4. Some Personal Observations of People at AMCU IV
The people were interesting. They came from various nations, Asian and Western. India was rather over-represented, strangely. Thus, at times, what was supposed to be an Asian discussion became a sole discussion on the Indian context. Having said that, I have some concrete comments on my observations of these friends I met at AMCU IV, most of whom I’d met for the first time (and hopefully not the last).

a. On the “Thereness” of the People. One observation that struck me about many of the Roman Catholic archbishops, bishops and priests, as well as the Orthodox monk and priest who were present at this seminar, was how “unbusy” they were. They didn’t look like they were in a rush to move around or entertain phone calls on their mobile phones. They seemed truly present, unlike many other Protestant gatherings I’ve attended wherein I met ministers who were physically present but seemed very anxious to leave because of family- or ministry-related issues. This latter observation can sometimes be true of me too. But these ministers I met at the AMCU IV seminar and some other ecumenical meetings, they were there. And their physical, emotional, and mental presence was very telling.

They were so present and so accessible that I even had an opportunity to have an engaging conversation, personally, with the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Kuala Lumpur. Over lunch, he asked me, "What is the position of the Protestant Church in Malaysia on interfaith dialogue?" Answering honestly was at best a painful necessity. I simply had to say, "Honestly, I don't think we have a unified position on this (or on anything else, for that matter). Even if we did, it wouldn't be visible at the lower levels of our ecclesiastical hierarchies. And for some, interfaith engagements is about 'converting them all'!"

b. On Their Concern for Christian Unity. There was a stark absence of representation from Protestant denominational leadership. Daniel rants here about this rather embarassing situation wherein the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church sent their highest level ecclesiastical leaders, whereas small fries like us had to represent the Protestant Church where our denominational leaders were nowhere to be seen. The Roman Catholic and Orthodox concern for such matters as Christian unity (or disunity) has made a deep impression on me. And it somewhat alarms me that the same cannot be said about the stream of Christianity to which I belong.

It is strange how our Protestant denomination leaders don't seem to see anything promising in the spirit of ecumenism. Okay, they may be concerned about it - but I've not yet seen it thus far. Yet I deem it too crucial an issue to be dismissed, perhaps because of how it has impacted me so deeply. My ecumenical journey has very much affected the way I have come to view things and express my spirituality. Just one simple example of this is the whole arena of dialogue. Dialogue takes place at two levels: i) with people of other Christian traditions, and ii) with people of other faith traditions.

My dialogue with people of other Christian traditions has created an awareness within myself of the poverty of the spirituality I've lived with all these years. My eyes have been opened to many things I previously didn't even know I didn't know. It prompts me of the urgency of growing beyond myself towards a more holistic appreciation of the Christian faith - not just my own tradition, but the Great Tradition comprising of the synergistic contributions of all the traditions.

My dialogue with people of other faith traditions provokes an awareness within me of what Pope John Paul II called "the scandal of a divided Christianity". It prompts me of the urgency for a visible unity within the church of Jesus Christ. And it reminds me that I constitute a part of this sad disunity.

c. On the Representation of the Delegation. By and large, the representation at the seminar was still Western-dominated. Even if the delegation was Asian in ethnic representation, the theology and the worldview was very Western by virtue of the delegates' theological training in the Western context.

Also, there were only two representations from the Oriental Orthodox Church amidst over 25 voices; this was unfortunate. As a result of the under-representation of the Orthodox voice, the dominant assumption was still one of ethical and virtuous qualities rather than an ontological one (which is fundamentally the underlying concern of Orthodoxy). In other words, for the Western-minded Roman Catholics, Protestants and Evangelicals, the bigger issue pertained to doing, i.e. what we do and how we do it. The Orthodox people, on the contrary, see being as the more pertinent issue, i.e. who we are and whose we are.