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Prayer focuses on overcoming hunger

A World Council of Churches (WCC) morning staff prayer focused on the Weekend of Prayer and Action Against Hunger, as well as the Ecumenical Prayer Cycle for the churches and people of Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, and Belize.

EWN members stand in solidarity with water and land defenders

Berta Caceres was a well-known land rights defender who led a battle against a large dam on ancestral lands in Honduras. She was shot to death at her home in 2016. Recently the former president of the internationally financed dam company was found guilty over the assassination. Members of the WCC-Ecumenical Water Network (EWN) are worried that violence against activists who are taking a stand against the overexploitation of natural resources, like land and water, is on the rise. Unlike the murder of Berta Caceres, most attacks and killings go unpunished.

Indigenous peoples and the pandemic in the land of inequalities

476 million indigenous people live around the world, of which 11.5% live in our Latin American region. In these years that we are going from the COVID 19 pandemic in our territories (indigenous or tribal at the Latin American level), the presence of many extractive companies, mainly uranium and lithium, has increased, land traffickers and among other monoculture companies with fires for the cultivation of oil palm, logging, putting vulnerable peoples at greater risk than what is already experienced.

Latest issue of International Review of Mission focuses on “reconciliation as a missional task”

The latest issue of the World Council of Churches’ journal International Review of Mission deals with one of the most urgent issues in the world today – reconciliation.

Under the title, “Reconciliation as a Missional Task,” the issue explores the meaning of reconciliation, how it can be understood theologically, and what its missiological dimensions mean for the church’s missional task.

WCC general secretary meets with Indigenous representative from Latin America

The World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit met last week with Rev. Miguel Salanic, from Guatemala, in Geneva, Switzerland. They discussed the role of indigenous people as part of the living WCC fellowship and the preparations leading up to the WCC 11th Assembly to be held in Karlsruhe, Germany in 2021.

Einheit, Solidarität und Hoffnung als Leitthemen des Ökumenischen Wochenendes

Einheit und Solidarität in Christus gegen populistische Trends waren die bestimmenden Themen der Eröffnungsbotschaft für das Ökumenische Wochenende in Uppsala, Schweden am 3.–4. November. Unter dem Motto „Seht! Ich mache alles neu!“ haben sich 150 Gäste versammelt, um sich über die aktuellen Herausforderungen der Ökumene auszutauschen.

Unity, solidarity and hope at core of Ecumenical Weekend

Unity and solidarity in Christ against populist trends was at the core of the opening message for an Ecumenical Weekend in Uppsala, Sweden on 3-4 November. Under the theme ”Behold, I make everything new!”, 150 guests gathered to reflect on current challenges for ecumenism.

How can you help refugees?

What else could your family, your parish, your community do to respond to the needs of migrants and refugees arriving in your country? Representatives of many different churches met in Rome in September to discuss that practical question, as well as respond to the broader challenge of how people of faith can combat the rising tide of racism, xenophobia and nationalist policies that increasingly target vulnerable migrants and asylum seekers.

#WCC70: Eine Lebensgeschichte

Wenn Elias Crisóstomo Abramides von Argentinien also eine Geschichte über das 70jährige Bestehen des Ökumenischer Rats der Kirchen (ÖRK) schreibt, dann schreibt er auch die Geschichte seines Lebens. Sein Dienst beim ÖRK öffnete für ihn das Tor, „die sehr gute Schöpfung Gottes“ kennen und lieben zu lernen: Liebe, Respekt und Bewunderung für das Leben seines Nächsten und der gesamten Schöpfung.

#WCC70: A story of life

In writing a story for the 70th anniversary of the World Council of Churches (WCC), Elias Crisóstomo Abramides of Argentina, from the Ecumenical Patriarchate, is writing the story of his life. His service at the WCC opened for him the gate to meeting and loving “the very good Creation of God”: love, respect and admiration for the life of his neighbours and for all creation.

Solidarity with peaceful eco-resistance movements

“We are part of a struggle in defense of water, life, and mother earth,” people from the Peaceful Resistance Movement of La Puya told us. La Puya is a campsite at the entrance of the El Tambor gold mine in Guatemala, built by some local people five years ago after Kappes, Cassiday and Associates (KCA) – a U.S. based company, tried to bring in equipment to start mining.

Strengthening advocacy for women’s human rights

Delegates from around the world will this week explore strategies that lay and religious leaders and other civil society actors can use to increase the impact of faith-based advocacy for women’s human rights.

Blanket Exercise uncovers deep injustices in Canadian history

The report issued by Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission in June 2015 on abuse of aboriginal children in church-run residential schools included a call for non-aboriginal Canadians to learn about the impact of European settlers and their descendants on the country’s indigenous peoples. Church people have taken that call seriously.

Solidarity overcomes sorrow: Indigenous Peoples gather in Trondheim

Journeying from urban centres and small Pacific islands, mountain ranges and rural towns, more than 170 Indigenous people gathered this week at the mouth of the river that flows from traditional Sami lands. Their conference, “Reconciliation Processes and Indigenous Peoples: Truth, Healing and Transformation,” brought together representatives of more than two dozen Indigenous societies in connection with the WCC Central Committee meetings in Trondheim, Norway.

Trondheim conference to explore reconciliation in Indigenous contexts

Experiences of reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people around the world will be front and centre at an upcoming international conference in Trondheim, Norway. The Sami Church Council of the Church of Norway and the WCC are the chief organizers behind the conference, “Reconciliation Processes and Indigenous Peoples: Truth, Healing and Transformation,” which will take place from 20-21 June. Coinciding with the National Aboriginal Day of Prayer in Canada, the conference will be held in connection with the WCC Central Committee meeting also taking place in Trondheim from 22-28 June.