Olav Fykse Tveit to step down as Head of World Council of Churches

Secretary General of the WCC Olav Fykse Tveit. Photo: stbasil.center

On March 31, 2020, Lutheran pastor from Norway Dr. Olav Fykse Tveit will leave the post of Secretary General of the World Council of Churches, which he has held since 2010, Blagovest-info reports.

The organization will be led by a clergyman of the Romanian Orthodox Church, Archpriest John Sauka, until the election of a new secretary general, scheduled for June.

The 59-year-old Olav Fykse Tveit, who was the WCC's Secretary General for two five-year terms, was elected Preses (Presiding Bishop) of the Lutheran Church of Norway. His ordination and installation will take place on April 26 in the Nidaros Cathedral of Trondheim. In August, Olav Fykse Tveit will again arrive at the WCC to present his final report.

The WCC’s session to elect the new secretary general was scheduled for March 18-24 but was postponed until June due to the threat of coronavirus.

Archpriest John Sauka is a graduate of theological faculties in Sibiu and Bucharest, Ph.D. with a degree in Missiology from the University of Birmingham. He was a teacher of missiology and ecumenism at the Theological Faculty of Sibiu, then he headed the newly created Department for Press and Communications of the Romanian Orthodox Church, worked in the Department of External and Ecumenical Relations of the Romanian Patriarchate, oversaw religious education in secular educational institutions of Romania.

John was employed by the WCC in 1994, taking the post of executive secretary for Orthodox studies and relations in the mission. Since 1998, he has taught at the Ecumenical Institute of Bosse near Geneva, in 2001 became its director. Since 2014, he has been Deputy Secretary General of the WCC.

As reported by the UOJ, earlier the head of the WCC, Dr. Olav Fykse Tveit, assured that the Council of Churches considers the UOC as the only universally recognized Orthodox Church in Ukraine.

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