Search results

During the debate on human rights and obstetric fistula at the 52nd session of the UN Human Rights Council, the World Council of Churches (WCC) with its ecumenical partners called upon governments to pay more attention to the prevention of obstetric fistula in their policies, strategic plans, and budgets.

As a crowd of more than 300 gathered, the St Paul’s University School of Theology officially launched Thursdays in Black, pledging to build an Africa without violence and to join together on a pilgrimage of justice, peace, and reconciliation.

Two World Council of Churches (WCC) HIV initiatives met to review and celebrate the critical and life-changing work of the initiatives and to continue planning for a strengthened WCC HIV response in the new WCC Commission of the Churches on Health and Healing.

The Family and Sexual Violence Action Committee, based in Papua New Guinea, continues to advocate against sexual violence, and has been lighting a special “lamp of justice and peace” as part of the Thursdays in Black campaign for a world free from rape and violence.

Upon the 20th anniversary of the UN Resolution 1325, the question is still being answered as to whether women’s important work in peace and security is getting the visibility it deserves.

Amid growing concerns over runaway corruption and public debt in Africa, the All Africa Conference of Churches on 21 September launched a policy brief on the challenges, saying the two were now inseparable in the continent.

Rev. Dr Lydia Mwaniki, director for Women, Gender and Youth at the All Africa Conference of Churches, has received the Lanfranc Award for Education and Scholarship from the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Thursdays in Black grew out of women’s movements of resilience and resistance to injustice, abuse and violence. In the Pacific region, which has some of the highest recorded rates of violence against women, churches are leading conversations to change attitudes and actions. Domestic violence is prevalent throughout Fiji. According to UN Women’s Global Database on Violence against Women, almost 2 out of 3 women aged 18-64 in Fiji have experienced physical or sexual violence from their intimate partner – almost twice the global average.

In a statement to the president of the Republic of Indonesia, Papuan religious leaders are urging justice for seven defendants on trial in the Balikpapan - East Kalimantan District Court who held a demonstration because they were rejecting racist treatment. “But the indictments and charges at the trial were very different from the data and facts in the field,” reads the statement. “They are victims of racism but they have been accused of treason.”

Frontline actions by African faith communities in mitigating against the novel coronavirus are being welcomed as timely, as groups move to support people left vulnerable by the pandemic.