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A Swedish WCC working group which met in Stockholm on 4 September has called on Swedish churches to use ‘The Gift of Being: Called to be a Church of All and for All’ as a resource for including persons with disabilities in church life.

Gathering at World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden on 30 August, representatives from a range of faith communities and organizations engaged in water issues held a session exploring how faith communities can help achieve the sixth Sustainable Development Goal, ensuring availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.

Organized as part of World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden, the WCC invites faith-based organizations, congregations as individuals to a 30 August public event entitled “Water and Faith: Building partnerships to achieve the SDGs”. The event is an open session, organized by the WCC in collaboration with Church of Sweden, Global Water Partnership, Stockholm International Water Institute, and Swedish Institute Alexandria.

Around 60 participants from Christian churches all over the world gathered in Beit Sahour for peace consultations two weeks ago.

At the Sami Church Days in Sweden, a festival held 14-16 June, World Council of Churches general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit described how indigenous people lead the world in caring for creation.

WCC President for Europe Archbishop Emeritus Anders Wejryd has reminded South African church leaders of the importance of the nation’s constitution, speaking at a time of political uncertainty in the country.

The WCC general secretary, Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, denounced the terror attack in Stockholm, Sweden, on 7 April and mourned the loss of life, extending prayers for the victims and their families and friends.

As Pope Francis marks the fourth anniversary of his election, the latest issue of The Ecumenical Review, the quarterly journal of the WCC, opens with an article discussing the ecumenical gestures that have marked his pontificate, one of the most striking being his presence at the joint Catholic–Lutheran Reformation commemoration in Lund in 2016.

The newly released Fifth Anniversary Women’s Global Prayer Guide, published by the Lott Carey Global Christian Missional Community, features 31 days of prayer for women’s empowerment from contributors around the world.

ACT Alliance and the WCC jointly announced today that they will hold two strategic governance meetings, back to back, in Uppsala, Sweden in the fall of 2018. The ACT Alliance General Assembly will be held at the end of October, bringing together over 200 people from its membership around the world at its quadrennial meeting. The WCC’s Executive Committee and members of ACT’s General Assembly will then meet together on 1 November for a joint day of learning and work around the concept of ecumenical diaconia and sustainable development, followed by the WCC Executive Committee’s regular meeting.

The experience of his father’s fleeing Nazi Germany in 1938 and then living alien and stateless in Sweden provides biblical theologian Hans Ucko with the touchstone of his writing about stateless persons.

Roman Catholics and Lutherans, in committing to forging ahead as pilgrims together, are significantly contributing to the wider ecumenical movement, acknowledged the WCC executive committee last week at its meeting in China.

Germany’s main Protestant and Roman Catholic churches have published a “Common Word” for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017 in which they call for a “healing of memories” of past divisions and for the event to be commemorated in ecumenical fellowship.

How can religion and faith communities contribute to achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals? Setting out to address this very question, a panel of faith representatives gathered at World Water Week in Stockholm on 29 August, introduced by keynote speaker Cardinal Peter Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace at the Vatican. The panel was also welcomed by Rt. Rev. Thomas Söderberg, Church of Sweden.

A plenary discussion on support by religious communities for the rights of children, and a first draft of the statement of “principles for child-friendly churches,” captured the imagination of the Central Committee of the WCC on 27 June. The document will now undergo further revision and be resubmitted at the next WCC executive committee meeting.

Youth are not the future leaders of tomorrow. They are the leaders of today, as they fearlessly lead efforts for justice and peace in their societies.

Journeying from urban centres and small Pacific islands, mountain ranges and rural towns, more than 170 Indigenous people gathered this week at the mouth of the river that flows from traditional Sami lands. Their conference, “Reconciliation Processes and Indigenous Peoples: Truth, Healing and Transformation,” brought together representatives of more than two dozen Indigenous societies in connection with the WCC Central Committee meetings in Trondheim, Norway.

As a United Nations high-level meeting on ending AIDS led to the adoption of a new political declaration to fast-track progress toward combating HIV and AIDS, the faith community responded, both with words of commendation and a call for changes.

Women and children figure prominently as refugees in mass movements of people in recent months and their rights will be at the forefront of a summer school organized in Greece by the Conference of European Churches.

Almost forty years after the advent of HIV and AIDS, people around the world living with HIV still endure assaults on their dignity and basic human rights—from stigma and discrimination to denial of legal protection and even medical care.