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Violence in the name of religion echoed in the distance, demanding a response, through the November 2015 meeting of the 25-member Executive Committee of the WCC in Bogis-Bossey and nearby Geneva, Switzerland as it planned the work of the Council in the coming years.

Mere days after terror attacks in Beirut and Paris, the theme of an interfaith meeting of Christians and Muslims at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva on “Religion, Peace and Violence” was entirely appropriate, said participants.

Commemorating the Armenian Genocide of 1915-23 was to have been the principal focus of the service of Sunday morning prayer on 15 November in the cathedral church of Saint-Pierre at the summit of Geneva’s old town. Following terror attacks in Beirut and Paris killing and wounding hundreds of civilians over the preceding days, the prayers of the Protestant Church of Geneva and the WCC Executive Committee took on a new dimension.

A delegation representing churches and ecumenical bodies around the world met for an historic international ecumenical visit and meeting in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea from 23 to 30 October.

The general secretary of the WCC, Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, sent greetings to Hindu religious partners across the world on the occasion of the Hindu festival of Diwali.

“Stigma, discrimination, lack of access to information and appropriate prevention measures aggravate the spread of HIV and AIDS,” says Samuel Matsikure, who participated in a dialogue sponsored by Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy of the WCC.

"In COP21 we decide whether the glass is half full or half empty, but the glass must be transparent", tweeted climate activist Yeb Saño at the end of a day full of activities engaging leadership and staff members of the WCC, the Lutheran World Federation and ACT Alliance, at the Ecumenical Centre, in Geneva, Switzerland.

Following the burning and demolition of church buildings and the flight of many Christians from their villages in Indonesia, the WCC general secretary has expressed the world fellowship’s support of religious liberty and its solidarity with Indonesian believers as churches assist displaced people and work toward future peace.

Adebayo Anthony Kehinde leads an African group supporting ICAN, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. Its interfaith campaign is especially significant on the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombings in Japan.

Churches continue to play their role in peace building for South Sudan despite the dashed hopes of many in the world’s newest nation, the moderator of the WCC said at a regional meeting.

“Christianity is not about big preaching, it’s about how you can impact somebody and add value,” says Nigerian ecumenical leader Rev. Dr Ibrahim Yusuf Wushishi, who leads a huge grouping of churches in Africa’s most populous nation.

Key stakeholders in a new inter-religious centre in Nigeria have met to plan for the centre and its work, set to launch in March 2016.

A WCC ecumenical training programme recently held in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, prepared 30 young Congolese to be peace-builders amidst the reality of conflict and the backdrop of upcoming elections in the country.

Seventy years after nuclear fireballs exploded over two Japanese cities, an ecumenical group of pilgrims has come to Hiroshima to listen to those who survived and renew the struggle against their own countries’ continued reliance on nuclear weapons.

As an ecumenical delegation to Japan participates in Hiroshima Day observances on the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombing, the WCC has published a liturgical resource and invites churches around the world to join in prayer.

Bishop Dr Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, chair of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) and a member of the church leaders’ pilgrimage to Japan on the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombings, pressed the case for the Humanitarian Pledge against nuclear weapons at the Hiroshima Day rally on 6 August 2015.

The World Council of Churches invites its member churches to join in prayer for peace and reunification of the Korean peninsula on Sunday, 9 August.

A new initiative titled Ecumenical Institute for the Middle East is “promising and inspiring” in its attempt to train young Christians in ecumenical thought and history, according to Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, general secretary of the WCC.

To strengthen the work of churches in achieving gender justice, the Zimbabwe Council of Churches has launched the Gender and Faith Network. The network is a movement of faith leaders in Zimbabwe committed to build a church that understands the cause of gender justice and supports local communities with deeper insight and sensitivity.

When a WCC meeting on ecumenical HIV and AIDS response concluded last week in Limuru, Kenya, its message to the global HIV and AIDS community was terse: traditional ways of tackling the pandemic have failed.