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Globalization has been cited by the World Council of Churches (WCC) as a prime cause of economic inequality, poverty and political injustice, and the moderator of the WCC Central Committee said Monday (26 August) that the churches must work together to redirect its impact.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) has begun a review of programme plans for 2003 to 2005 in order to strengthen the organization and chart a course for the future. At its meeting in Geneva, 26 August to 3 September, the WCC Central Committee heard a call from its Finance Committee for a review of programme plans that would allow for a budgeted operating surplus in 2003.

"In a century of surprises which we have already begun," the churches of Christ will have to move closer to unity to give the 75-year-old Faith and Order movement renewed meaning, a church leader told an anniversary celebration Sunday (25 August).

"We must have the courage to admit that the market and globalization have failed more than two-thirds of the world population who live in poverty," says Dr Molefe Tsele, general secretary of the South African Council of Churches (SACC). "The evidence, which is impossible to hide any longer, is that we are now living with the legacy of unparalleled inequality between North and South, impoverishment, and deprivation of the barest necessities of life and dignity."

Bob Scott

Issued jointly with the Conference of European Churches

cf. WCC Press Release, PR-02-21, of 31 July 2002

Bob Scott

The US-declared war on terrorism, still widely popular in the United States but subject to increasing scepticism elsewhere in the world, will be the focus of an international ecumenical meeting in Washington, D.C., 5-6 August.

The general secretary of the World Council of Churches (WCC), Rev. Dr Konrad Raiser, has today written to the Most Rev. Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Wales, congratulating him on his appointment as the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury.

Bob Scott

Michael Stahl

The World Council of Churches (WCC) was deeply grieved to learn of the sudden death of a former member of staff, Father Ion Bria, on 2 July 2002, in Geneva. In 1973, Bria took up the post of executive secretary for mission and relations with Orthodox churches within the WCC, and in 1987 became the director of the WCC Sub-unit for Renewal and Congregational Life. Shortly before his retirement in 1994, Father Ion took up the post of director of the Faith and Witness Unit.

The world’s religions aspire to peace. However it is a sad fact that they are often involved in conflict and violence. This paradox was the subject of intense discussion at a multi-faith consultation on violence, peace and religions held in June. Forty participants – Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians from Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, North and South America – gathered for eight days at the World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical Institute at Bossey, near Geneva. The elimination of violence, they declared, is a challenge to all religions. The consultation was the first in a series on the topic of religions and violence to be organized by the Ecumenical Institute.