The forum is the core programme of the Northeast Asia Reconciliation Initiative (NARI), which was founded in 2012. NARI is grounded in mutually transformative relationships between the following partner organisations: the Duke Divinity School Center for Reconciliation, the Mennonite Central Committee, and institutions and leaders in Northeast Asia. Our sister Choi Hae Young is one of the members of this council that promotes ecumenical collaboration.
The following prayer, shared and recited during the forum, expresses our hopes and desires towards our common mission, in spite of the current conflicts, divisions, and historical wounds that confront us in this region.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No programme accomplishes the Church’s mission.
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about.
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realising that.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way,
We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.
Section |International News
Province |Japan|Korea/Chinese
