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Former Bossey student Rev. Jianmei Jing who works at the Jingling Protestant Church in Hongkou near Shanghai in China has shown that masking your intention can be a truly Christian act. At significant sacrifice during the current COVID-19 pandemic when they were in short supply, she managed to get hold of 300 face masks and sent them to the Bossey community who she knew needed them in Switzerland.

A WCC support team is online and ready to help WCC member churches as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to evolve. The team—comprised of experts in different facets of faith-related pandemic response—is here for you, said WCC acting general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Ioan Sauca. “These are people who can serve as a tremendous support to the WCC fellowship,” said Sauca.

WCC ambassadors of the Thursdays in Black campaign are standing behind a joint statement that urges both awareness and protection from the “dual pandemics” of COVID-19 and gender-based violence.

The WCC is offering member churches some resources with a human face during the COVID-19 pandemic. A team of eight resource people has been made available to consult on how churches can discern their roles during the coronavirus pandemic, how they can adapt as faith communities, and how they can connect and share with each other.

Women in Chile have been subject to violence, forced nudity, humiliation and even rape in the framework of the social protests taking place in the nation since last October, said Chilean theologian and lawyer Cecilia Castillo Nanjari.

On 6 March, Christian women from 170 countries will observe a World Day of Prayer, drawing millions of people together for a healing message in a divisive world.

The 2020 theme is “Rise! Take Your Mat and Walk,” based on John 5:2-9a, and has been crafted by the World Day of Prayer Zimbabwe Committee. Each year, materials are developed ecumenically and collectively within a certain country in coordination with the World Day of Prayer International Committee.

The WCC has welcomed four new programme executives.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) was nominated as a top non-governmental organization and received a 4th place in the Geneva Engage Award on 29 January. The honor recognises the actors in International Geneva for their social media outreach and online engagement.

Students graduating at mountain-framed Bossey on the banks of Lake Geneva have admitted that the decision to come to the WCC Ecumenical Institute was not easy, but they left as a family with proof "that Christian unity can be lived."

As of January 2020, the WCC has relaunched its Sarah Chakko Scholarship Fund. The fund was first established in 1998, at the end of the Ecumenical Decade of Solidarity with Women, aiming to promote the education of women for leadership competencies for the ecumenical movement.

During 16 Days Against Gender-Based Violence, the World Council of Churches staff are demonstrating the links between their work and efforts to overcome sexual and gender-based violence under the theme, “From our House to Yours”.

Today, the #16Days contribution is from the General Secretariat, and the important role leadership plays in making equality and justice visible, and violence unacceptable.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) is highlighting the links between the household of God, and the fundamental need to make our homes safe and loving spaces during 16 Days Against Gender-based Violence. “16 Days” is an annual international campaign that begins on 25 November, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and ends on 10 December, Human Rights Day.

The WCC invites partners, friends, media and interested public to a lecture and book signing by Prof. Dr Jürgen Moltmann on 2 December.

Any prospective student who intends to study at the WCC Ecumenical Institute at Château de Bossey, in its picturesque setting near Geneva, soon learns it is an exceptional place.

Kenyan theologian Esther Mombo was born into an ecumenical environment in East Africa. She has a transcontinental education and told students of ecumenism this week that African Christianity is “young and vibrant”, but that it needs to listen to the “women in the pews”.

As the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission on Ecumenical Education and Formation held its biannual meeting at the Ecumenical Institute Bossey outside Geneva, Switzerland, space was given for a discussion on current concerns and trends in the area of teaching ecumenism in theological institutions today.

“What do the churches need today? And what does the world need from the churches?”, asked Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, general secretary of the World Council of Churches (WCC) as he reflected on the shrinking space for institutional ecumenical theological education in many contexts worldwide at the opening of the biannual meeting of the WCC’s Commission on Ecumenical Education and Formation, on 28 October.

Students at the World Council of Churches’ Ecumenical Institute at Bossey marked Thursdays in Black on 10 October, together with a group of visitors from Sweden.

Rev. Dr William Adam is the new director of Unity, Faith and Order for the Anglican Communion. He is also the ecumenical adviser to the Archbishop of Canterbury, as well as a graduate of the Bossey Ecumenical Institute.

As more and more people in the Philippines lose their loved ones to extrajudicial killings, and are falsely accused of crimes by the authorities, the World Council of Churches (WCC) is increasing its support and accompaniment of people fighting for human rights in the Philippines.
On 16 September, concerned colleagues and guests gathered in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva to attend an event entitled: “Defending the Sanctity of Life and Dignity of Creation: The Human Rights Situation in the Philippines”. The event gave a platform to four different speakers from victim, human rights and church perspectives.