History of the Ecumenical Movement and the WCC, Distance Education

Ecumenism has its beginnings, like all movements, and thus it has a history to be grasped, understood, and studied. Through its history, we can see the evolution and growth of the Ecumenical Movement. The beginning is not one, but multiple attempts to achieve reconciliation between divided churches to recover the apostolic sense of the early Church, and to handle balances between unity and diversity. At the same time, the development of the Ecumenical Movement became a struggle for bringing these attempts together, through sharing frustrations, difficulties, and ironies that the modern pluralistic constantly changing world made Christianity to confront with. The movement evolved through various trends and encounters. Some of them formed the World Council of Churches, while others continued developing independently from the WCC.At the end of the course, the student is expected to be able to: - demonstrate an in-depth understanding of how the Ecumenical Movement, Society and Christianity affected each other in the twentieth century; - display advanced insight in how various Christian communities participated, interacted and was shaped in the Ecumenical Movement; - demonstrate the capability of analyzing themes that surfaced in the Ecumenical Movement debates and represent them accurately; - reflect critically on the conditions of ecumenism