CCA will initiate an Asian Ecumenical Fellow (AEF) residential program based at the CCA headquarters in Chiang Mai. The objective of this program is to provide opportunities for Asian and global church and ecumenical representatives to leverage facilities and resources at CCA headquarters in Chiang Mai while working on their specific projects. This program is designed for research scholars, ecumenists, activists and practitioners from church and ecumenical organizations and institutions from a wide range of disciplines and sectors.

Every year, 3-4 fellowship grants will be awarded and the selected Asian Ecumenical Fellow of CCA will be an Ecumenical Fellow in Residence and will be part of the CCA team at the headquarters in Chiang Mai for up to 2 months. During this time, the AEF will be able to use the resources at the CCA library and archives to complete their projects or research assignments on Ecumenism in Asia as well as benefitting from interactions with the ecumenical community visiting CCA and working in CCA. The opportunities to use the CCA resources and theoretical and practical experiences for discussions and feedback will be an added value of this program.

Asian Ecumenical Fellows are also given the opportunities to share their expertise and experience with CCA staff community and students of theological institutions and in Thailand and also with CCA program participants.

The AEF is CCA’s effort to maximize its engagement in future ecumenical leadership development through wider ecumenical involvement and exposures even for members from the grass-roots level and nurture their ecumenical leadership. It is also envisaged that ecumenism will be promoted at all levels and AEF will be instrumental in promoting ecumenism in their congregations, churches and institutions; will help expand the networks of ecumenical fellowship in different countries being responsive to the issues in local and national contexts and provide a human resource pool who can be engaged in wider ecumenical involvement and activities and initiatives.