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A World Council of Churches delegation led by general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Jerry Pillay has concluded its visit to Armenia after “witnessing dramatic events”.

Peter Prove, director of the World Council of Churches Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, spoke on a nuclear weapons-free world during “The Audacity of Peace” gathering in Berlin.

A group of bikers from the Bike for Peace visited the World Council of Churches on 30 August as part of a commemoration in the Place de Nations. 

Pacific islands experience lasting impacts of the 50 years of nuclear testing and the region has become a global hotspot of climate change, the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission of Churches on International Affairs (CCIA) learned in its meeting this week in Brisbane, Australia.

The work of the World Council of Churches (WCC) related to disarmament continues to endure and expand, even as the world faces increasing injustice and tensions that threaten peace on a daily basis.

Virag Kinga Mezei is a Hungarian intern for the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission of the Churches on International Affairs. With a passion for human rights, she regularly engages in discussions while also getting training through the WCC on mechanisms that lead to the achievement of racial and social justice.

Archbishop of York John Habgood, a member of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Central Committee from 1983 to 1991 and moderator of Church and Society from 1983 to 1990, died on 6 March at the age of 91. A scientist and philosopher, Habgood was regarded as one of the most outspoken clerics of his time.

The WCC congratulated its partner, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), for receiving the Nobel Peace Prize on 6 October.

In a 15 September letter to Swedish foreign affairs minister Margot Wallström, WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit expressed strong support for religious leaders in Sweden who have requested that Sweden take part in the next step towards entry-into-force for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which opens for signature on 20 September at the United Nations.

Governments’ foreign policies need to change to focus on issues such as global inequalities that drive conflicts in many parts of the world, the moderator of the WCC Central Committee, Agnes Abuom, said at a forum in Berlin with German foreign minister Sigmar Gabriel.

Bishop Dr Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, chair of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) and a member of the church leaders’ pilgrimage to Japan on the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombings, pressed the case for the Humanitarian Pledge against nuclear weapons at the Hiroshima Day rally on 6 August 2015.

Church leaders from seven countries currently making historic choices for or against outlawing nuclear weapons will embark on a pilgrimage in early August to the two Japanese cities that were decimated by atomic bombs 70 years ago.

Four weeks of negotiations on nuclear weapons came to a close on Friday 22 May, as the Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty ended without a formal agreement. Despite the outcome, a bright new prospect towards a world without nuclear weapons has emerged in the form of a Humanitarian Pledge, now endorsed by 107 states, which promises “to fill the legal gap for the prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons”.

Should robots make life and death decisions? Religious leaders are asked to tell governments “Never”.

The WCC mourns the death of Leopoldo J. Niilus, former director of the WCC’s Commission of the Churches on International Affairs (CCIA), renowned lawyer, peace negotiator and author of several writings on human rights and international affairs.

The opening of the Berlin Wall 25 years ago was one of the most dramatic symbols of the global changes sweeping across the world in 1989.