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WCC News met online with Dr Agnes Abuom, moderator of the World Council of Churches central committee, and she offers reflections on the impact of COVID-19, what gives her hope, and the future of the ecumenical movement. 

Rev. Dr Antti Laine is senior advisor for Theology and Ecumenical Relations with Finn Church Aid. He reflects below on how, while the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated gender-based violence, faith-based and humanitarian groups, can provide hope—especially when they work together.

The Right Reverend Dr Christopher Cocksworth is Bishop of Coventry, the senior leader of the Church of England in Coventry and Warwickshire in the United Kingdom. On 14 November 2020, Bishop Cocksworth, along with the Archbishops of Canterbury and York as well as more than 30 other bishops, issued a statement welcoming the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and calling on the UK Government to join it. The statement coincided with the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the bombing of Coventry and destruction of its cathedral.

In an ongoing call to churches across the globe to work together to prevent gender-based violence, particularly against women, children and young people, World Council of Churches moderator Dr Agnes Abuom reflects below on some of the reasons such violence has increased, and the vital role churches can play in creating safe spaces for those most at risk.

Bishop Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, chair of the council of the Evangelical Church in Germany, and Cardinal Reinhard Marx, Archbishop in Munich and former president of the German Bishops’ Conference, were awarded the 2020 Augsburg Peace Prize for their “unconditional will to live together in peace.”

Two weeks after Hurricane Eta struck, Nicaragua and Honduras are now bracing for another massive storm, Hurricane Iota. Eta killed at least 120 people in flash floods and mudslides. By 15 November, ahead of Iota’s landfall, some 63,500 people had been evacuated in northern Honduras, and 1,500 people in Nicaragua had been moved from low-lying areas of the country's northeast. Carlos Rauda, a regional officer with ACT Alliance, offers a glimpse of this unfolding situation, and the important role of churches.

Our series of interviews with Thursdays in Black ambassadors highlights those who are playing a vital role in increasing the impact of our collective call for a world without rape and violence. Rev. Dr Karen Georgia Thompson is associate general minister for Wider Church Ministries and Operations, United Church of Christ.

Dr Manoj Kurian is coordinator of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance. We we are now in the midst of observing Churches’ Week of Action on Food, he reflects on this year’s theme, “Grow, Nourish, Sustain Together.”

Rev. Eva Guldanova is a Lutheran minister, ecumenical theologian, and assistant to the general secretary of the Ecumenical Council of Churches in Slovakia. This interview is part of a series dedicated to the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.

Rev. Inácio Lemke is president of the National Council of Christian Churches of Brazil (CONIC). He is an ordained pastor of the Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil. This interview is part of a series dedicated to the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.

This interview with Fr Manuel Barrios Prieto, secretary general of the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Union (COMECE), is the first one in a series dedicated to the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.