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Providing migrants and refugees a platform to share their concerns, challenges, and aspirations not only helps them, but also addresses xenophobia and helps build bridges with host communities, participants at a recent conference found.

The World Association for Christian Communication is creating a rapid response fund to help support grassroots community media outlets that provide accurate, trusted coronavirus-related information to vulnerable people who often cannot access mainstream media. Individuals and organisations are encouraged to contribute to the fund.

Observed on 13-20 October, the WCC Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance invites churches around the world again to a Churches’ Week of Action on Food, an opportunity to pray, reflect and take action together, for food justice across the globe.

“As Christians, we are called every day to generously practice hospitality”, said Bishop Samuel Aguilar, from the Methodist Church of Peru, as he lamented cases of xenophobia, discrimination and violence suffered by thousands of Venezuelans in different parts of Latin America.

Church and related organizations’ response to food crises globally may need to be strengthened following the findings of a new report which projects millions of people will be without food due climate change, conflict and insecurity.

Ma’alul, a Palestinian village destroyed in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, saw a visit by ecumenical accompaniers in mid-March. “I would have liked to invite you to a real home, not just as a refugee,” said Jad Saba Yusef Salem as he received the group of accompaniers to the village. Today, 95-year-old Salem is one of few remaining survivors from the 75 families who used to live in the village back in 1948.

In a country now counting 100 million inhabitants, and where 2.5 percent are added annually, it is increasingly hard for the government to keep pace with the needs of its people. “In this challenging environment, the work of non-governmental organisations is critical in order to ease the burden on public service institutions”, explains Dr Maged Moussa Yanny, general director of EpiscoCare.

In a speech at the World Council of Churches (WCC) Assembly Planning Committee (APC) meeting in Cyprus this week, WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit reflected on the theme of the upcoming WCC 11th Assembly, “Christ’s love moves the world to reconciliation and unity.”

Dealing with people on the move is crucial to the work of the Church in the 21st century says Greek Metropolitan Gabriel of Nea Ionia and Filadelfia. More than 31,000 irregular migrants arrived in Greece by sea in 2018 and almost 17,000 arrived by land, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM).

WCC News met with the Very Reverend Archimandrite Dr Alexi Chehadeh, who leads the Department of Ecumenical Relations and Development for the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and all the East in Damascus, Syria. He is an impressive role model and peacemaker in Syria.

On 14-16 December, the Conference of European Churches and Cumberland Lodge in the UK will host an Ecumenical Conference on Human Rights with the theme “Towards Peaceful Coexistence in the Middle East: Challenges and Opportunities.”

“I didn’t have any document that says who I am, so I started to look for answers that would help me to understand the real definition of my condition as a stateless person”, said Maha Mamo in a video interview published by World Council of Churches communications.

The International Commission for Anglican–Orthodox Theological Dialogue released a communiqué after a meeting in Larnaca, Cyprus from 13-20 October.

At a global conference on xenophobia in Rome, a panel of four religious leaders from, respectively, Buddhist, Christian, Hindu and Islamic traditions, spoke candidly about how xenophobia can sometimes be woven deeply into the fabric of these traditions.

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.

Heads of churches in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories have reacted with dismay and concern to the Israeli Knesset’s adoption on 19 July 2018 of a new Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People, which specifies that “The right to exercise national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish people.”