Monday morning prayer at the chapel of the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva today celebrated the Season of Creation – the time of year when the worldwide Christian family joins in praying and caring for our common home.
At a meeting in Auckland, New Zealand from 1-3 August, the Pacific Conference of Churches released texts on climate change and nuclear weapons, and issued calls to action related to human rights and other issues.
During Kirchentag, a Protestant church festival in Germany, vice-moderator of the WCC Commission of Ecumenical Education and Formation Prof. Dr Esther Mombo visited the World Council of Churches (WCC) booth, where she talked with Marianne Ejdersten, WCC director of Communication.
Speaking at the Peterskirche, the University Church of Heidelberg, on 27 October, WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit said the Reformation can only be commemorated properly if the remembrance is done in a modus of mutual accountability.
The church must work for climate justice as part of its quest for just peace, urged Dr Agnes Abuom, moderator of the WCC Central Committee (WCC) as she offered a keynote address at the Württembergische Evangelische Landessynode in Stuttgart, Germany this week.
Georges “Yorgo” Lemopoulos says his discovery of global ecumenism as a theology student in Istanbul, Turkey, transformed his life. The member of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople credits theology professors who were active in ecumenical work with awakening his interest in the global church movement.
The faces of those who lead the global ecumenical movement have changed dramatically since 1954, says the head of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Rev. Dr Sharon Watkins. Pictures of delegates to the World Council of Churches’ assembly held that year in Evanston, USA, show rows of men in dark suits and ties, most of them white.
Africa space is a religious space, a combination of 54 states from North to East, West to South. Differences in culture and religious persuasion exist, but a unity of purpose is always on peace and development. What is not negotiable is the strong believe in God, the piousness of Africans. That's why we boldly and unanimously walk on the common ground to say this weapon of mass destruction remaining unbanned is totally unacceptable.
In Gaza, 30 to 40 percent of all disease-related deaths are caused by bad water. The multiple cases of kidney and liver diseases Gaza have to do with salts and minerals in the water. 95% of the water that Palestinians in Gaza have been consuming for decades has been proven unfit for human consumption.
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.
As the 21st Conference of Parties (COP 21) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change came to a close in Paris, a consultation organized by the National Council of Churches in the Philippines and the Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance of the WCC on 11 December in Quezon City, Philippines considered “The Right to Food and Life in the Context of Climate Change.”
In November 2015 a WCC Seminar on Ecumenism and Spirituality Lived and Practiced by Young People was held in Salatiga, Indonesia. I was really excited because that was the first time I participated in a worldwide ecumenical event.
Reducing the gap: Interfaith riches, a common message prepared by participants of Building an Interfaith Community Summer Course,
held from 27 July – 14 August 2015, Chateau de Bossey, Switzerland
In a high level panel on Climate Change and Human Rights held at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, the WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit said that despite all negative conditions “we have the right to hope” – not as a matter of passive waiting but as an active process towards justice and peace, in which human rights should play a key role.
The 6th biblical reflection of the Seven Weeks for Water 2015 is by Susan Smith, a Professor of Law and Director of the Certificate Program in Sustainability at the Willamette University, USA. She teaches environment law, including water law and is a water activist. She represents the United Church of Christ at the International Reference Group of the Ecumenical Water Network of the WCC. In this reflection she highlights that the kingdom of God/ paradise can be witnessed here on this earth, if we make water available for all for their basic sustenance with dignity, contrary to the model where water is “harnessed as fuel for the engine of economic growth to serve the twin gods of economic efficiency and profit”.