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The World Council of Churches Executive Committee issued a statement on 23 May expressing concern and solidarity for the people of West Papua who are facing violence and human rights violations.

Behind Bali’s luxury hotels, sandy beaches and lush landscapes pampering tourists from all around the world, one finds a heartbreaking poverty, and its most vulnerable victims are children.

In the small village of Kaliki, men, women and children are on their feet, dancing, accompanied by drum rolls, as an international World Council of Churches (WCC) Pilgrim Team arrives. The pilgrims are given intricately-woven crowns of grass and flowers and their faces are painted with traditional patterns.

The 56th meeting of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission of the Churches on International Affairs took place in Bali, Indonesia, on 24 – 28 February, discussing many of the most critical concerns of churches in the region and around the world.

With the sounds of the kulkul wooden bell at the Galang Ning Hyang Protestant Church in the Badung region of Bali, Indonesia, the 56th meeting of the World Council of Churches (WCC) Commission of the Churches on International Affairs opened on 24 February, setting its yearly regional focus on Asia.

An ecumenical delegation coordinated by the World Council of Churches (WCC) visited Indonesia on 15-22 February, including the provinces of Papua and Papua Barat - where increasing violence and discrimination against indigenous Papuan people was recently highlighted in a joint statement by five UN human rights mandate-holders.

Monday 28 January was a very special day for 25-year-old student Kezia Wairata from Jakarta, Indonesia. Along with 30 dedicated peers she received her diploma in advanced studies of ecumenism at the WCC Ecumenical Institute in Bossey, Switzerland.

“Inequality hurts us all and goes against God’s vision of life in abundance for every human being”, said Athena Peralta, World Council of Churches (WCC) programme executive for economic and ecological justice, at a prayer service on the occasion of the Week of Action to Fight Inequality, held at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, on 21 January.

Twenty-nine students from the WCC Bossey Ecumenical Institute traveled to Rome for the annual study visit to the Vatican, and to take part in the inauguration of the 2019 Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, which is observed 18-25 January.

A “Bible App” is making material for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity available on smart phones, computers and tablets as the World Council of Churches (WCC) continues its collaboration with YouVersion.

From 18-25 January, Christians will embark on the largest prayer gathering in the world, the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Whether praying together, exchanging preachers or planning ecumenical services, they will bear witness to Jesus’s prayer for his disciples that “they may be one so that the world may believe.”

After the tsunami hit the coast on Indonesia's Sunda Strait, the World Council of Churches (WCC) reached out with condolences to people who have lost loved ones. More than 200 people have been killed and 750 injured after a tsunami hit the coast on Indonesia's Sunda Strait, government officials say.

Rev. Dr Ofelia Ortega Suárez may be 82 years old, but after the students at the Ecumenical Institute in Bossey heard her speak about the World Council of Churches (WCC) at 70: Achievements and Hopes, they said she has the lively spirit and enthusiasm of a 20-year-old.

More than 220 church leaders representing over 20 churches from Belgium, France, Luxemburg and Switzerland are meeting from 27-31 October in the French city of Lyon for the first Francophone Christian Forum.

Maryland-based, Ghanaian-born Rev. Dr Casely Essamuah was in February selected as secretary of the Global Christian Forum. Originally ordained in the Methodist Church in Ghana, he began his work officially in July. This week he made a study visit to the WCC and the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva and the WCC was able to converse with him.