Since 2008, the World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical Water Network has invited member churches to use the season of Lent to reflect on God’s gift of water.
The former coordinator of the WCC Ecumenical Water Network, Maike Gorsboth, and Rev. Jane Stranz, pastor in Courbevoie of the United Protestant Church of France, gave an anecdotal background of how the Seven Weeks for Water was launched 14 years ago through an experimental blog on biblical reflections on water justice issues. They were overjoyed by the widespread reception of this Lenten campaign that has reinvigorated WCC member churches around water justice issues.
The moderator of WCC central committee, Dr Agnes Abuom, in a pre-recorded video message, reflected on how water justice is an important component of the WCC’s Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace. She said, “As well, we can see that both [the] justice and peace [movement] and [the] water justice network accompany people on the margins, where they draw lessons of transforming past experiences and heal present wounds.”
Abuom said that the central concept is justice. “It can be economic justice, social justice, political and religious justice, and structures that transcend from just relationships with God, the Creator, and the created nature,” she said. “Both the Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace and the water justice network are movements and momentums that seek to address matters of injustice, oppression, inequality, conflict and threats to life.”
Summaries of all seven reflections of this year’s Seven Weeks for Water were presented.