THE first Church of England Representative to the European Union, the Revd Dr Gary Wilton, was commissioned and collated in Holy Trinity Pro-Cathedral, Brussels, on Sunday.
In his sermon, the Bishop in Europe, Dr Geoffrey Rowell, said that the Church of England’s creation of this new post had “belatedly signalled its recognition that we are a European Church; that the European Institutions shape our lives, and that a distinctly Anglican voice needs to be heard”.
Dr Wilton, former Lecturer and Head of the Postgraduate Programme in Theology and Religious Studies at York St John University, has also been appointed to the associated staff of the Church and Society Commission of the Council of European Churches (CEC) in Brussels.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, sending greetings, said that Dr Wilton’s appointment presented “significant opportunities” for the Church’s witness in Brussels, and in countries influenced by the policies shaped there.
Dr Rowell hailed his appointment as a “pioneering ministry”. “Cultured despisers may write off religion; but faith and religion has a habit of coming back, because it reaches to places in the human heart that political ideology cannot reach,” he said.
An additional 1.85 million UK citizens were projected to move to Europe in the next 25 years, and there were already many Africans and Asians in Europe.
Dr Wilton said that he looked forward to working within the framework of the CEC’s Church and Society Commission “to strengthen the Churches’ common contribution to the climate-change agenda”.
He will work with the European Christian Environmental Network and its secretary, the Revd Dr Peter Pavlovic, as well as with other CEC member Churches.
Reconciliation call. The President of the European Parliament, Hans-Gert Pöttering, has said that spiritual leaders need to be involved in regions such as the western Balkans where “inter-community wounds still needed healing.”
He told religious leaders at an annual meeting in Brussels on Monday: “I firmly believe that the European Union, as well as our neighbours, can benefit greatly from dialogue between religions. . . You have a great responsibility in seeking to present an understanding of faith in terms of peaceful coexistence and reconciliation.”
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