a294  1945  23 Nov 89
AM-Europarliament-Runcie,0343
Runcie Says East European Churches Must Not Become Organs Of Ideology
By CHRISTINA MACKENZIE
Associated Press Writer
    STRASBOURG, France (AP) - Archbishop Robert Runcie of Canterbury
said Thursday that churches in Eastern Europe must not seek to
replace crumbling communist parties as instruments for ideology.
    In a speech to the European Parliament, Runcie also urged the
assembly to continue to question capitalism.
    Runcie heads the Anglican Communion, a global family of churches
with 70 million members. He is also the spiritual leader of the
Church of England and president of the British Council of Churches.
    ''While it looks as if at the moment communism has lost the battle
for hearts and minds in Europe, it certainly cannot be said that
capitalism as a total world view has won,'' Runcie said.
    He said recent ''events in East Germany are as much a vindication of
Protestantism as are the events in Poland of Catholicism.''
    Yet churches there ''should not seek to replace the Communist party
as an organ for ideological purity.''
    ''Christian faith is not an ideology,'' the archbishop said.
    Runcie said that despite recent democratic reform in Eastern Europe,
''we must not shut our eyes or close our ears to the world. ... No
Europe (is) worthy of the name if it is not open to the world.''
    He cautioned against seeing the changes in Europe as an all-out
victory for capitalism.
    The nearer capitalism ''comes to triumphing totally, the more
questions are raised about its capacity to be magnanimous in victory,
to heed the cries of the poor at home and abroad, to seek the paths
of peace and to care tenderly for the Earth,'' Runcie said.
    He said urgent solutions must be found to global environmental
problems.
    ''We are part of our environment. If it dies, so do we,'' he said.
    Runcie said churches have had to add to the struggle for justice and
peace, the fight for the environment, the fight for ''the integrity
of creation.''
    
 
AP-NY-11-23-89 2237EST
***************