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Article: Baptism -- the Basis of Church Unity?: The Question of Baptism in Faith and Order.
- Article from:
- The Ecumenical Review
- Article date:
- October 1, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 World Council of Churches. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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"When baptismal unity is realized in one holy, catholic, apostolic church, a genuine Christian witness can be made to the healing and reconciling love of God. Therefore, our one baptism into Christ constitutes a call to the churches to overcome their divisions and visibly manifest their fellowship."(1)
This is a quotation from Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry (BEM), the well-known document published in 1982 after many years of study and consultation in the WCC's Faith and Order commission. What BEM sought to do, to put it simply, was to say together that which can be said together. The document has been described as an example of a new literary genre, the ...