world and to promote interfaith dialogue and education. Many well-known celebrities have given their public blessing to this Temple, including Eleanor Roosevelt, the Dalai Lama, Nehru, Anwar Sadat, Mother Teresa and former Secretary-General of the United Nations, U Thant. At the time that it was founded, Dr. Albert Schweitzer said, My hopes and prayers are with you in the realization of this great Temple of Understanding, which has a profound significance...The Spirit burns in many flames,28 a reference to the idea that all religions — which, for interfaithists, includes Christianity — are diverse expressions of the same essential deity. The Temple of Understanding was the brainchild of a wealthy American woman who had studied comparative religion at Union Theological Seminary in New York. By 1963, it had been sponsored by six thousand politicians, occultists, celebrities, one-world religion advocates and multinational companies, including Robert McNamara (then U.S. Secretary of Defence; later head of the World Bank), financier John D. Rockefeller IV, Dr. Henry A. Smith (President, Theosophical Society of America), Walter N. Thayer (President, New York Herald Tribune), James Linen (President, Time-Life Inc.), Milton Mumford (President, Lever Bros.), Barney Balaban (President, Paramount Pictures), Thomas B. Watson Jnr. (President, IBM), Richard Salant (President, CBS News), Cary Grant (Hollywood actor), Dr. Martin Israel (now an Anglican vicar and renowned teacher in the Church of England); the Presidents of Egypt, India and Israel; representatives of Methodist, Unitarian, Episcopalian, Spiritualist, Lutheran and Presbyterian churches; various U.N. officials, and many others.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Nov 2014 00:15:36 +0000