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The Church and Peace network is warning against extending a financial and political instrument at the disposal of the European Union (EU) that could strengthen the military capacity of non-EU countries, a move the network sees as a major shift.

Green Cross International has launched a new edition of The Future We Want photo exhibition for 2016 at the United Nations in Geneva. It features a number of its new partner organizations from around the world, including the WCC.

Bossey’s story is both old and new but it’s younger than ever, says one of its graduates, a renowned ecumenical scholar who opened a book launch on the history of the institute that has had students from so many parts of the world.

The sound of a bell “calling across fields and cities, re-assembling the community that celebrates the new creation” opened the Sunday service prepared to commemorate 70 years of the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey, on 2 October. The celebration closed a three-day programme of activities around the historic institute’s anniversary.

As Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby condemned antisemitism in an article for the Holocaust Educational Trust, he and other religious leaders underscored the importance of working together to seek the flourishing of all. In an essay entitled “Vigilance and resolution: Living antidotes to an ancient virus,” Welby refers to antisemitism as “an insidious evil.”

A brief yet lively history of the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey, The Story of Bossey: A Laboratory for Ecumenical Life, will be released by the World Council of Churches (WCC) Publications at a book launch 1 October on the grounds of the institute.

Roman Catholic and WCC representatives are forging new ways of working together on today’s most pressing issues.

The Association Internationale pour l’ Education Sociale Chretienne (AIESC), or International Association for Social Christian Teaching, held its 30th anniversary meeting at the Aristotle University in Thessaloniki, Greece from 2-3 September.

From 13 to 17 September 2016, members of the Joint Working Group overseen by leaders of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and the World Council of Churches will meet at the Ecumenical Institute in Bossey, Switzerland. Part of the focus for the meeting, is to review relations between the WCC and the Roman Catholic Church.

Speaking at a book launch on 9 September linked with the meeting of the Globethics.net consortium committee at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Professor Dietrich Werner challenged churches and related religious bodies to respond to today’s environmental crisis by answering the question “How can we make our impact felt?”

Receiving the news that Pope Francis has appointed Cardinal Peter Turkson as president of the newly created dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, the WCC expressed expectation to cooperation with the new structure, as it relates to several dimensions of work and cooperation with the Roman Catholic Church worldwide.

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.

Rev. Dr Hielke Wolters is leaving the WCC after serving for nine years - the last seven years as associate general secretary - but he is not leaving the ecumenical movement to which he has been dedicated since his student days. Officially is he going to retire, but only on the paper. He has many thoughts and plans to realize as he moves back to the Netherlands to serve, in one way or another, the church or the wider ecumenical movement. Wolters said to WCC News with a smile: “I’m open for any suggestion and I know that God will lead me in the right direction when that time comes.”

Interview with Dr Agnes Abuom, moderator of the World Council of Churches Central Committee at the Synod of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Württemberg, Germany.

The church must work for climate justice as part of its quest for just peace, urged Dr Agnes Abuom, moderator of the WCC Central Committee (WCC) as she offered a keynote address at the Württembergische Evangelische Landessynode in Stuttgart, Germany this week.

“Truth, healing and transformation” are key themes of a statement from an Indigenous Peoples’ Conference that has been received and commended by the WCC Central Committee.

“Creation is God’s work, every day, according to Luther. Creation ultimately belongs to God. We are accountable to God for what we do as partners in God’s creation, as deacons of God’s creation. Do we bring hope for human beings and the whole of creation? This is the question we in the Christian Church must ask one another,” said WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit.

The leadership and representatives of the World Evangelical Alliance and the WCC met in the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey, Switzerland to explore and discuss possible areas of future cooperation.

In a message to its Buddhist partners, WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit offered greetings on the day of Vesakh, which celebrates the founder of the faith, Siddhartha Gautama.

Global security has been a key concern of the ecumenical movement for more than a century, and was in many ways integral to the very formation of the WCC in the mid 20th century. On 6 April, WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit addressed this very issue in a contribution to York Minster’s lecture series Global Security and the United Nations: 70 years on.