MM Thomas - Life, Legacy and Theology

THEOLOGY OF MADATHILPARAMPIL MAMMEN THOMAS
Thomas maintained that the world outside is raising these questions, as are some of the
many members of the Council. The distinctions between the center, the radius, and
periphery become increasingly important as the Council seeks, under the mandate of the
Uppsala Assembly, to enlarge the circle, on the one hand, and to become more militant,
on the other.
These questions are increasingly important since the Council now includes not only
churches with western Protestant traditions but also most of the Orthodox churches, and
many churches in Latin America, Asia, Africa (deeply oriented toward African culture),
and those of Pentecostal spirituality. This expansion has brought into the Council the
human hopes and despair of the wide world in the midst of which the churches struggle
to witness to their faith and life in Christ. The Council has been greatly enlarged in
program and membership.
Along with this development has come a new sense that the Council should not only
engage in study but that its churches should seek to define more precisely-in the light of
the central faith-their common goals as regards unity, witness, and service, so that the
Council will be an instrument of the churches for mutual help to reach their goals.
Dr. Thomas proceeded to emphasize the implications of the Council's Christological
center and its theological-ethical basis in the struggle for human community at the local
and world levels. This theological basis implies a catholicity that is the criterion not only
for the Christian community but for the life and unity of all mankind. It implies, too, that
churches which deny the ethics of world community may be considered guilty of heresy.”
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