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Today the world joins in mourning the passing of a towering figure in the struggle for freedom and for human dignity and rights.

Religious and traditional leaders in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) participated in online consultations on the SADC Model Law on gender-based violence.

The Religious Forum Against COVID-19 in South Africa issued a statement with faith leaders standing in solidarity in response to COVID-19, and with a broader objective of collaborating in making for a safer South African environment.

Religious leaders in South Africa signed a letter on behalf of The People’s Vaccine Campaign Of South Africa that urges the US medical team leading the COVID-19 pandemic response to address the global vaccine shortage, and urges the US government to take specific actions.

South African church leaders heard that corruption in their country kills when they organized for a campaign against the latest version of pillaging during the fight against the novel coronavirus pandemic.

On 15 September, the South African Council of Churches will stand in silent prayer in all nine provinces to declare that “Corruption is Not Our Heritage.”

The South African Council of Churches released guidelines for member churches as they prepare for the COVID readiness of their congregations.

Africa is of huge concern around the novel coronavirus pandemic for the World Health Organization (WHO), but the continent’s churches have been preparing for the silent and lethal virus for some time.

With great sadness, the World Council of Churches (WCC) received news of the demise of Prof. Vuyani Vellem on 4 December. A member of the WCC’s Commission on Ecumenical Education and Formation, Vellem was director of the Centre for Public Theology and associate professor at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. He also served as deputy secretary of the South Africa Council of Churches.

World Council of Churches leaders spoke on the theme “Hospitality: On a Pilgrim’s Way of Justice and Peace" at a symposium on 23 August at the Protestant Theological University Amsterdam.

In 2018 we celebrate the 70th anniversary of the World Council of Churches. In order to create a lively firsthand account of the ecumenical fellowship and of our shared journey, member churches have contributed stories of people, events, achievements and even failures, all of which have deepened our collective search for Christian unity. This story was written by Olle Eriksson, a Namibian who worked for 35 years (1968 – 2003) with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia, Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission and Lutheran World Federation.

After an historic meeting in South Africa in June 2017, study groups within the WCC Faith and Order Commission are using theological reflection as a tool to build unity between churches. The questions Faith and Order considers are not abstract issues but, in many contexts across the world, matters of life and death.

The Dutch Reformed Church (DRC) in South Africa is currently striving to revive and enhance its missional identity with its core aspect being a church for Africa, said DRC general secretary Dr Gustav Claassen.

For the World Council of Churches Comission on Faith and Order, meeting in South Africa this year holds special significance. In 1960 a WCC meeting with member churches in the country was followed by a parting of ways with one of those churches for more than half a century, over the question of apartheid.

The World Council of Churches Commission on Faith and Order will begin an 8-day meeting this week in Pretoria, South Africa, dedicating an opening ceremony to youth, reflecting on their struggles with past injustices and noting their key role in opening gateways to the future.

World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit joined others in congratulating Prof. Jürgen Moltmann for receiving an honorary doctorate of divinity degree on 5 April from the Theological Faculty of Pretoria University, South Africa.

Christianity is growing faster in Africa than anywhere else in the world says Rev. Fr Dr Lawrence Iwuamadi, Professor of Ecumenical Biblical Hermeneutics at the Ecumenical Institute, Bossey. He was the convener of a discussion on the Anthology of African Christianity held by the WCC on 15 February with a panel of experts at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva.

Increasingly, the unity of the church is threatened by different positions on moral issues. In response to this, the Faith and Order Commission of the WCC continues to study how churches arrive at the ethical decisions they make.

A five-day consultation on “Evangelism in Theological Education and Missiological Formation In Africa” drew some 25 participants who explored what it means to live out authentic Christian witness within secular, multicultural and multi-religious contexts.