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Africa is of huge concern around the novel coronavirus pandemic for the World Health Organization (WHO), but the continent’s churches have been preparing for the silent and lethal virus for some time.

Hope, solidarity and a spirit of service are recurring themes in Easter messages received by the World Council of Churches from many of its member churches and partners.

A group of churches from Germany’s west inspired by the quest for justice and peace presented an ecumenical exhibition showing how “Peace takes a different way” at the World Council of Churches in Geneva.

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.

Peace education to promote mutual understanding and cooperation between people involving the religious and secular sectors is needed to counter uncertainty fed by radicalization and xenophobia, says a leading human rights advocate.

In advance of the Liberia Council of Churches (LCC) assembly, its members reflected on the economic and spiritual challenges in the nation last week.

On 21 September, an event unfolded in Liberia to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the WCC. Held in conjunction with other civil society organizations observing the International Day of Peace in Monrovia, people gathered for a ceremony and a parade.

The latest edition of the quarterly WCC journal features a discussion of the roots of religion and violence in the Middle East. Five presentations drawn from three WCC-sponsored conferences of recent years explore aspects of the religious concepts of “promised land,” the “theology of land” and how to go about “reading the Hebrew Bible in solidarity with the Palestinian people.”

“Statelessness renders people’s vulnerability to abuse and to denial of their rights invisible to national authorities. In this sense the right to a nationality is a threshold issue for access to protection of all other human rights - almost a 'right to have rights'”, said Peter Prove, director of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission of the Churches on International Affairs (CCIA), following a regional training workshop on birth registration and gender discriminatory nationality laws in Africa, organized by the WCC in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 11–13 May.

The African continent bears witness to the tragic consequences of the manipulation of religion to incite violence. Yet it is also the home of untold instances of the power of religious leaders and actors to exert a positive influence, said panellists at an international meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, today.

The 13th International General Assembly of the Church of the Lord (Prayer Fellowship) was held in the Bantama area of Kumasi, Ghana from 9 to 16 November.

Prayers and action undertaken by the Liberian Council of Churches during the Ebola outbreak of 2014-2015 will be honoured by the Liberian government with distinction of “Commander, Order of the Star of Africa”.

United Nations leaders and the WCC have agreed that the international community and faith leaders need to cooperate more on working to fight the scourge of the deadly Ebola virus.

To respond to the Ebola crisis in West Africa, which has taken more than 3,000 lives, the WCC brought to the table representatives of Christian aid organizations and United Nations agencies to learn from each other and to escalate their efforts.

The World Council of Churches has expressed a “deep and shared concern” to its member churches in West Africa over reports concerning “the Ebola crisis and its devastating impact on the lives of men, women and children living in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea and Nigeria.”

“Blessed are the peace makers” is the proclamation in Matthew 5:9. Today the WCC 10th Assembly featured Leymah Gbowee as one of the key speakers at the Peace Plenary, which featured stories, images and signs of hope from God leading toward justice and peace.