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Members of the WCC's Ecumenical Disability Advocates Network met in the Netherlands to develop a new statement with the working title "Gift of Being: Called to be a Church of All and for All". The new document is founded on the premise that persons with disabilities experience marginalization both in societies and in the church communities themselves.

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

In his Easter reflections, the WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit called this year an “opportunity for shared testimony to the Resurrection” since churches from both eastern and western traditions of Christianity will celebrate Easter on the same day, Sunday 20 April.

Dans ses réflexions pascales, le pasteur Olav Fykse Tveit, secrétaire général du COE, a affirmé que cette année représente «une chance pour le témoignage commun de la résurrection». Cette année en effet, les Églises des traditions orientale et occidentale du christianisme célébreront Pâques le même jour, le dimanche 20 avril.

A communiqué adopted at a WCC consultation describes human trafficking as a “serious human rights violation” and its consequences are “most horrific results of the economic and social disparities that increase the vulnerability of millions of people”.

In an audience with Pope Francis in the Vatican, the WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit stressed the significance of Christian unity. He also expressed appreciation for Pope Francis’s call to pray for peace in Syria and his call for churches to remember the poor, encouraging Christians to work for economic justice.

Lors d'une audience avec le pape François au Vatican, le pasteur Olav Fykse Tveit, secrétaire général du COE a insisté sur l'importance de l'unité chrétienne. Il a en outre exprimé sa satisfaction concernant l'appel du pape François à prier pour la paix en Syrie et son exhortation faite aux Églises pour qu'elles gardent toujours les pauvres à l'esprit, encourageant les chrétiens et chrétiennes à œuvrer en faveur de la justice économique.

Today the WCC 10th Assembly hosted a unity plenary. The plenary invited participants to reflect on unity and the spiritual journey of fellowship grounded in prayerful reflection.

Migrants are reduced to mere commodities, traded and exchanged in the global market, according to a declaration issued by churches calling for an end to this gross violation of human dignity. The declaration was issued on the occasion of the Second United Nations High Level Dialogue on International Migration and Development in New York City, USA.

At the recent World Social Forum, ecumenical voices warned about the grave consequences of extraction of natural resources and mining, which they say generate a tremendous amount of social and ecological debt.

Transformative spiritualities and mission is a significant point of discussion at the pre-assembly event of the WCC Commission on World Mission and Evangelism (CWME) which is currently under way in Manila. Transformative spiritualities are also one of the constituent themes of the CWME statement on mission and evangelism that will be presented to the WCC 10th Assembly in Busan, Korea in 2013. Dr Rico Palaca Ponce, academic director of the Institute of Spirituality in Asia based in Quezon City, the Philippines, gave an interview on the topic on 23 March.

With more than 200 participants from around the globe, an event of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission on World Mission and Evangelism (CWME) starts today in Manila, the Philippines. Its aim is to seek renewed thinking on mission and evangelism, developing a draft of the WCC statement on mission and evangelism that succeeds a statement of thirty years ago.

“Without any doubt, ecclesiology remains in our times the crucial issue for Christian theology in ecumenical perspective.” This was one of the conclusions drawn by a week-long consultation in Cyprus at which forty Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox representatives provided a common response to The Nature and Mission of the Church, a 2005 ecumenical text published by the WCC Commission on Faith and Order.