Search results

Christian educators and other church leaders in Togo are eagerly turning the pages of a new resource for children, a curriculum entitled “Because God Loves Me—Affirming My Value in Christ,” published by the World Council of Churches (WCC).

The South Sudan Council of Churches is inviting churches to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, observed globally on 19 June. The council published a series of messages available for use in worship services over the weekend.

Damaris, a Nigerian woman, described her experience of 2020: “We’ve gone through hell.”

Damaris and her sisters were kidnapped in March 2020 and threatened with death as their kidnappers demanded money. Her father had to sell everything and beg on the streets to meet their demands. “We are just a common people in Nigeria,” she said. “We don’t know what we did.”

Brought together by the South Sudan Council of Churches, women and men are sharing the pain of many years of war and associated gender-based violence in a series of workshops in Kenya and Burundi.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy programme sponsored an intergenerational workshop on HIV, masculinities, femininities and sexual reproductive health education for 35 adolescents, young people, theologians, and religious leaders from 28-30 October at the Village du Benin, University of Lomé, Togo.

Pastors, supervisors, teachers, counselors, chaplains and youth from primary schools, universities, theological institutions, and churches met from 23-24 May at the Theresia Residency in Togo to reflect and deepen their knowledge on masculinities, femininities and HIV.

Speaking in Lviv, Ukraine on 30 August, World Council of Churches (WCC) deputy general secretary Prof. Dr Isabel Apawo Phiri presented a paper on ”Women and Ecumenical Engagement for Peace in South Sudan,” reflecting on the experiences of a Pilgrim Team visit by the WCC in May 2018.

If the human spirit and likeness of God's will for peace with justice for all people is alive in the world, the pilgrim team that visited South Sudan this week has witnessed it. From 5-9 May, a World Council of Churches “Pilgrim Team” visited South Sudan under the theme “African Women of Faith and Gender Justice.” The delegation was hosted by the South Sudan Council of Churches (SSCC).

Twenty-five people took part in a workshop in Lome, Togo on 9-11 July jointly organized by the World Council of Churches Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy (WCC-EHAIA) and the Church of Sweden.

In the West African countries of Togo and Benin, adolescents and young people are confronted by various obstacles in accessing sexual and reproductive health services. Organized by the World Council of Churches Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy West Africa regional office in Lomé, Togo, a workshop for 25 adolescents and young people from Benin and Togo helped participants make safe, responsible choices that prevent HIV infection.

“She is HIV positive too. No need to inherit her late husband’s title deed. She will die soon and leave it anyway.”

These man’s thoughts during his brother’s funeral were used by Jane Ng’ang’a, national coordinator, International Network of Religious Leaders Living with or Personally Affected by HIV (INERELA+) Kenya Chapter, to push the debate on property and inheritance rights linked to HIV. The discussion was held during the 61st Session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), on 16 March, at the headquarters of UNAIDS, in New York.

Sexual and reproductive health services must be not just "youth-friendly" but also “male- and female-friendly" and "youth participatory" so that young men and women gain access to the information and services they need and want, agreed adolescents who attended a workshop in Lomé, Togo on 24-25 March.

Preventing HIV, particularly among adolescents and youth, was the focus of a two-day meeting for 25 Sunday school teachers and chaplains from the Methodist Church of Togo, Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Togo, Assemblies of God, Baptist Convention and Pentecostal Church.

When a WCC meeting on ecumenical HIV and AIDS response concluded last week in Limuru, Kenya, its message to the global HIV and AIDS community was terse: traditional ways of tackling the pandemic have failed.

“HIV and AIDS is not just a public health issue. It is a multi-layered social issue – an issue churches in West Africa should not ignore,” says Rev. Godson Lawson, a pastor in the Methodist Church in Togo, a country where 110,000 people are living with HIV and 6,600 lives have been lost to the pandemic, according to recent UNAIDS estimates.

Churches in Togo have taken on a compelling fight against HIV and AIDS. Sexual minorities, highly vulnerable to the pandemic, remain in dire need of pastoral care that encourages access to HIV prevention facilities, if their lives are to be saved.