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How a meeting place became a sacred space

Two years ago, Andrés Pacheco Lozano defended his PhD. The title of his research was “Pilgrimage of Reconciliation: Relationship Between Communitarian Bible Reading.” Now, it was time to celebrate with a mini symposium "Communities of Faith Reading the Bible Across Cultures: A Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace.” For two days, 24 and 25 October, participants reflected on contextual and intercultural Bible reading at the Singelkerk and the Free University in Amsterdam.

Treating the underlying conditions

On May 24, the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA hosted a memorial service for lives lost to COVID-19. In a time of physical distancing, the church ecumenical gathered online for “A Time to Mourn,” drawing thousands together to remember and lament. Grounded in our hope in the resurrection, the Rev. Elizabeth A Eaton, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, declared, “The body of Christ is COVID-positive.”

Who is my neighbor? Love at a time of physical distance?

May God's comfort and love be with you who are holding up every day in the midst of the coronavirus. We lost our normal lives very quickly and we are experiencing limitations of human being in the face of such a sudden disaster. The number of confirmed cases and deaths that flow out of the news every day seems unrealistic, and this painful reality puts us in deep frustration.

When forced to stay in a place of danger

While reading Psalm 46, I noticed a very interesting introduction to the poem. It read, ‘To the leader. Of the Korahites. According to Alamoth. A Song.’ (NRSV) My curiosity peaked. An alamoth could be a soprano instrument or a direct reference to young female singers, (that is – virgins). Intrigued, I read a few commentaries and the preceding psalm, which also references alamoth, albeit in the context of a wedding feast. I wondered whether the two poems, ascribed to the same family of writers and maintaining that peculiar introit, could once have been one psalm.

Like a prophet: breaking the silence

As we continue our 16 Days Against Gender-based Violence, one of the fundamental messages that must be heard is to break the cycle of remaining silent. This is critical because at so many levels in our society we are repeatedly being told to be quiet.

Hospitality, food and gender-based violence

In the context of extensive migrations due to climate change and economic hardships, women are increasingly being left alone in rural areas, taking care of children, elders, and farms. It is estimated that women are responsible for carrying out 70% of agriculture in the world. However, few have legal rights to land and property and have poor access to resources. Much of the work women do in the context of providing for livelihood and care is not sufficiently acknowledged.

Sharing is caring

"Sharing is caring" I hear my little granddaughter say. "Sharing is caring" children sing in nursery schools and on playgrounds. #SharingIsCaring in hundreds of thousands of tweets and social media posts. Sharing toys, sharing food, sharing joy, sharing love, sharing stories, sharing pain, sharing our lives, from our house to yours. “Sharing is caring” – it seems so simple, so logical.

Love is the action of unity

As a young person who finds myself passionately involved in human rights movements, I often wonder how people’s unity at a large scale is sustained and even strengthened. Most of us understand what binds our smaller and closer relationships, but our acts of unity among the larger society despite all our differences certainly goes beyond believing in the same cause and being well organised.

Love heals: it never hurts

Let us talk about Abuse and Love. Growing up as a child, I saw my mother being physically, emotionally, mentally abused by my father. She was beaten, violated, abused – but not once did she ever mention this to anyone. One day, I asked my mother why she had to take all the pain, the violence and abuse she was going through in the hands of my father all to herself. Guess what… She said, my daughter listen, “your father hits me, he beats me, he hurts me because he loves me.”

Taking a visible stand against gender-based violence in Uganda

Before I was born and as I grew up, there were many gender stereotypes that negatively affected women and girls. These included beating wives and not appreciating baby girls. In my culture, girls were deprived of education, because taking them to school was considered a waste of resources. Parents and the general communities looked at girls as sources of dowry (bride price) and so they were married off at an age of 14 -18 years.

We cannot baptise violence

The 16 days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence serve as a reminder to the world that such violence remains widespread. Women from diverse social, economic, political, religious and other backgrounds are vulnerable to violence. Sadly, religion has denied many women survivors of gender-based violence access to justice.

Phenomenal woman

Without peace, there is no justice. Too often, we pursue justice at the expense of peace, and peace at the expense of justice. To conceive peace apart from justice is to compromise the hope that “justice and peace shall embrace” (Ps 85:10). When justice and peace are lacking, or set in opposition, we need to reform our ways. Let us rise, therefore, and work together for peace and justice.

A church that cares for its youth in the midst of HIV and AIDS

The old chapel of the United Evangelical Church "Anglican Community in Angola" in the neighborhood of Golf 1 in Luanda turned out to be quite small for the large number of students from the church's district school. 200 of them had come to attend a workshop on "HIV and AIDS amongst Adolescents and Youth: The Church´s Responsibility" on 2 August, organized by the World Council of Churches' Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy (WCC-EHAIA) team.

Together Towards Life: becoming a Church of inclusivity

When I was invited to attend the consultation on spirituality, worship and mission, I was asked to prepare some personal reflections on my own spiritual journey as a young person. I was asked to share what advice I had for the WCC with respect to how to engage youth in the Church as they aimed to define what they could say "about the spiritualities of the Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace and how to manifest it in worship, spiritual formation, and mission activities of the church as well as in daily life."