Peace-building: Conflict transformation & Reconciliation

While divisions, conflicts and violence grow in many parts of the world, Christians and Christian churches are entrusted with the ministry of peace and reconciliation. This ministry calls for ecumenical engagement by the churches against any form of violence - on the international and national level, in our societies and our families.

The World Council of Churches’ peacebuilding efforts are aimed at conflict transformation and reconciliation.

The concept of just peace, developed at the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation (IEPC) in 2011, continues to be a major theological focus for WCC and is reflected in the invitation by the WCC’s 10th Assembly for Christians and people of good will everywhere to join in a Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace.

The situation of the Middle East demands collective efforts by ecumenical partners to achieve peace and justice at local, national, regional and international levels. Major problems in the region include armed occupation of territory, denial of human rights and national aspirations, failures to implement the rule of law, various forms of extremism and intolerance, nuclear proliferation, as well as control of energy resources.

The WCC is accompanying its member churches in the region, especially in Egypt, Syria and Iraq, where the recent dramatic, violent developments have endangered the Christian presence and witness. WCC keeps its focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, supporting UN resolutions and other efforts for a peaceful and just settlement of the conflict.

Inaugurated in August 2002, WCC’s Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel accompanies Palestinians and Israelis in their non-violent actions and concerted advocacy efforts to end the 50-years-long Israeli occupation of Palestine.

Since the 2013 WCC 10th Assembly in Busan, South Korea, and in the response to escalating tensions and risks of nuclear-armed conflict in the region, the World Council of Churches (WCC) and its member churches have renewed and strengthened their commitment to increased ecumenical efforts for peace, reconciliation and reunification of the divided Korean people.

Commitments expressed in the Panmunjom Joint Declaration, signed by the leaders of South Korea and North Korea in April 2018, closely match the key foci and objectives of over three decades of ecumenical advocacy for peace and reunification in the Korean Peninsula.

The WCC strongly affirms the commitment to the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in the context of the ecumenical movement’s support for nuclear disarmament globally. The WCC encourages churches to pray for an end to confrontation and calls for intensified ecumenical engagement with the North and South Korean Christians in their pilgrimage of justice and peace.