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At a Peace Conference in Jakarta, Indonesia, hosted by the United Evangelical Mission (UEM) and the Communion of Churches in Indonesia (PGI), Peter Prove, director of the World Council of Churches Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, participated as a panel speaker during a session on ““Global Challenges and Perspective for Interfaith Action” on 21 November.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) will be represented at the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (IFES) World Assembly on 2-10 August in Jakarta, Indonesia.

Rev. Dr Santanu Kumar Patro, registrar of the Senate of Serampore College (University), passed away on 5 May in Calcutta. The news of his death was met with outpourings of grief and gratefulness from students, faculty and friends of seminaries and institutions responsible for theological education in South Asia and beyond.

Rev. Fr Dr Lawrence Iwuamadi is dean of the Ecumenical Institute, the graduate school which opened its academic year this week. Below, Iwuamadi reflects on the arrival of new students at the Ecumenical Institute during this remarkable time.

Alumni from the World Council of Churches Ecumenical Institute Bossey who live in Thailand are continuing to foster ecumenical activities and relations. Every year for a decade, they have offered a local orientation for new students from Thailand who are headed to Bossey.

Former Bossey student Rev. Jianmei Jing who works at the Jingling Protestant Church in Hongkou near Shanghai in China has shown that masking your intention can be a truly Christian act. At significant sacrifice during the current COVID-19 pandemic when they were in short supply, she managed to get hold of 300 face masks and sent them to the Bossey community who she knew needed them in Switzerland.

As of January 2020, the WCC has relaunched its Sarah Chakko Scholarship Fund. The fund was first established in 1998, at the end of the Ecumenical Decade of Solidarity with Women, aiming to promote the education of women for leadership competencies for the ecumenical movement.

During a visit from World Council of Churches (WCC) deputy general secretary Prof. Dr Isabel Apawo Phiri, WCC member churches in Japan received expressions of appreciation from the WCC for hosting various visits and forums that strengthened ecumenical ties.

WCC members in Japan reported a deepening spirit of koinonia as well as more involvement in the programmatic life of the WCC, particularly as the ecumenical movement sets its sights on the upcoming WCC 11th Assembly in 2021 in Karlsruhe, Germany.

His Holiness Moran Mar Baselios Marthoma Paulose II, Supreme Head of the Indian (Malankara) Orthodox Church, and Catholicos of the East, met with Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia at St Daniel Monastery in Moscow on 3 September.

His Holiness Catholicos Paulose II thanked Patriarch Kirill for the hospitality, stressing that “forty years have elapsed and now we as primates of our Churches can resume the exchange of visits. Your Holiness, your love and insight have helped to make it possible. Once again, thank you for it”.

As the Youth in Asia Training for Religious Amity opened at the Yonsei University Chapel in South Korea on 18 September, participants were already learning to live into the theme “Stewards of Hope, Seekers of Harmony.” For the first time, the training includes not only young people from Asia but from across the world, and is being co-coordinated by the World Council of Churches (WCC) Programme for Interreligious Dialogue and Cooperation, the Council for World Mission, and youth representatives from the ecumenical movement.

Au lancement de la formation des jeunes en Asie pour l’amitié religieuse (YATRA) le 18 septembre dans la chapelle de l’Université Yonsei, en Corée du Sud, les participant-e-s apprennent déjà à s’immerger dans le thème «intendants de l’espoir, prospecteurs d’harmonie».

C’est la première fois que la formation inclut non seulement des jeunes venus d’Asie, mais également du monde entier. Elle est coordonnée à la fois par le Programme pour le dialogue interreligieux et la jeunesse dans le mouvement œcuménique du Conseil œcuménique des Églises (COE), le Conseil pour la mission mondiale (CMM) et la Communion mondiale d’Églises réformées (CMER).

Twenty-seven young ecumenists from across Asia are currently attending the month-long Asian Ecumenical Institute organized by the Christian Conference of Asia. The programme aims to provide ecumenical formation and leadership development training for prospective church and ecumenical leaders. It is being held at the Christian Conference of Asia headquarters in Payap University Campus in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

In the wake of the Easter Sunday terrorist attacks in Sri Lanka, the Omnia Institute for Contextual Leadership, based in Chicago, lifted up points of hope that peace will win in the end. In a 25 April message, Shanta Premawardhana, president of the institute, wrote that every person of every faith of every nation deserves to wake up in peace. “Every child deserves to feel safe, welcomed, and alive to the promise that each day brings,” Premawardhana wrote. “I'm sure you know that this is why we build Interfaith Peacemaker Teams in Sri Lanka.”

The Christian Conference of Asia gathered over 100 participants representing seven religions including Christian, Buddhist, Islamic, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu and Sikh to meet with the participants of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace Reference Group to discuss relevant issues about religion and their implications to the Asian society.

La Conférence chrétienne d’Asie a invité plus de 100 représentants de sept religions – des chrétiens, des bouddhistes, des musulmans, des juifs, des bahaïs, des hindous et des sikhs – à rencontrer les participants du Groupe de référence du Pèlerinage pour la justice et la paix du Conseil œcuménique des Églises (COE), pour discuter de questions relatives à la religion et de leurs implications pour la société asiatique.

An ecumenical delegation coordinated by the World Council of Churches (WCC) visited Indonesia on 15-22 February, including the provinces of Papua and Papua Barat - where increasing violence and discrimination against indigenous Papuan people was recently highlighted in a joint statement by five UN human rights mandate-holders.

Une délégation œcuménique coordonnée par le Conseil œcuménique des Églises (COE) s’est rendue en Indonésie du 15 au 22 février, visitant notamment les provinces de la Papouasie et de la Papouasie occidentale, où, selon une déclaration commune récente de cinq mandataires des Nations Unies travaillant dans le domaine des droits de la personne, les violences et les discriminations à l’encontre des populations papoues autochtones se multiplient.

Social media was awash with messages of love on Valentine’s Day, but from Thursdays in Black supporters, the flowers came with strong messages that love is not violent.

Les réseaux médias ont débordé de messages d’amour pour la Saint-Valentin. Mais, pour les internautes soutenant les Jeudis en noir, les fleurs étaient accompagnées de messages catégoriques sur l’incompatibilité de l’amour et de la violence.