Search results

The World Council of Churches (WCC) fellowship joined family and friends of Prof. John Samuel Mbiti in giving thanks for his life and grieving his death on 6 October.

An unfolding drought in Africa is threatening hunger for tens of millions of people in the horn, eastern and southern parts of the continent.

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.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical Theological Education programme has, for the second time, contributed to ecumenical capacity development in Morocco. The WCC helped instruct a course on contextual theologies and African theologies at the Ecumenical Theological Institute Al Mowafaqa in Rabat.

The South Sudan Council of Churches, United Nations World Food Programme, and UNICEF have signed an agreement to work in partnership towards peace building to realize food security.

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.

Women in Liberia participated in the Thursdays in Black campaign by staging a peaceful demonstration in the streets of Margibi County against the growing waves of violence against women and girls.

The life of Rev. Dr Rena Joyce Weller Karefa-Smart is being remembered and commended this week by the WCC fellowship after her passing last week. Karefa-Smart was the first Pan African woman to graduate in 1945 from Yale Divinity School. She was a champion for global ecumenism over the course of a long and distinguished career. An attendee of the first WCC Assembly, she was also a procession leader and author of the liturgies at the second WCC Assembly in Evanston, Illinois (USA).

As a result of a consultation on 9-10 November in Washington, D.C., Pan African Women of Faith have released a Call to Action toward a vision of sustainable communities and an end to hunger and poverty.

A delegation from the Evangelical Church in Germany is visiting the WCC on 26-27 October for an ecumenical learning experience that includes prayers with students from the Bossey Ecumenical Institute, an introduction and overview of the work of the WCC, a meeting with the Lutheran World Federation, and a guided tour of the Ecumenical Centre.

As churches worldwide focus on the “Action Week for Food” in October, increasing numbers of people going hungry due to violent conflicts, failed harvests and rising food costs are compelling faith-based organizations to offer urgent intervention.

Each year students from all over the world arrive at Bossey near Geneva for a three-month language training course to pave their way for ecumenical studies that follow on straight after. “The title captures the goal of the course,” says Father Lawrence Iwuamadi, the Nigerian priest who studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and is academic dean of the Ecumenical Institute.

“Congratulations for being a student at Bossey!” Fr Prof. Dr Ioan Sauca, director of the Ecumenical Institute in Bossey and deputy general secretary, welcomed the students for the new academic year 2018-2019. Thirty-one students from diverse countries and traditions will start their classes at the ecumenical institute on Tuesday.

Speaking in Lviv, Ukraine on 30 August, World Council of Churches (WCC) deputy general secretary Prof. Dr Isabel Apawo Phiri presented a paper on ”Women and Ecumenical Engagement for Peace in South Sudan,” reflecting on the experiences of a Pilgrim Team visit by the WCC in May 2018.

The Global Day of Prayer to End Famine has found relevance in Africa, where communities bear the brunt of severe food shortages associated with the challenge. On 10 June, the WCC, All Africa Conference of Churches and World Evangelical Alliance called on churches to pray for millions of people at risk and those who face severe hunger.

At the Conference on World Mission and Evangelism, held in Tanzania in March, WCC communications interviewed Rene van Dongen, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Deputy Representative. Van Dongen spoke about Churches’ Commitments to Children, which is now supported by more than 200 churches and partners worldwide. The initiative was created when the WCC and UNICEF facilitated a broad consultative process around the question ‘How can churches use their influence to improve children’s lives?’

If the human spirit and likeness of God's will for peace with justice for all people is alive in the world, the pilgrim team that visited South Sudan this week has witnessed it. From 5-9 May, a World Council of Churches “Pilgrim Team” visited South Sudan under the theme “African Women of Faith and Gender Justice.” The delegation was hosted by the South Sudan Council of Churches (SSCC).

The WCC, World Evangelical Alliance and All Africa Conference of Churches, along with church-related humanitarian organizations and a coalition of church-related networks and organizations and partners, are planning 10 June 2018 as a second Global Day of Prayer to End Famine to be observed in faith congregations worldwide.

The marketplace - also referred to as a “sokoni" - became an opportunity for faith and community-based institutions to share what they do to improve the lives of people around them.

Discipleship takes place when we intentionally, sacrificially, and consistently live every moment of our daily lives in commitment to following Jesus, said Rt Rev. Dhiloraj Ranjit Canagasabey at the missional formation plenary of the Conference on World Mission and Evangelism (CWME) on March 12.