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I sometimes ask people if they know which is the first point in the Bible that Bethlehem gets a mention. And that normally offers them quite a challenge. People certainly move back from the New Testament into the Old – and come up with responses like, ‘the story of David’, or ‘the Book of Ruth’. Good thinking. But actually the first mention of Bethlehem in our Bibles (as they are now set out) occurs much earlier still.

Looking back on a year of Reformation commemorations, many churches ask themselves, what has changed, or what will change after this outstanding 500 years jubilee. We look back on an enormous engagement, from congregations to the worldwide level, to organize events and celebrations. The Assembly of the Lutheran World Federation pointed out clearly: “Salvation, human beings and creation are not for sale.” The three protestant churches of Austria – Lutheran, Reformed and Methodist - celebrated the 500-years Reformation Jubilee together with thousands of participants and proclaimed “Justice, Peace and Integrity of creation” as their main topics. No question: we are talking about the economy!

Returning from another visit to Iraq alongside Carla Khijoyan, the World Council of Churches' Middle East programme executive, and Fr Emanuel Youkhana of the Christian Aid Programme Northern Iraq (CAPNI), many images fill my mind: images of destruction, and of life hesitantly picking up again. Many uncertainties remain, prompting us to bend our heads and raise our prayers to the Lord.

With mega cities "mushrooming" all over the world, one must wonder how they can be supplied with enough, and healthy, food. Ideas range from an increased rural production to urban gardening and technically complex solutions like vertical indoor gardens. As Christians, we are called to side with people who live in poverty and who are marginalized. For me and my colleagues at Bread for the World, it is important to ask: What does all this mean for the rural population and for small scale farmers?

October 16 is the World Food Day, and from October 15 to October 21, we celebrate the Churches' Week of Action on Food. So it is an appropriate time to reflect on the scandal and the shame that each night, one person in nine of all humanity goes to sleep hungry. 38 million more people than the previous year are hungry, bringing the number up to 815 million, reversing the 10-year trend of gradual reduction in hunger.

During the night of 3-4 October 2016, Hurricane Matthew tore through the southwest region of Haiti. Powerful winds and torrential rains washed away fields, livestock, and houses. The only bridge linking the region to the rest of the country was destroyed. Suddenly farmers who had been exporting agricultural produce could no longer feed their families.

Never has humanity lived in a more connected, yet disconnected time! Connected by the endless notifications on our smartphones – alerting us to all the latest news and tidings in our social media, yet not connected deeply enough to respond substantially to people's suffering. Among the many tragedies are the human-made famines in South Sudan, Somalia, North-Eastern Nigeria and in Yemen.

In Landskron, where I am a pastor of the Lutheran Church in Austria, we have a dynamic, growing and socially engaged congregation. Our town hosts hundreds of refugees and asylum seekers from various countries. While their papers are being processed, they are not allowed to work. In our interactions with the refugees and asylum seekers, they have expressed their frustration at not being able to use their time fruitfully. Most of them miss working, and the contact with the land.

One in eleven adults is diabetic. I happen to be one of those 422 million adults. There has been a dramatic increase in the number of those affected by Diabetes over the last quarter century. This increase points to a disturbing decrease in levels of physical activity of people, excessive weight gain among populations and a dramatic shift in how people access food. In the history of humanity, this reality indicates far-reaching changes in lifestyle, economics, and well-being.

The Ecumenical Water Network (EWN) of the World Council of Churches (WCC) has been observing World Water Day since its inception. It is an important occasion for all those working on water issues, including the WCC, to highlight the global water crisis. Particularly the Lenten campaign of the WCC, the “Seven Weeks for Water”, is an opportunity to galvanise its constituencies to discuss issues around water.

I was standing in the control booth at the back of the auditorium when the moderator of the WCC Central Committee declared the 9th Assembly open, in Porto Alegre, Brazil, on 14 February 2006. My friend Jean-Nicolas Bazin and I were surrounded by light and sound technicians and we had our eyes on the script of the opening plenary, making sure everything was flowing smoothly and according to plan.

Women are at the heart of agriculture, yet too often their core function is neither recognised nor supported. That message stood out to me in the annual meeting of the Food for Life strategy group that I attended last November. The issues that affect women came up in all discussions, whichever goal of the Food for Life campaign, run by the Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance (WCC-EAA), was on the agenda.

Promoting children’s rights necessarily involves creating platforms for children to speak up, and for their concerns to be heard. It also involves ensuring that children and their families have access to relevant and easily understood information, as well as building the communication skills of children so that they can defend and exercise their rights.