The Birth of the Middle East Council of Churches: The Dawn of a New Era in Middle East Churches

MECC’s first General Assembly, which took place in 1974, was an inaugural meeting during which the council was founded. In the following text, you can find the decisions that were taken during the meeting and important excerpts from the statements of MECC presidents at that time.

In 1974, a new chapter in Middle Eastern church history was opened at the Inaugural Assembly of the Middle East Council of Churches which took place in Nicosia, Cyprus from the 28th till the 30th of May.  Delegates, representing at that time, over six and one-half million Christians from the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Anglican and Protestant Churches, voted for a new regional Council for common witness and service in this region of this world.

The Inaugural Assembly planning committee was composed of:

Chalcedonians:

Archbishop Constantine Michealides

Metropolitan Ignatius Hazim

Metropolitan Parthenius

Non-Chalcedonians:

Bishop Samuel

Father Aram Keshishan

Father George Saliba

Evangelicals:

Rev. Hovhannes Aharonian

Rev. Ibrahim Dagher

Rev. Fayez Fares

Co-Secretaries:

Rev. Albert Isteero

Mr. Gabriel Habib

During the meeting, a 15-member Executive Committee was elected to direct the Council’s work and services during a transitional period, estimated at 12 to 18 months. The Chairmen of this committee were Rev. Hovhanness Aharonian, President of the Near East School of Theology in Beirut and a representative of the Armenian Evangelical Union, Metropolitan Ignatius Hazim of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch, and Bishop Samuel of the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria. The Rev. Albert Steero was elected General Secretary of the new organization.

Declaring the theme, “Our Common Christian Message in the Middle East Today”, all of the speakers emphasized that the formation of this Council was a remarkable ecumenical step. They also discussed the continuous consultations which were taking place with other churches in the region, in order to push churches to join hands in Christian fellowship.

This Inaugural Assembly was mainly a constitutive meeting whose objective was to initiate the process of transition between the old and the new structures. It also aimed at starting the process of merger between the different departments of the previous Near East Council of Churches (NECC) and the independent bodies.

During the 1974 first assembly of the Council, the words of the founding presidents reflected the main message which the participants aimed to convey to the churches of the Middle East and to believers. These words still apply to today’s reality and to the situation of our churches. Therefore, we decided to publish some meaningful excerpts which portray the spirituality and ideology prevailing during this historical meeting.

During his speech, Dr. Hovhanness Aharonian, speaking on behalf of the Protestant and Episcopal members of the Near East Council of Churches (NECC), which preceded the Council, said,

‘‘…We do come into this Council (the MECC) with the intention of forgetting our differences and trying to discover our similarities… this does not mean we shall give up what we are, forget what we stand for. We are convinced that only by being ourselves can we effectively contribute to the koinonia of the Council. Excessive emphasis on our differences has separated us for centuries and yet the realization of the sense of unity has helped us to come out of our own isolation. We do aspire to be one in Christian fellowship… We are prompted to come to this Council in obedience to the call of our Master for unity, for common witness and service to the world. We are convinced that this is the will of God for us in Jesus Christ our Lord’’.

In his speech, the late Bishop Samuel, also a founding President, reflected a spirit of genuine commitment to the ecumenical movement:

‘‘As you have already heard, the negotiations [towards the formation of the MECC] started ten years ago. Good will existed on all sides, but it took all these years to realize the importance of finding the measures that make the churches in the area feel a real sense of belonging and not just occasional gathering of folkloric manifestations of some black robes that make the meeting more ecumenical… Having reached this present stage in establishing our new Council, we should realize that it is not the end of the road. It is just the beginning of a new era, the beginning of a new challenge. We have agreed on the principle of working together under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and in obedience to our common calling. It is our common responsibility now to pray and work hard in order to detect the spiritual and social needs of our people and to place how the churches of the area could cooperate in responding to them and in serving the message of the Lord to all people; expressing His liberating ministry, His saving call, His healing power to the souls and bodies, and His illuminating words to the needs of the oppressed… One of the main aims of the Council is to manifest the ministry of reconciliation and unity in due time and in the way the Lord will design for us’’.

This commitment was further reflected in the keynote address of the other founding President, H.B Ignatius IV, then Metropolitan Ignatius of Latakia:

‘‘Beloved brethren, no doubt the churches that have come together to hold this meeting are fully aware that they are sitting side by side to engage in long-term, brotherly discussions which will last as long as our brotherhood. We, in this Council, have no pretense to be a church above churches. We constitute a meeting place which is very serious and deep rooted; we will not be satisfied with our lines of communication to continue only in a parallel direction but we insist that our dialogue must become intersecting… There is no doubt that this meeting and this Council will greatly help not only in re-discovering this brotherhood but also in strengthening and deepening it and making of it a living reality in the churches and in the people of the region in general…We know each other and live under one sky. We all express the one Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we have not translated and transmitted it to our part of the world sufficiently. Neither have we yet fully achieved our common interpretation of the Gospel nor have we witnessed to this Gospel properly. Our multiplicity was a sign that we were divided. May this become, from this moment forward, an indication of the diversity of our gifts, and not of our divisions’’.

Forty-six years after the birth of the Council, these words still echo as real and timely messages, as they constitute the solid foundations of our commitment to the ecumenical mission in this region and the whole world.