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In the midst of a mounting climate of fear of refugees and immigrants, the WCC is calling on Christians to be true to the Biblical imperative to “welcome the stranger”.

Nearly 60 participants gathered to reflect on the theme “Reclaim Evangelism!” at the North American 2015 Conference on Evangelism, held 29 October - 2 November in Nashville, Tennessee (U.S.). The conference was organized by the WCC and the NCCUSA, in consultation with the Canadian Council of Churches, and it was hosted by the Discipleship Ministries of the United Methodist Church.

Church World Service, Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, and other faith communities are urging the U.S. government to resettle 100,000 Syrian refugees this coming fiscal year, in addition to increasing the total U.S. resettlement commitment to 100,000 refugees from other parts of the world.

An historic vote in Canada has set the stage for close cooperation between two North American churches.

A new publication provides collected reflections on ecology and ethics, including a chapter by Dr Guillermo Kerber, programme executive for Care for Creation and Climate Justice at the WCC.

Seventy years after nuclear fireballs exploded over two Japanese cities, an ecumenical group of pilgrims has come to Hiroshima to listen to those who survived and renew the struggle against their own countries’ continued reliance on nuclear weapons.

Church leaders from seven countries currently making historic choices for or against outlawing nuclear weapons will embark on a pilgrimage in early August to the two Japanese cities that were decimated by atomic bombs 70 years ago.

Bishop Mark MacDonald shared views on indigenous peoples and climate change in an interview with WCC Communications. "We are entering an era in which the public has a broader awareness of the rights of indigenous peoples," he said.

The WCC has condemned the mass killing at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, United States.

Four weeks of negotiations on nuclear weapons came to a close on Friday 22 May, as the Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty ended without a formal agreement. Despite the outcome, a bright new prospect towards a world without nuclear weapons has emerged in the form of a Humanitarian Pledge, now endorsed by 107 states, which promises “to fill the legal gap for the prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons”.

“Nuclear weapons are incompatible with the values upheld by our respective faith traditions”, representatives of some 50 Christian, Buddhist, Muslim and Jewish organizations said on 1 May. The inter-religious statement came in a joint call to the 191 governments participating in the world’s largest disarmament treaty. The call, co-sponsored by the WCC, was made during civil society presentations to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference in New York City.

A court decision in the Dominican Republic annulling the citizenship of an estimated 200,000 Dominicans of Haitian ancestry has been strongly criticized by church leaders, including the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church.

The newly published issue of Current Dialogue is now available online. Along with key documents from the WCC 10th Assembly, the issue includes several strong pieces addressing some thorny issues in contemporary inter-religious encounter and dialogue, including the recent Malaysian prohibition of Christian use of the name Allah for God, the relationship of ecumenism and inter-religious dialogue, the particular difficulties in dialogue among the Abrahamic traditions, and the limits of dialogue itself.

Ferguson is in turmoil. So is New York. And so is Union Theological Seminary in the city of New York, a long-standing institution of theological education located on the upper west side of Manhattan – or in West Harlem – since 1836.

The WCC Executive Committee has expressed deep concern over recent developments in the United States following the Grand Jury’s decision not to indict officer Darren Wilson in the killing of Michael Brown.

Evangelism in new contexts was the focus of a meeting last week in Atlanta, Georgia, United States, involving the WCC and the North American councils of churches. The meeting’s primary objective was to set the agenda for a larger consultation on evangelism in North America, slated before the end of 2015.

Indigenous peoples have a role to play in the struggle against climate change, indigenous faith leaders said during a panel at the Interfaith Summit on Climate Change held at the Church Center for the United Nations in New York City.

Scattered throughout the recent history of Indigenous Peoples are national treaties, declarations and laws that languish in obscurity or are brushed aside and ignored.

Churches in the United States, including member churches of the WCC, have called on the Obama administration to open up a high-level dialogue with Cuba aimed at normalizing relations between the two countries.

In an ecumenical harvest, a spate of European and North American church bodies are entering agreements recognizing each other’s baptisms.