By Jerry Van Marter and Edmund Doogue
Harare, 5 December (ENI)--The financial crisis that has plagued the World Council of Churches (WCC) for a number of years is over, delegates to the organisation's eighth assembly were told yesterday, 4 December.

In her preliminary report to the assembly, WCC finance committee chair Birgitta Rantakari, a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, said that a series of budget and staff cuts, begun in 1991, combined with extraordinary investment results in 1996, had made WCC financial officials "cautiously optimistic".

However, Rantakari added that there was "still more to do" and that the "main goal now is to balance the WCC's budget without reliance on investment income". Depending on such volatile sources of funds, she said, was "an invitation to disaster". For example, although investment income reached 10 million Swiss francs (US$7.29 million) in 1996, it dropped by several million francs last year.

WCC operating budgets showed modest surpluses for the last two years, Rantakari said, adding that she was "much encouraged" by reports that the operating surplus for the first nine months of 1998 was 1.4 million francs.

Rantakari urged WCC member churches to "stand by your commitment to the WCC, which includes the financial security of the council". She noted that only about half of the WCC's 332 member churches made any contribution at all. Figures also showed that member church contributions accounted for only about 10 per cent of the WCC's budget.

The WCC's income and expenditure figures from 1994 to 1997, reproduced in the preliminary report presented to delegates on 4 December, suggests that the organisation's financial situation has improved markedly in the four-year period. Contributions (churches' membership fees) improved from Sfr 7 100 000 in 1994 to Sfr 9 128 00 in 1997, although income for WCC programmes - for specific activities by the council - fell from Sfr 20 172 000 to Sfr 18 566 000 in the same period.

Figures for the "net operating results" show that in 1994 the WCC had a deficit of Sfr 5 770 000 in 1994, while in 1997 there was a deficit of Sfr 1 960 000.

However the document does not indicate expected expenditure for 1998, nor does it state the expected final cost of the Harare assembly, which in 1996 had been budgeted at Sfr11 million. In September the WCC's general secretary, Dr Konrad Raiser, said that it was likely the assembly would keep within its budget.

The document also indicates that both the Ecumenical Centre, the WCC's headquarters in Geneva, and the building housing the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey, near Geneva, will "need extensive repair and renovation work". A fund-raising campaign is under way to pay for these projects.

The WCC is also eager to become less financially dependent on the Protestant churches of northern Europe, notably those in Germany, which pay the lion's share of the organisation's costs. WCC financial director Robert Christeler this week told Jubilee, the daily newspaper published in Harare for the assembly delegates: "We must decrease our dependence on traditional Western and North European partners who are also feeling the ripple effects of the economic downturn. And the churches in Germany, for example, have to make the difficult decision whether to finance international ecumenism through the WCC or help meet the local social demand after the reintegration of the former Eastern Germany."

The WCC should diversify its sources of income, he said.

"We are looking at building stronger relationships with North America, because with closer relationships and understanding come a deeper commitment. That will hopefully lead to a more generous source of income." [609 words]

Photographs of the assembly are available from Photo Oikoumene

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WCC Assembly Web Site

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