36. The church does not practise formation in abstraction from its history. The experiences congregations encounter in trying to find their way are themselves formational. The memory of past experience, including the experience of moral failure in the face of challenges such as those of nationalism, ethnicity, racism and violence, needs to be taken into our consciousness. The power of the community of faith to bear moral witness in society rests not only on its inner life but also on the outward roles it has played, and may in the future be challenged to play. A church not positioned where the gospel demands it to be amid social forces and events will mal-form its members, rendering them insensitive to the demands of their faith. Churches need ecumenical relationships, with the global accumulation of experience those relationships make available, in order to find an adequate perspective.

37. These thoughts need concrete illustration. We need to observe some respects in which the churches have failed to locate themselves rightly in relation to historic issues, and some instances in which the churches have, by the grace of God, better fulfilled their callings. We draw the examples given in the next few paragraphs both from recent European history and from the recent history of South Africa.

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