Anglican Communion News Service

(ENI)At an historic meeting in Cyprus, 20 leaders of Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Protestant churches in the Middle East have called attention to the falling numbers and resources of Christians living in the region where Christianity began. The church leaders attending the high-level meeting also promised to cooperate with each other and with their Muslim neighbours to overcome difficulties faced by Christians.

At the same time, the church leaders took care not to create "alarmism" over the issue, pointing out that: "The first Apostles who preached the Gospel only numbered twelve."

Dr Tarek Mitri, an academic and World Council of Churches staff member who was involved in the preparation of the meeting, told ENI that a "pastoral letter" released at the end of the meeting was a result of a decision by the church leaders to "speak publicly" about something that had been "widely whispered" about in the region - the falling number of Christians living in the Middle East. But he added that the statement was also significant because it showed that the church leaders did not believe that the way to ensure the continuation of "Christian presence" in the Middle East was to call for outside intervention.

The meeting of church leaders, organised by the Middle East Council of Churches, was held in Nicosia, Cyprus, on 23 and 24 January, during the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, and was hosted by Archbishop Chrysostomos, Primate of the Church of Cyprus.

The meeting in itself was highly significant because it was only the second meeting of such high-ranking church representatives from the region since the Council of Ephesus in the year 431. (A similar meeting was held in Nicosia in 1985.)

"Symbolically the meeting was extremely powerful," Dr Mitri, of the World Council of Churches' Office on Inter-religious relations, told ENI this week. "There was a higher concentration of patriarchs than ever seen before. That all these people were there is in itself a breakthrough. They also discussed the need to meet every two years. If this is implemented, it will give the ecumenical movement a different pace."

This willingness among church leaders to cooperate is reflected in the "pastoral letter" which states: "We cannot properly carry out our mission nor are we even be able to carry it out at all, unless we strengthen our bonds of love and cooperation. We are all responsible for that which Christ the Lord has entrusted to us."

Dr Mitri told ENI: "The pastoral letter reflects the fact that the problem of Christian emigration and the erosion of various aspects of the Christian presence in Middle Eastern societies have generated serious preoccupations, not only among Christians, but among Muslims as well. It has become an issue of public debate in the region and beyond. In the US, for example, this is addressed as a question of religious persecution.

"But they [the church leaders] are also warning against sensationalism and sweeping statements of those who predict the imminent eradication of Christianity in the Middle East.

"Also, the document says that numbers [of Christian residents] are important, but it doesn't get into a fever about them. Let's not fetishise numbers or make little idols of them. Faithfulness is more important than numbers."

Dr Mitri said the church leaders also stressed the need for any difficulties to be solved in cooperation with Muslims.

"Rather than complaining to the world about what Muslims, or at least some of them, are doing to Christians, churches are saying 'We prefer to discuss this with our Muslim neighbours'," Dr Mitri said.

The church leaders did not want to fall into a "minority-centred" trap - that of seeking protection from foreign governments. "However, it is extremely difficult, for you cannot say that the Christian communities don't face problems," Dr Mitri said. "But you don't want these problems to be instrumentalised by politically motivated forces abroad and be used - or rather misused - in a crusade against Islam.

"The churches are trying to say: There are problems, and they are to be solved here."