Preoccupation of the Church about Fate of the Creation. Ecological Crisis and Tasks of Christians

Wacław Hryniewicz

Abstract

To the 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Busan, Republic of Korea (30 October to 8 November 2013) we owe two particularly important documents which are relevant to the problem of ecological crisis and endangered human environment. They are: the convergence text The Church: Towards a Common Vision and Unity Statement. The first one is a result of many years’ work of the Commission Faith and Order. In both documents one can see a profound preoccupation of Christian Churches about the integrity of the whole creation of God. As creation has been misused, Christians are not allowed to remain indifferent to this fact. We truly live today “in the tension between the profoundest hope and the deepest despair”. To this urgent issue the author devotes his reflections in the following points: the divine plan for the universe; our faults concerning the divine gift of life; God wants reconciliation for the whole of creation; continuation of some earlier initiatives undertaken by the WCC to protect the creation; towards a new sensibility to the fate of the creation; the nature itself teaches us humility. God is the ultimate future of all his creatures. “The New Testament ends with the vision of a new heaven and a new earth, transformed by the grace of God (cf. Rev. 21:1–22:5). This new cosmos is promised for the end of history but is already present in an anticipatory way even now…” (Towards a Common Vision, par. 69).

Keywords:

Kościół, ekologia, zachowanie/integralność stworzenia, Światowa Rada Kościołów, jedność