| Youth Protests against Being Silenced by the Churches |
|
|
| Written by Christian Roar Pedersen | ||||
| Tuesday, 21 February 2006 | ||||
.jpg) Porto Alegre, Brazil, Feb 20 - Angry young people demonstrated today at the assembly of the World Council of Churches against being silenced by the churches.The assembly has been named a “youth assembly” by the organizers. Both the moderator of the Central Committee Catholicos Aram I and General Secretary Samuel Kobia mentioned the importance of young people’s involvement in the ecumenical movement in their reports to the assembly, but when the report of the Nominations Committee was presented today, it became clear that it was not in the WCC Central Committee that they are going to be involved. The WCC itself states that 25% of the Central Committee must be youth - which in the ecumenical world is defined as being between 18 and 30 years of age. In the Nominations Committee’s suggestion for the coming Central Committee there are only 15%. The 10% gab caused outrage of both the young delegates and the stewards present. According to Habitus sources there had previously been a meeting between Aram I, Samuel Kobia, and the youth dealing with the concern of the youth that words are not followed by action. There was no outcome of that meeting. In a peaceful action the young people gagged themselves and entered the plenary hall with banners saying “silenced,” “25%,” and “youth assembly?” The 150 persons of Central Committee are elected from among the delegates present at the assembly. The problem of lacking young members of the committee arises from the fact that the churches are not sending enough young delegates to the assembly. During the plenary debate following the report of the Nominations Committee the Middle East and Latin America where mentioned as regions not sending any young persons at all. A delegate from Scotland suggested that a solution to the problem could be to cut the total number of persons in the Central Committee in order to meet the quota. The delegates have 24 hours for suggesting changes the list persons to the Nominations Committee, but there are not going to be more youth due to the lacking number of young delegates. .jpg) Did you enjoy this article? Please bookmark it onto:             
Only registered users can write comments. |
||||
| Last Updated ( Tuesday, 21 February 2006 ) | ||||
Be first to comment this article
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
|
|
Login
Latest Commented
Members Online
No Users OnlineNewsletter
Copyright © 2004 - 2009 Habitus Network.
Aarhus - Bucharest.
Contact us
