Search results

World Council of Churches general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Jerry Pillay sent a pastoral letter to Haitian brothers and sisters whose lives are lived in a land with hatred, violence, and suffering. “Although we might be physically distant, we are close to you in heart, in the spiritual sense,” wrote Pillay. “We all are children of God. We belong to one family, as Jesus Christ himself said.”

The upcoming Barbados Gospelfest, set for 21-28 May, will express churches’ affirmation and celebration of persons with disabilities in musical and other creative ways.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS) publication highlights the lessons learnt from the project Strategic Engagement of Civil Society Networks and Faith Actors in the HIV Response in India, Dominican Republic, Indonesia, and Jamaica.

The Mothers Union from the Church of Uganda (Buganda region) in collaboration with the World Council of Churches Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy and Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance programmes have been finding strength and inspiration during the 16 Days campaign against sexual and gender-based violence. 

At an online roundtable hosted by the All Africa Conference of Churches, male “champions for gender justice” shared their ideas and insights during their yearlong service as men who are helping to prevent gender-based violence.

Young people in Uganda are on fire for change that will free the world from both HIV and sexual and gender-based violence. Spreading sparks of knowledge and enthusiasm, they have been visiting schools to inform and inspire even more young people.

Rev. Kelli Jolly, like many Bahamians, is used to living through the possibility of multiple hurricanes, year after year. She serves as itinerant presbyter with the Methodist Church in the Caribbean and the Americas, Bahamas/Turks and Caicos Islands District, Nassau Circuit of Churches.

As Makerere University in Uganda admitted new undergraduate students in August, trained “ambassadors of change" were able to speak about preventing sexual and gender-based violence and HIV transmission. The ambassadors were trained though workshops offered by the World Council of Churches Ecumenical HIV and AIDS Initiatives and Advocacy programme.

Students at Makerere University in Uganda have launched an evangelical and health mission in Kayunga, one of the rural villages in Mityana district located about 50 km from Kampala, Uganda.
The initiative follows the October 2018 launch of the Thursdays in Black Campaign against sexual and gender-based violence in Uganda by the Anglican community of the College of Veterinary Medicine, Animal Resources and Biosecurity at Makerere University.

The World Council of Churches, working with the Jamaica Council of Churches and Caribbean and North America Council for Mission, offered a training in Jamaica to help people cope with violence against children, particularly sexual violence, gang-related violence, and gun violence.

World Council of Churches (WCC) deputy general secretary Prof. Dr Isabel Apawo Phiri reflected on the recent Global Consultation on the Decade of the Churches in Solidarity, and what the insights gathered there might mean for the ecumenical movement.

Rev Prof. Dr Ofelia Ortega Suárez is a retired professor of Theology and Gender, and Christian Ethics for the Reformed-Presbyterian Church in Cuba. Ortega Suárez was born in Cuba. After her undergraduate studies in Theology and Christian Education at the Evangelical Theological Seminary in Matanzas, she completed her post-graduate studies in Ecumenical Theology at the World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical Institute at Bossey. She returned to Cuba and obtained her master's degrees in Divinity and Education.

Turtles, both in the Caribbean and elsewhere, are becoming increasingly confused. Their main prey of jelly fish doesn’t taste the same nowadays and is much more difficult to digest. Often, turtles die after having ingested plastic bags they thought were jelly fish.

A warm welcome with cheers and high expectations awaited WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit when he touched down in Kingston earlier this week. The Jamaican capital was the first stop of a 10-day tour in the Caribbean.

During an open air common prayer event held in Nelson Mandela Park in Kingston, Jamaica on 4 October, women and men processed and sang, most of them dressed in black as they renewed and expanded their commitment to the Thursdays in Black campaign seeking a world free from rape and violence.

Linette Vassel has been associated with the struggle for women’s rights in the Caribbean since the 1970s. She was the first coordinator of the Committee of Women for Progress, an activist organisation formed in 1976 which was among the pioneering organisations for the struggle for maternity leave with pay for women.

Thirty years ago, the founders of the Ecumenical Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women were searching for ways to not only help women across the globe seek justice but also highlight their contributions to churches and the world.

What have we achieved in building a just community of women and men? What must we still do? How can we strengthen ecumenical collaboration in reading the signs of our times in order to map the future direction of our work?