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While peace is a commonly held value within Judaism, Islam and Christianity, other religious values can often become sources of conflict. In order to build community beyond faith boundaries a group of young adults from each of the three faith groups spent a week focusing on the common value of peace recently.

Although it is often portrayed as a religious conflict, the crisis in Nigeria's Central Plateau State is of social and economic nature, the country's foreign minister told church representatives. The church delegation advocated for government action to develop the area and to bring to trial those responsible for an outburst of communal violence last March.

A World Council of Churches (WCC) Living Letters team has appealed to Nigeria's religious leaders to encourage people belonging to different ethnic and faith groups to take initiatives to promote lasting peace and harmony in violence-affected communities.

It was a deeply moving experience for the Living Letters team visiting Nigeria on behalf of the World Council of Churches (WCC) when they gathered to pray around a mass grave in Dogonahawa, near Jos, in the Central Plateau State on Tuesday. About 323 locals murdered last March have been buried at the site.

During a meeting with a Living Letters team visiting Nigeria on behalf of the World Council of Churches, the governor of the Plateau state, Jonah David Jang said that “religion is used to cover up all conflicts, although other factors also exist”. While explaining certain reasons for the conflicts, the governor admitted that “I am a committed Christian. As governor of this state, I am elected by the people and God gave me the mandate to direct the people in the righteous way”.

A Living Letters team travelling on behalf of the World Council of Churches (WCC)was welcomed to Abuja by Nigerian church and ecumenical leaders during an ecumenical celebration organized by the Christian Council of Nigeria, (CCN) on Sunday 16 May.

A Living Letters team of the World Council of Churches (WCC) will pay a solidarity visit to Nigeria from 15-20 May 2010.

"The gospel in the 21 st century has gone beyond just preaching and evangelization. The Church must reach out to the poor, sick and thirsty like Jesus did, extending the love of Christ through every possible way", said Rev. Okechukwu Kalu Iro, national director of the Presbyterian Community Services and Development, during the inauguration of the churches’ new Preach Water Foundation on Sunday, 6 December in Lagos, Nigeria.

Christian and Muslim leaders from Western Africa have called on the followers of their two religions "to complement each others efforts for peace in society and peaceful co-existence" among the faith communities at a meeting organized by the Programme for Christian-Muslim Relations in Africa (PROCMURA) in Accra, Ghana, 24 July 2009.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Rev. Dr Samuel Kobia urged the Nigerian President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua to "ensure the safety of all citizens" as well as seeing that "all perpetrators [of] acts of violence and human rights violations are brought to justice".

By Annegret Kapp (*)

Methodist archbishop Michael Kehinde Stephen of Nigeria has been chosen to moderate the Continuation Committee on Ecumenism in the 21st Century, a group assigned to monitor and encourage initiatives in the global quest for Christian unity. He was affirmed by consensus of the fourteen members attending the committee's first meeting during the week of 18-20 November in Bossey, Switzerland.

The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) is ready to join the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Vatican in supporting a code of conduct to guide activities seeking converts to Christianity.