Hisako Kinukawa, Professor of Theology, Tokyo

I. Church as Household

It is well known that ecumenism (oikournene) is a term that derives from the Greek word oikos, or “household.” Oikoumene is most often translated “the whole inhabited earth.” In other words, our earth is conceived as a place where a family or families reside together. It is also well known that women have been most closely related to the places where a family or families establish their lives together.

A family consists of different members,’ each of whom is different in her/his age, talent, ability, role, nature, and as the time goes, there may be found more aspects which contribute the dynamism of the household. When each member may live in her/his uniqueness and at the same time accept others’ uniqueness as well, we can say the family is well managed. To say it in a different way, when every member finds her/his comfortable place in the household, it may be considered healthy. The household premises growth of the young, flexibility to accept changes brought by the combination of the ages, hospitality in relation to the social relationships each member has, and mutual support when a member faces problems.

The same was true with the Christian church since its beginning. It was characterized by the diversity of gifts, ages, ethnicity, roles in society, etc. The Christians were called to form one household, one community of faith, which has been characterized by such ideas as unity, harmony, communion, sharing, fellowship, participation, solidarity and sister/brother-hood. It expects neither divisions nor uniformity.

During the twentieth century, “ecumenism” has more emphasized commitment. It has more referred to a movement toward cooperation among and between Christian churches - Eastern and Oriental Orthodox, Protestant, and, since Vatican II, Roman Catholic. It is also remarkable that churches have been trying to expose themselves to “multilogue” among various religions. In concrete, churches have worked together on matters on witness and service and the search for justice and peace. Even so, it has not lost its original concept of managing the household as the one church. Therefore in its theory and idea, the ecumenical movement goes beyond mere cooperation. It is called to challenge to full and visible unity, even though it may have to be defined for the moment by mutual recognition of baptism, Eucharist, and ministries, and, accordingly, by mutual recognition of one another as church. We must admit that there are still so many factors which divide the churches. Therefore we need to have more chances through which these can be faced more openly as churches grow in understanding and trust.

I regret to say that, inasmuch as the ecumenical movement has characterized unity in terms of doctrines and church orders, it has been dominated by the men who have traditionally been the theologians and decision makers and clergy.

II. Ecumenical Decade of the Churches in Solidarity with Women

Until the 1970s, the watchword of women’s participation in the ecumenical movement was cooperation. Then, at the all-women’s consultation sponsored by the WCC in Berlin in 1974, the word sexism became part of the ecumenical vocabulary. The consultation led to the Community of Women and Men in the Church study. 1975 was the UN International Women’s Year and gave rise to an international decade for women. At the closing conference of this decade, held in Nairobi, a Methodist bishop declared, “What we need is a churches’ decade of women.”1 These movements resulted in the inauguration of the Ecumenical Decade of the Churches in Solidarity with Women (1988-98). The decade is a call to the churches to examine their structures, their theology, their practices, towa’rd a sharing of power among women and men in all aspects of common life.

The aims of the Decade have been quite clearly stated in the following five statements:

It puts the following priorities before the Christian community.

These points are distinctive as well as significant in the sense that they are raising radical questions about the egalitarian concept as the integrating key of the Christian

community. Not only that, but they are challenging the creation of the human family as a multifaith, multiracial and mixed gender community in their ultimate concerns.

A mid-decade evaluation in 1993 concluded that the decade has so far been a women’s decade more than a decade of the churches in solidarity with women. Accordingly, among women worldwide three concerns came to the forefront at mid-decade: 1) the global economic system and the poverty of women, 2) racism and xenophobia, and 3) violence against women and children. I would like to talk about more on these three concerns in the following because I believe they are still the big issues we, the church, must keep struggling with.

To conclude the ecumenical decade of the churches in solidarity with women in 1998, a decade festival will take place in Harare, Zimbabwe, 4-9 September 1998. It happens to be the same year as the 50th anniversary of WCC. At the meeting women and men will reflect on the achievements they hav~ made in their commitments to stand in solidarity with women. Ahead of the festival, national ecumenical organizations, the churches and five women’s groups will hold national or regional gatherings to look back and look forward beyond 1998.

As we approach the end of the decade, this opportunity to reflect on what we can do about promoting ecumenical formation in the churches is especially precious to me. It is also very precious as I can share my feminist theological thoughts with my colleagues, female and male, in both Catholic and Protestant churches.

III. Women’s Issues Discussed at CATS

When the Congress of Asian Theologians held its first meeting in Suwon, Korea on May 25 to June 1,1997, I participated in two discussion groups; one on the theme of “feminist and gender issues in Asian theologies” and the other, “women’s studies” dealing with disciplinary and interdisciplinary issues. In the first group there were ten women and four men representing eight Asian countries. The group was diverse and dynamic enough to look at the issues from different perspectives and social locations. Our experiences were quite different from each other in political situations, colonialism and economic disparities, but all of us acknowledged our common experiences in richness of multi-cultures and multi-religions. There were three big issues we came up with and discussed in detail. They happened to be very closely related to the three mid-Decade concerns I stated above.

They are the issues caused by globalization, sexism, and cultural and ideological oppression. I would like to share what we came up with so that we can get hold of the ideas that are commonly experienced by Asian theologians in our different contexts of Asia. I do so as I believe this way I may be the most fair to represent women and men of Asia who are struggling with those problems.

1) Globalization

2) Sexism

3) Cultural and Ideological Oppression

IV. Strategies and Suggestions to Overcome the Problems

After we analyzed the problems, experiences and concerns we have in Asian contexts, the group tried to find alternatives and engender concrete suggestions, which are summarized and proposed as strategies for change. They are very important to be taken seriously if we want to promote ecumenical formation in our future.

While partnership is a goal we work towards, we must recognize and admit the current existence of unequal relationships between women and men. Women are discriminated against and oppressed within the church and society. So that we can celebrate the end of the Women’s Decade with full satisfaction, we need to strive harder and to be engaged in daily struggles of mending God’s broken creation.

V. Resources and Methodology

There were eleven women and four men in our disciplinary and interdisciplinary group. The discussion there may be helpful to concretize the strategies I mentioned above. We talked about resources of doing feminist theologies/women’s studies in Asian contexts and then the methods we may apply.

Resources:

Methods:

VI. Conclusion

I would like to conclude this paper with my own experiences in ecumenical movement. Presently I am a member of International Christian University church, which is a university church open to society and which claims to be a Protestant church. That means it does not belong to any particular denomination, but is open to all who confess their faith in Christ. Any person who belongs to any denominational church can become a member of the church or move her/his membership tentatively with a simple registering process. In principle, it is as inclusive as possible.

Since it is a university church and the university was built by the good will of Christians belonging to various denominations in Japan as well as in North America, it was natural for the church to accept all those who would like to join it. There has been also a special concern paid to students who may be members of churches in particular denominations at their home towns. They can feel free to have their tentative membership at ICU church which does not stick to any tradition or liturgy particular to a certain denomination. Thus we can say this church is a good experimental example to break down barriers which have been built by various traditions on which each denomination has put much authority and which have made boundaries around churches. It is ironical to see Jesus and his movement divided into small cells because of different traditions that have built different cages with claims that their cage is the most ideal for him and his movement.

I used to be a member of a church which was originated by a Japanese, Kanzo Uchimura. The church is called non-church movement as he aimed at founding a nondenominational as well as non-westernized church. Though he was introduced to Christian faith by an American missionary who taught agriculture at his school and he himself had his theological education in the USA, he was led to start a new church which
heclaimed indigenous in the soil of our country. He put much emphasis on reading biblical texts from his own perspective as a Japanese. He tried to overcome church organization as well as biblical interpretation that were brought by Western missionaries and promoted through Westernized evangelization strategies. He sought a Christian faith that was of, for and by the Japanese. He did not execute any sacraments in his church. Even baptism and communion were not practiced. There was no membership or ordination system. The church is fully inclusive and has no reason to exclude anyone that wants to come and worship together. In addition, anyone can become a pastor of a church if she/he feels called to be one. It is based on her/his personal faith decision led by her/his personal relationship with God. The non-church keeps the tradition till now for almost 80 years. Much emphasis has been put on the study of the biblical texts in the worship services. Many pastors have their own works to earn their bread so that they do not need to depend on the stipend paid by the church members.

It happened that I committed myself to the non-church when I became conscious of my faith. I felt very free and comfortable with the way the church deals with believers, seekers and non-believers. I became a member of the church without baptism or faith confession of any sort. We do not dare to know who are believers, who are seekers and who are non-believers by sacraments or confessions. It is not difficult to know who we are and who the others are.

The church has never rejected baptism or communion as nothing, but it has claimed those are not indispensable elements to have a community of faith. I am a witness for that. I have never been baptized or gone through ordination system, but I am a Christian, have been preaching and have given the blessings if necessary. I used to say I belong to an ecumenical church and am a God- ordained pastor.

The reason I had to move to the International Christian University church was that my spouse was appointed the University president. The President and his wife are expected to be members of the University church. When I was asked to move, I had one condition. I would move if the church accepted me as a full member without asking me to accept baptism or say a confession of faith. And it happened as I desired. The church proved its inclusiveness to the extent we could expect the most.

Though the non-church has not executed communion services as a sacrament, it practices more agape meals than any other churches. A long time ago, I began to participate in communion services at different churches of different denominations when they held them. I was never rejected or withdrew myself when I had chances.

The non-church has been well-known for its tradition that puts much emphasis on reading texts and their hermeneutics. The biblical interpretations done by the founder and his followers (successors) have been very contextual. The unfortunate element of the contextuality is found in the fact that interpretations have been deeply embedded in the mentality of patriarchy which has been overwhelmingly strong through the history of our society. In the patriarchal society of Japan, pastors have been male, even though in theory the door is open to anyone. The non-church is not an exception. Women have
been deeply embedded in the patriarchal mentality as well as men so that women have withdrawn from taking leadership in preaching and writing.

The founder even wrote that the non-church spirit is based on the Bushido, the code of the warrior spirit that supported Japanese patriarchal and hierarchical mentality through the history, especially after Meiji Era (1868--). The male-centered orientation was conveniently used for keeping dominant/subordinate relationship between men and women in churches.

The fact of being controlled by such patriarchal mentality when we read the biblical texts became a stumbling block to me and disturbed me for a long time until I was motivated to do my own theology from my own perspective. I cannot be but critical about intellectualism, classism, racism and sexism that are inherent in the part of patriarchally colored theology of the non-church. It can disregard the pain of the oppressed. It can legitimize women’s subordination using certain biblical texts. It is unconsciously building borders around itself and excludes the oppressed as “other.”

As I began to read texts from my own perspective as a woman and learned how the Bible was constructed, I became aware of the necessity to deconstruct the patriarchal bias which was reflected upon texts themselves as well as interpretations. I started reconstructing the good news Jesus proclaimed, how he related himself with the oppressed, how women related themselves with Jesus and his movement, the roles women and men bore in the earliest community of faith, how the first encounters and events held between the people and Jesus were distorted by tellers of traditions and writers of the gospel etc.

Feminist theology was far from being welcomed when I started writing, speaking and preaching in the 70’s. I suffered from the feeling that I was not welcome at my church and I felt I had to leave. When I became a “free, freelance feminist theologian,” I felt so free and enjoyed more ecumenical activities. I did not need to be denominational or even Protestant. There has been no baffler around me that hinders me from connecting myself with any church.

I began to be invited by different denominational churches, including Catholic churches. As the feminist perspective has become more accepted by churches, my work has become more intense. I have had many workshops with sisters of Catholic orders. The first test given me by the Catholic church was at the general assembly of the provincial directors and mother-superiors of the 70 women’s convents in Japan. I think I passed the test then. Ever since, my relation with Catholic sisters and brothers has been heavenly.

On the other hand, I must say that the academic arena has not been so good about accepting feminist theology as a part of theology. Almost all the offers are limited to teach a course as a part time professor. Last year I taught at four different universities. That means that the need and interest to offer such a course taught from feminist perspective has been increased and many schools are aware of it. However, to provide a
full time position is quite a different story. We have many miles to go and many years to endure.

Coming from Japan and talking about violence against women, I cannot end this report without mentioning our work on the so-called “Comfort Women” issue. I feel deeply sorry for our being unable to push our government strongly enough, despite the fact that we have been endeavoring to make our government recognize that Japan as a nation is guilty and to compensate the victimized women individually.

We are aware the issue is linked with ethnocentrism, nationalism, racism, colonialism, militarism and sexism, all of which have been so deeply interlocked. We continue to strive for transformations that may bring all of us peace and justice, even though we often experience failure. We are often occupied by helpless feeling. We do not despair, but are always with a hope that we will get out of this long, dark tunnel for the silenced women who endured far longer thar,i we.

Lastly I should say we do not know how much we have been empowered by the global attention paid to the “Comfort Women” issue through various means such as the report issued by UN Working Group on “Contemporary Forms of Slavery” (1994), the preliminary report submitted by Radhika Coomaraswamy, Special Rapporteur on violence against women to the Commission on Human Rights (1995) and the working paper on systemic rape and sexual slavery by Linda Chavez, an expert of the Subcommission as Special Rapporteur on Wartime Slavery (1995).

Behind such world-wide attention, a serious concern is expressed that the same kind of violence is continually done against women and children in different parts of the world. Linda Chavez, Special Rapporteur on Wartime Slavery will submit her report on “Violence Against Women in War and Disputes” to the UN Commission of Human Rights in spring 1998. So that she may reflect in her report what Asian women have been struggling with, we grassroots women in Japan, Christian and non-Christian, held an international conference on “War and Violence Against Women” in November 1997, in solidarity with women in other countries working to retrieve the human dignity of the victimized women. 41 women from 20 countries and almost 700 Japanese women gathered together and had hot discussions on the issue.

In order that violence against women may disappear from the earth, we feel it the most prior obligation to keep working for the full settlement of the issue.