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From 4 to 9 December 2023, thousands of people convened in Harare, Zimbabwe, for the 22nd International Conference on Aids and STIs in Africa (ICASA). Scientists, medical experts, advocates, people living with HIV, and civil society organizations came together under the theme “AIDS IS NOT OVER: Address inequalities; accelerate inclusion and innovation.” Participants from many faith traditions were a meaningful part of many of these representative groups but also took up a space of their own.

Prof. Ezra Chitando, World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy regional coordinator for Southern Africa, presented on behalf of WCC deputy general secretary Prof. Dr Isabel Apawo Phiri, a paper on “Women’s Transformative Leadership and Africa’s Holistic Development: The Role of the Churches” during an international conference on leadership transformation and innovation in Africa.

Religious and traditional leaders in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) participated in online consultations on the SADC Model Law on gender-based violence.

Church leaders in South Africa and Zimbabwe are participating in online workshops on “Churches and Child Safeguarding” on 3 and 5 August. Part of the World Council of Churches (WCC) partnership program with UNICEF, “Churches’ Commitments to Children,” the workshops are designed to nurture churches where children feel welcome and safe.

Religious leaders are participating in online training on male engagement in Zimbabwe, 12-16 July. The participants are drawn from diverse faith communities and will come up with action plans to enhance their work with boys and men.

“When the music changes, so must the dance,” counselled Prof. Dr Isabel Apawo Phiri, World Council of Churches (WCC) deputy general secretary at the Africa Association of United Methodist Theological Institutions Anglophone Group virtual conference on 9-10 April. Phiri gave a keynote address at the conference organized by Africa University, a Methodist-affiliated university in Zimbabwe.

Online training for church leaders in Zimbabwe is helping them find creative, positive theologies to navigate the many challenging facets of the COVID-19 pandemic.

H.E., Most Rev. Serafim (Kykkotis) of Zimbabwe is the metropolitan of the Archdiocese of Zimbabwe in eastern Africa, part of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria and All Africa. He serves on the World Council of Churches (WCC) executive and central committees, and also on the WCC Climate Change Working Group.

During a workshop on 29 June-1 July, Pastor Maxwell Kapachawo summed up the inspiration driving the group: “This training has come at the right time! We are facing the challenge of people on antiretroviral therapy defaulting on their medication due to faith healing claims.”

Using lessons learned from building health-competent faith communities and responding to the HIV and AIDS epidemic, African church leaders are doing their best to help their communities cope with the novel coronavirus.

Victoria Falls is known locally as Mosi-oa Tunya ("The Smoke that Thunders") due to the power of the water from the Zambezi River that often flows across one of the great wonders of the world. Today it is a mere trickle.

More than 100,000 people are still stranded from massive flooding caused by a devastating cyclone and heavy rainfall in Mozambique and neighbouring southeastern African countries. As the numbers of victims and people displaced are still unfolding, churches in the region are calling everyone to join in prayers for the wellbeing and protection of those affected.

At a meeting in Harare on Tuesday this week, church and civil society leaders in Zimbabwe strongly rejected all forms of violence and urgently called upon the state to restore the rule of law and constitutionalism in the exercise of state power.

Catholic and World Council of Churches (WCC) leaders, meeting in Rome to discuss ways of combating racism and xenophobia, have pledged to uphold the rights and dignity of migrants and refugees.

I have experienced many good stories with the WCC, but unfortunately disappointing ones as well, says Rev. Dr Margot Käßmann, Lutheran theologian and former chairperson of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany. She was a member of the WCC Central and Executive Committees for many years, until her resignation in 2002. The story she contributed for the WCC 70th anniversary commemoration looks back to the 1998 WCC Assembly in Harare, which marked the end of the Ecumenical Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women.

As election polls closed in Zimbabwe on 31 July, and people awaited announcements of results, reports on the ground were indicating that, although peace was holding, the situation is tense.

In 2018 we celebrate the 70th anniversary of the World Council of Churches. In order to create a lively firsthand account of the ecumenical fellowship and of our shared journey, member churches have contributed stories of people, events, achievements and even failures, all of which have deepened our collective search for Christian unity. This story was written by Olle Eriksson, a Namibian who worked for 35 years (1968 – 2003) with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia, Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission and Lutheran World Federation.

In a press statement on 27 September, the Zimbabwe Council of Churches (ZCC) called for government officials to offer adequate information in order to ensure peace and justice in the face of panic buying of fuel and basic food items.

Working with boys and men is critical to the success of the UNAIDS Fast Track agenda, said Pierre Somse, UNAIDS senior advisor for Fast Track Innovation, speaking at a symposium in Harare, Zimbabwe.

More than 130 theological educators from southern Africa met at the Association of Theological Institutions in Southern Africa Conference at the University of Zimbabwe, 18-22 July.