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Church representatives from around the world will gather in New York City 15-20 November to press three issues within the agenda of the United Nations: peoples being displaced by climate change, indigenous people's rights and Colombia's protracted internal conflict.

The Assembly of the Council for World Mission has appointed Rev. Dr Moiseraele Prince Dibeela as moderator to lead CWM's Trustee Body for the next three years.

The Dutch queen will be the guest of honour at a conference seeking to take on the legacy of the World Council of Churches' (WCC) historic anti-racism efforts.

As the centennial of a landmark mission event approaches in 2010, a global study process is mobilizing churches, theological institutions and mission bodies around the world.

By Dr Manoj Kurian (*)

By Peter Kenny (*)

After six days of intense discussions on migration, the conflict in Sri Lanka and climate change, of common prayer and practical efforts to make the voice of the churches on these issues heard at the United Nations, the UN Advocacy Week of the World Council of Churches (WCC) ended with good results on Friday.

Representatives of ecumenical organizations meeting in advance of the 17th International AIDS Conference in Mexico City vowed to launch a global campaign to help churches become competent in dealing with the HIV and AIDS pandemic.

Can religions do more in response to the AIDS pandemic? To address this question over 450 representatives of faith-based organizations currently responding to HIV and AIDS will gather in Mexico City, 31 July - 2 August, in advance of the XVII International AIDS Conference.

By Walt Wiltschek (*)

Joint release with the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and the Council for World Mission

The legacies of the slave trade, and how churches can respond to past and present forms of slavery, are going to be discussed at an ecumenical conference to be held 10-14 December in Runaway Bay, Jamaica. About sixty theologians, church leaders, social scientists and activists, mainly from Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean will gather in the country where nearly one million Africans and later indentured servants from Asia were exploited as human commodities and many more transited on their often deadly passage into slavery.

The bloody conflict in Northern Ireland, the crimes committed under the apartheid regime in South Africa and under communist rule in eastern Germany, mass killings perpetrated by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia or by the Guatemalan military during a 35 year long civil war: the diverse cases of these nations and their struggles to cope with the legacies of massive human rights violations are at the heart of the 1-4 October ecumenical consultation "Healing of Memories - Reconciling Communities" in Dublin, Ireland, co-organized by the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Irish School of Ecumenics.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) has welcomed a resolution on rational use of medicines to be considered by the 60th World Health Assembly taking place in Geneva 14-23 May 2007.

Raising awareness about mental health among faith communities, sharing information on what they are doing in this area (best practice), and providing an ecumenical and inter-religious platform for learning on mental health in different regions will be the focus of WCC work on "mental health and faith communities" over the next few years.Â

World AIDS Day is a unique moment each year when all of humanity is challenged to reflect on the way that HIV and AIDS affects us and how we can respond to the pandemic.

Every person living with HIV and AIDS should have access to the treatments made available by medical science and churches must advocate for this to happen, said the World Council of Churches (WCC) central committee in a statement adopted at a meeting that ends today. The statement also challenges churches to a greater commitment in fighting the pandemic and welcoming positive people into their communities.

The global fund for tackling HIV and AIDS should be distributed through churches because they have the best access to the populations affected.

Dr Peter Piot, Bishop Mark Hanson, Canon Gideon Byamugisha, Rev. Rick Warren and his wife Kay, and Erik Sawyer are among speakers at ecumenical and interfaith pre-conferences taking place on the eve of the world's largest HIV/AIDS conference.

by Stephen Webb (*)