Stockholm – As of 2012, three Swedish free churches intend to merge into one. That decision has been reached by the country’s Baptist union, Evangelical-Methodist Church and the Mission Covenant Church. The new church will have roughly 70.000 members and 900 congregations. At the first constitutional meeting in Stockholm on 4 June, the required bylaws were adopted and an executive committee elected – but no president or general-secretary was named. The seat of the new church will be Stockholm’s Ecumenical Centre. The new church’s name remains unclear - the 434 delegates were unable to reach agreement. The proposed name of Oecumenica Church met stiff opposition in the discussions and needed to be withdrawn. Consequently, the church will continue to be called by its inofficial title, Gemensam Framtid (Joint Future), for an interim period. Before the next annual gathering in 2014, the executive committee will need to propose a new name. The Baptist press release states that Jesus’ prayer for unity was the primary motive for unification. Talks on strengthening cooperation began in the 1970s; the youth federations of the three denominations officially merged in 2008.

The new church’s largest member will be the Mission Covenant Church consisting of 686 congregations and 65.000 members. The Baptist Union of Sweden has 207 congregations with a membership of roughly 17.500. One-hundred-sixteen of these 207 congregatons are strictly Baptist; 43 more belong to both the Baptist union and the Mission Covenant Church. An additional 48 are also linked to the Methodists, the InterAct missions movement (the one-time “Örebro Mission Society”), the Pentecostal movement or others. The Evangelical-Methodist Church consists of 55 congregations and a membership of roughly 3.300. In general, local congregations belong to a wide variety of umbrella organisations.

It was also reported that Karin Wiborn, the long-time General-Secretary of Swedish Baptists, has been elected General-Secretary for the Christian Council of Sweden. She has belonged to this Council’s executive committee since 2007. She will succeed Sven-Bernhard Fast, who has been elected Bishop of Visby for the Lutheran Church of Sweden. The Christian Council of Sweden consists of 27 churches having a joint membership of roughly 8,1 million. Of these, 7,6 million are Lutheran, 165.000 are Catholic, 250.000 are free church and another 100.000 are Orthodox.