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By Marcelo Schneider (*)

“As women, we have a bond that helps us to engage in interfaith dialogue at the grassroots level in communities. Together we can identify the issues that concern all of us,” said the Rev. Krise Anki Gosal from the Christian Evangelical Church in Minahasa, Indonesia.

World Council of Churches (WCC) participants in the Rio+20 Conference have joined a broad religious coalition in rejecting the official outcome document of the United Nations-sponsored event.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) has been playing an active role in the two major events that are taking place in Rio from 12 to 23 June: the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD), also known as Rio+20, and the People’s Summit.

“The growing church in the People’s Republic of China today presents four characteristics: independent and autonomous, post-denominational, fast growing and faced with lots of challenges and emerging difficulties,” said the Rev. Gao Feng, president of the China Christian Council (CCC), in a speech in China on 14 June.

A call for solidarity with the poor was delivered to a gathering of religious, political and civil society leaders from all over the world by one of the presidents of the World Council of Churches (WCC). The meeting on the topic “Bound to Live Together: Religions and Cultures in Dialogue” is taking place from 11-13 September in Munich, Germany.

In an energetic book launch featuring Jamaican drummers and an Indian “Bollywood” dance lesson, the World Student Christian Federation (WSCF) released a new publication seeking to break the silence on sexual abuse of women by clergy within the church.

As peace advocates from around the world relayed heartrending stories of violence and oppression, they also expressed their ongoing hope that a movement of peace will prevail during the proceedings of the second day of the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation (IEPC) being held in Kingston, Jamaica.

By Theodore Gill*

At the 50th meeting since its foundation in 1946, the Commission of the Churches on International Affairs (CCIA) decided to refocus, establishing four thematic working groups, in order better to respond to the needs of the member churches.

A new inter-religious partnership for health will be kick-started at the United Nations Millennium Development Goals Review Summit in New York, 20-22 September.

With a new sense of urgency in view of a pandemic that grows exponentially, high level figures from many of the world's faiths have committed to exercise "stronger, more visible and practical leadership" in response to HIV, with an emphasis on eradicating the stigma and discrimination towards those affected.

The first-ever Summit of High Level Religious Leaders on HIV and AIDS will be held in Den Dolder, Netherlands, from 22-23 March 2010. It aims to generate greater involvement from religious leaders of many of the world’s faiths in the global response to the pandemic.

On the eve of the 22 September United Nations Summit on Climate Change representatives of faith communities around the world called on world leaders and on "all people of Earth to accept the reality of the common danger we face, the imperative and responsibility for immediate and decisive action and the opportunity to change."

WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Samuel Kobia was one of ten world religious leaders who signed a statement entitled "Faith in Human Rights" at an International Inter-religious Conference in The Hague, Netherlands on Wednesday, 10 December.

By Naveen Qayyum (*)

German churches' experience with the issue of "domestic violence" will play an important role in a Peace Declaration of the World Council of Churches planned for 2011. "The churches have denied the existence of this issue for a long time", said Georges Lemopoulos, deputy general secretary of the World Council of Churches (WCC), speaking on Saturday 28 June in Frankfurt.

<span style="font-weight: bold; "» Indigenous peoples challenge UN draft declaration

<span style="font-weight: bold; "» Critical moment interreligious conference

Grace and peace to you on this Feast of Pentecost 2005, in which we celebrate the many gifts of God's Spirit!