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Engaging climate justice: WCC Eco-School

Students who recently completed the WCC Eco School in Crete, Greece, took time to compile their reflections on how the experience helped them hone their messages and actions related to climate justice and a transition to green energy. This is first of a series of blog entries from Eco School students.

Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch marks 15th centennial jubilee of Mor Philoxenus of Maboug (523-2023)

In July 2021, I shared a blog with all of you, as my church, the Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch and all the East marks the 1500 Jubilee Year of Mor Jacob de Serugh (St Jacob of Serugh) a great Syriac Poet, who religiously articulated theological doctrines for monks to fight heresies.  He employed poetry to formulate pure and clear theological teaching using Biblical evidence. 

Reflections from a 1978/79 alumna on Bossey reunion at the WCC 11th Assembly

At the meeting for Bossey alumni, I represented the “oldest” alumna of the 1978/79 term, and it was good to see what a chance Bossey studies and encounters not only continue to give but increase for further ecumenical involvement and for carrying ecumenical messages. Today the studies at Bossey are well institutionalized and established at the University of Geneva. My own former classmates were not present as alumni: The Methodist Bishop Sally Dyck (USA) is again represented in the WCC central committee and was busy at that moment.

Study trip to Rome testifies that ecumenical engagements can move forward

Our successful visit to Rome with various ecumenical deliberations itself testifies that ecumenical engagements can move forward despite the pandemic. The launch of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity document “Ecumenism in a Time of Pandemic: From Crisis to Opportunity,” followed by an ecumenical panel discussion, helped us to understand how different churches have approached the pandemic. 

Happy Birthday, Dear WCC!

You are very much needed. You are very much appreciated. You are very much discussed. You are bringing the fellowship of churches together through prayers, discussions, reflections, and actions in consensus.

Martha and Maria Orthodox Christian Sisterhoods. Princess Alice of Greece and her unknown sisterhood

With the death and burial of Prince Philipp, Duke of Edinburgh, and husband of Queen Elizabeth II, of the English and the British Commonwealth throne, a kind of Orthodox Christian witness came into the fore, in the form of Christian Brotherhoods, quite unknown to Greece and the entire Orthodox world. Very few till now in Greece had known that there is also another kind of Orthodox Christian witness, that of the socially oriented and pastorally significant Brother- (and Sister-) hoods, especially in periods of crisis.

Remembering Patrick Matsinkinyiri (27 July 1937 – 15 January 2021)

Patrick Matsikenyiri was born in Biriri, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), and died in Mutare, Zimbabwe near his home village a few kilometers from the border of Mozambique, as a result of complications due to the COVID-19 virus. His career included virtually all aspects of church music — singing, choral directing, composition, hymnal editor, festival leader, professor, and enlivener of global songs in venues around the world.

Reflection from a Bossey graduate on the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

At the end of this year’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, even though we could not be in Rome as we had hoped, my fellow students at the World Council of Churches (WCC) Bossey Ecumenical Institute and I were thrilled to be able to participate online with two services: the WCC’s Global Ecumenical Prayer and the Vatican’s Vespers for the Feast of the Conversion of St Paul live from the Basilica of St Pauls Outside-the-Walls. Both services reflected on a reading from John 15 – from which was taken this year’s Week of Prayer theme: “Abide in my love and you shall bear much fruit.”

God, faith and church life under question in a time of a pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has shaken the political, economic and social life of a troubled world, already suffering by the financial crisis and imposed neoliberal austerity measures. With this current crisis, a strange unity has risen; a unity in fear of illness and death, anxious uncertainty for the future and collective mourning for the tens of thousands of deaths.

The architect of the ecumenical movement of the twentieth century

There is a saying that “people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots”. There are undoubtedly many things we could aspire to learn when it comes to the possibilities of learning from history and the people that left a legacy of their work, setting foundations for the future in which is now our present.