Planning to have a meeting in 2007 in a country with a large Orthodox majority, Churches in Dialogue Commission will have this year's meeting in Tallin, Estonia. Its agenda and comments are available here.

Dialogue between Orthodox Churches and Protestant, Anglican and Old CatholicChurches is to be pursued with added vigour in the working programme of the Churches in Dialogue Commission of the Conference of European Churches (CEC). Underlining the central importance of this work, commission members meeting in Tallinn, Estonia, from 8-12 June 2006, voted to establish a working group that will prepare for a consultation on dialogue in 2008.

In preparing documents and further publications related to the proposed consultation, the working group will be asked to consider four areas of work: to assess the potential, and inter-relatedness of bilateral and multilateral dialogues; to work towards establishing criteria for measuring progress made around the central theological issues in existing dialogues; to evaluate dialogue methodologies; and to formulate proposals for concrete steps that can be taken to improve processes of reception within the churches. The Co-Moderator of the Commission, Canon Elizabeth Fisher (Church of England), observed: "This fresh impetus is very timely and welcome. I urge our member churches to give it the fullest possible support."

Additional working groups are to be set up to give sustained attention to other important areas of the commission's work. The "Healing of Memories" project, currently underway in Romania as a partnership between CEC and the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe (CPCE), will be dealt with by one of the working groups. The programme has now reached a crucial stage and careful evaluation is required in order to determine the priorities for the future development of this work. A third working group will be commissioned to deal with the issue of "Minority and Majority Churches."

The work of the commission is to include a study programme addressing the
highly topical issue of the relationship and engagement of the churches of Europe with those from other religious communities.

Planning is now underway for a mission consultation to allow many of the findings from the Mission Research Project to be presented and explored. In addition, ecumenical formation and spirituality are to be given renewed attention.

Commenting on the wide ranging agenda of the commission, its Director designate, Prof. Dr. Viorel Ionita, said, "We are working on an important range of questions that face the churches of Europe in their encounter with one another and with other religious communities.  In Tallinn we took very concrete steps towards deepening our commitment to addressing more seriously the questions of theological dialogue for which a common understanding eludes us."

The meeting of the Churches in Dialogue Commission was hosted by the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Estonia. For its next meeting in 2007, the Commission plans to meet in a country with a majority Orthodox tradition.

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