WSCF and the Concerns of Communities of Higher Learning

By Kyaw Than

This is a historic moment and I count it a singular privilege to be asked at the outset of this meeting to provide some perspectives on the Christian concerns of the churches and WSCF amid the communities of higher learning in our time. I want to refer to the background inspirations for this meeting. When the East Asia Christian Conference (now Christian Conference of Asia) held its assembly here in Bangkok some 30 years ago, its Committee on Christian Responsibility in University Education recognized the need to plan a sustained programme of work in the university communities, to strengthen the lay leadership of the church and assist in the task of interpreting the gospel in contemporary intellectual and cultural terms. There was also a feeling about helping, encouraging and stimulating Christian institutions of higher learning at a time of growth and expansion of education in the nations of Asia.

The statement went on to identity WSCF as the ecumenical organization, which has shown an active concern for universities and colleges and their faculties and students in Asia. It was convinced that this work of the WSCF needs to be strengthened and enhanced. It accordingly requested the Assembly to aid in the development of this work by cooperating with the WSCF.

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The other background inspiration for this meeting is the History Working Group of WSCF itself, as the WSCF celebrates the 100th anniversary of its founding this year. For example, we recognize Dr. John Albert Coleman, former WSCF secretary for the University Commission, in whom, together with his wife Marie-Jeanne, we have the personification of historic and basic concerns of the Federation viz. the university, the central focus of the witness of the Federation, and then the concern for bible study which provides the basis of Christian witness of the Federation since its inception.

To Build and To Plant

The book of Jeremiah opens with the coming of the Word of the Lord to Jeremiah in his youth in a spectacular way. He was not allowed to protest that he was still a child as the Lord put forth his hand and touched Jeremiah's mouth and said: Behold I have put my words in thy mouth. See, I have this day set these over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant. His call was to communicate God's word to the nations and kingdoms involving both to pull down and to destroy and then to build and to plant. It was an awesome calling given to a young person who possibly was still trying to make sense of his own life at that stage.

We are living in a confusing world. The universities of our time are more than ever blown about by varying winds of doctrines. The transition from the twentieth century is fraught with many unprecedented challenges for all of us. In Global 2000 Revisited, a publication of the Millennium Institute, a brief description is given of the challenges the world in 21st century will face. It said:

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If present beliefs and policies continue, the world in the 21^st century will be more crowded, more polluted, less stable economically and ecologically, and more vulnerable to violent disruption than the world we live in now. Serious stresses involving inter-religious relations, the economy, population, resources, environment, and security loom ahead....

It went on to say that, life for billions of people will be more precarious in the 21^st century than it is now — unless the faith traditions of the world lead the nations and peoples of the earth to act decisively to alter current beliefs and policies.

A study of another organization just some months ago spoke of higher education in crisis. It said that despite the clear importance of investment in higher education for economic growth and social development, it is in crisis throughout the world. The crisis is most acute in the developing world, both because fiscal adjustments have been harsher and because it has been more difficult for developing countries to contain pressures for enrolment expansion. In these countries, higher education institutions operate under adverse conditions: overcrowding, deteriorating physical facilities, and lack of resources for non-salary expenditures such as textbooks, educational materials, laboratory consumables and maintenance.

The WSCF is celebrating this year its hundred years of service and witness in the university world, and will soon enter its second century continuing to declare God's word, manifest God’s purpose of truth, and love for the university communities in our global village. The theme of our meeting. To come together to build and to plant, will keep on reminding us of the task to which we are called as Christians in the twenty-first century university world.

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The WSCF and the University

God has set the WSCF as the Christian community within the university community for all these years. The churches have supported this body as their arm to reach out to the students and faculties whether they belong to one church tradition or none. The WSCF has been granted to pursue many concerns be they related to the issue of manifesting unity so that the world may believe or to that of examining what it means to be a Christian in the midst of social and political challenges the university communities face. Understandably, the Federation has over the years sought to bring the claims of Christ to the community that forms its primary context, viz. the university itself. Hence, in this statement I propose to dwell only on the way the Federation had approached this vocation according to my reading of its history concerning this particular effort while of course we can refer to many other concerns which it gave attention to in different periods of its past. The statement does not claim to be comprehensive and I am sure different persons with more sensitivity and discernment can fulfill this assignment more ably.

In its policy statements from General Committees or Assemblies and in its process of thinking, the tradition in the Federation is always to refer to a biblical starting point for its reflections. I want to refer to different stages and emphases in the thinking of the Federation regarding the calling of the Christian in the university communities. Without trying to be simplistic, I intend to lift up some key biblical references regarding the emphases of the Federation in different stages of its work and witness in the universities of the world. In reading Ruth Rouse's history of the Federation, as a new member of the staff back in the early fifties, the text that struck me has to do with that oft quoted account in the second chapter of the second book of Kings. We read how the people of the city of Jericho because of its water problems approached Elisha the prophet. Elisha went to the spring

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of waters and cast the salt in there for the healing of the waters on which the Jericho population depended. The work of the Federation and its member Student Christian Movements was understood as crucial in the universities on which nations depend to secure those who play key roles in society, in education and in religion. Accordingly, for Dr. John R. Mott and the Federation or the SCM leaders of those early days, university missions were central to their work.

We then see a new emphasis emerge in a later period. In the tenth chapter of Paul's second letter to the Corinthians, he said: For though we walk in the flesh we do not war after the flesh (for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds,) casting down imaginations^ and every high thing that exalted itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. I am reminded of the earlier part of the text of our theme where the references about pulling down, throwing down, etc. are mentioned before the injunction to build and to plant is given. To bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ was the emphasis in the mid-1940s following the Second World War. During the WSCF Executive Committee meeting of WSCF in New York, Dr. Visser't Hooft as chairperson, said.' We have been at a point in history, which formed the starkest break in the whole tradition of the university. We must think adventurously about the tasks ahead. Bishop Hans Lilje's book The Abuse of Learning, Dr. Visser’t Hooft's None Other Gods were for me indicative of the kind of new tasks they were seeing for the Federation then. It was not merely about university missions to challenge members to go out to the ends of the earth to carry the gospel of Christ. The new emphasis was on the mission of the SCMs to the university itself, to examine the nature and purpose of the university, to see the relation between Christian faith and the various intellectual disciplines be they humanities or the sciences, and to consider what Christian

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obedience means in the life and thought of the scholar within that institutional context concerned. Hence, the appointment then of John Coleman to work on the so-called university question leading to the publication of the Grey Book he authored entitled The Task of the Christian in the University.

Then came also the attempt to decentralize the work of the Federation. M.M. Thomas served as the coordinator for the work of the University Commission. In calling a consultation of Asian university professors in 1950 at Bandung City in Indonesia, Dr. M.M. Thomas lifted up a new emphasis regarding the university question. The Bandung Consultation dwelt on the Idea of a Responsible University in Asia. The need as mentioned then was to consider the responsible relation between the university and society, with all the national and social priorities society expected the university to give attention to. While universities should not be ivory towers in splendid isolation from the pressing challenges nations faced, pursuing truth for truth's sake, society or state should not also merely dictate that the universities become manpower factories expecting them to cough up the kind of needed technicians and resource personnel. The issue was one of developing creative relations between the university and society within the historical context of changing developments in the nations. Private institutions particularly the church-related ones in Asia were taken over by the state to ensure that the institutions of higher learning toe the line of national policy and solidarity. The biblical image that came to my mind was that of the eagle stirring its nest for the sake of the new generation getting equipped to fulfill its vocation. For Christians in the education field, the changing context was quite disconcerting. Not only the church-related institutions of higher learning but also the regular universities were astir because of the new historical developments requiring them to cope with the challenges as new winds of revolutionary change blew about with increasing force. Dr. Nambara of Tokyo University (that great Christian scholar) was

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for me putting the finger on the point when he warned the West that while the revolution in Asia was very important there was something more crucial to be attended to viz the renaissance in Asia. His prophetic statement continues to be crucial with increasing relevance as we come to the consideration of the changing climate of thought in our time.

Towards Witnessing in the Wilderness

When the late Philippe Maury was beginning his tenure as General Secretary and was asked what he would indicate as emphasis for his work he responded that it would be evangelism in the language of politics. His words foreshadowed the way the Federation family would be challenged and called to play its role in the university world of that period and the succeeding years.

The sixth and seventh decades of the twentieth century saw a fundamental shift in the understanding of the purpose of the Christian movement in higher education. The 1964 General Committee stated that the energies of all the movements should be directed toward the encouragement not of programs but of processes that might develop out of the life of the Christians in the university a new understanding of what it means to be a Christian in this place and at this time. This implied that a radically changing society and university needed a new way of thinking among the Christians in the academic world.

Consideration of the form and content of Christian witness was increasingly a very complex exercise during these decades. There were student protests and the suppression of these by direct force or by subtle means by those who held the reins of power. There was concern for student exiles and political prisoners. There was general confusion and lack of consensus about what a university is and what it should be, while some call for working toward a radical reform of higher education. If in the past reference was

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made to the crisis in the university the issue of these decades could be interpreted as having to do with the crisis of the university itself. Adapting what Dr. Walter Freytag, the late missiologist, had earlier reflected on missions in church history, we may say that while previously the university had questions to face up to, in the period under consideration the university itself was becoming the question. Was it an instrument for good or for bad and what did Christian presence in the university mean? Meanwhile within the Federation family not only its member Student Christian Movements but the Federation itself was facing problems. The University Christian Movement in U.S.A. dissolved itself and went out of existence. The Student Christian Association of South Africa dis-affiliated from the Federation. Constitutional amendments concerning the membership of the Assembly and the Executive Committee as well as the restructuring of the WSCF were the pre-occupations of the constituency of those years. It seemed as if the people called of God were themselves in conflict as to the direction and stages of the journey while seeking to negotiate the wilderness. There was the call for the Federation to move away from what some referred to as pontificating about the ideal university, and to turn to help members engage in actual situations to discover Christian tasks to be faithful and obedient in them. One is reminded of Ezekiel who said: / came to them of the captivity at Tel-Abib that dwelt by the river Chebar and I sat where they sat and remained there astonished among them for seven days. The need it seemed was an agonizing obligation to sit where people sat and to remain struck by the magnitude of the situation and the enormity of the task to be performed, and to avoid blurting out a hasty message, which does not address the depth of the challenge.

It meant that the prophetic function of the Christian community could only be performed out of costly and humble identification with those whom it seeks to serve and in terms of the experience of having struggled to receive the Word in season to be communicated. Those years are now behind us though we still have to contend with their aftermath.

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Towards the Second Century

Now in 1995 we are anticipating the event of the XXXI General Assembly. The theme includes the emphasis on the importance of memory in relation to hope and the future. The Assembly will also celebrate the faithfulness of God for God's people in the academic world for all the past one hundred years and for the promise, we have in God for tasks of the future. The world is also awaiting the dawn of the 21^st century. We realize we are living in a global village of the planet earth. At the same time within each region and nation, particularities of identities (groups or minorities) are also growing with new consciousness. Both centrifugal and centripetal forces are at work in most countries.

Populations seeking opportunities for higher education have grown in leaps, bounds while resources and facilities to meet these demands are disproportionately inadequate, especially in the developing nations.

There is also the explosion of information. Institutions of higher learning are greatly affected for both good and ill by the development of the superhighway of communication.

There is growing expectation of state and society from the institutions of higher learning for their contribution toward economic development of the nation. Content and direction of research are often determined by conditions of endowments provided by the multi-national corporations or the defense enterprises. Among nations under authoritarian regimes, the state calls the tune requiring the institutions of higher learning to provide human power to work for the development goals the regimes have set. However, the creation of wealth in a nation does not

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mean that it is distributed fairly to all sectors of society. Nevertheless, where no wealth is created everyone is worse off. Inquiries into the poverty of nations involve studies in mutual interrelationships of subjects and issues such as history and politics, theory and ideologies, economic structures and levels, social stratification, agriculture and industry, population developments, health and education. Recent study of the so-called Global Problematique by the Millennium Institute mentioned earlier also looked at the challenges of the 21st century in inter-related contexts.

Growth of world population, dwindling acres of arable land, depletion of energy sources, over harvesting of the seas, effects of air pollution and the eco-system are issues humanity must give early attention to as the twentieth century draws to a close. Long before the convocation of the World Council of Churches on Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation, Prof. Charles Birch of Australia sounded a warning to the ecumenical community concerning the importance of a proper understanding of the mandate of God given to humanity in the Genesis account. The blessing of God for humankind was in the command not only to be fruitful and multiply but also to replenish the earth. The challenge to humankind is a comprehensive one as academics see it. Vocation of humanity has global dimensions and we need to be developing pedagogies suitable to a globalized world.

The accusation against academics in the past was that they spend time to study to know more about less and less as their specializations steer them apart. While such obstructed intelligible communication and cooperation among them due to compartmentalization of knowledge, the new context and the global problematique requires that natural and social scientists as well as scholars in humanities and philosophy engage together, in common research and exchange perspectives on pressing problems facing humanity.

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The Task of the Federation

I believe that the WSCF as a pioneer and participant in the ecumenical movement faces pressing challenges in this time and age. Its tasks concern not just isolated problems affecting the university and a segment of society. It is called to examine the implications for its witness in the face of systemic sickness in the global village. We are reminded of Paul's injunction in his letter to the Ephesians when he said: For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places....

Our witness involves the communication of the claims of Christ not only on the institutions as such but also in their global settings in which they are placed. We are to point to the One who is not only the embodiment of the wholeness of truth but also the Lord of creation, and Lord of history. We may be only the voice crying in the wilderness and many will ask whom we to sound that voice are.

The prophetic function of the Federation in the 21^st century university world cannot be separated from the pastoral ministry to those lost, dejected and lonely in a confusing world. We may talk about the global village. Yet a global village can be a great solitude. We witness to that Great Shepherd of the sheep, that Good Shepherd who is concerned with the least of the flock. In addition, our concern for presenting the claims of Christ on institutions and systems should not let us neglect that the claims of Christ are also for each as individuals. The attention we give to a comprehensive witness must not let us neglect the incisiveness of Christ's claim for each person. Is this a challenge we have to take more seriously without complaining why our brothers and sisters in groups like the Campus Crusade could provide seekers with the message they look for and could relate to? The churches are

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maintaining or reaching out to maintain chaplaincies and denominational student programs among the university communities around the world, because of the growing feeling about the need for providing pastoral care.

However, whether we speak of the Federation or the churches carrying the mission and ministry among the members of the university communities, such witness cannot be separated from the call to unity. The prayer of Christ that they all may be one that the world may believe (and we remind ourselves of the motto of the Federation) requires that we manifest the unity we have in Christ in our presence in the universities of the world. Here again the call is to build and to plant in the setting where a disbelieving world confronts us in many forms. In an age of globalization the Federation is called to express as an arm of the church, the catholicity the gospel provides. There is a relation between reconciliation within the household of faith, and God's action in Christ reconciling the world to himself.

Conclusion

Someone said that the task of the Federation is like that of a hen trying to lay an egg on a moving staircase. The generations of students come and go and we have only a limited time to render our Christian obedience. The setting of the staircase keeps on changing as the steps move. In a department store, the moving stairs may carry us from a men's section to the ladies' floor. The environment becomes different and we have to get ready anew to fulfill our calling. We see different items, which attract our attention and inclinations. However, as we cannot purchase every item on sale as we ascend the stairs of a department store, we cannot tackle every issue the university communities face as we make our way among them. We have to choose the fronts for our engagement. The global village presents us with multi-faceted challenges in great varieties. However, the disciplining factor in my view is the setting of the university, with its particular nature and purpose in spite of their variety and differences.