During a noon prayer on 19 April, the World Council of Churches (WCC) called for global solidarity with the people of Sudan as an escalating conflict has plunged many innocent people into a situation in which they are barely able to survive.
A Global Peace Prayer on 22 March will draw Christians together in hope for a better future. A communique from a prayer planning committee explained that Christians are called into prayer and advocacy for peace. “In a global context where war and violence abound, the practice of peace has become even more urgent,” reads the message.
After receiving a pilgrimage of global religious leaders, the South Sudan Council of Churches released a statement on 10 March echoing the church leaders’ call for nonviolent means to solve the nation’s problems.
After postponing their unique ecumenical pilgrimage of peace to South Sudan, world Christian leaders will travel to the world’s youngest nation in February.
At the World Council of Churches 11th Assembly in Karlsruhe Germany, Jackcilia Salathiel Ebere will be carrying the voices of women from South Sudan who are crying for peace and justice.
In South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the peace and reconciliation work of pastors, priests and lay Christians remains critical for the people, as the global church and ecumenical groups amplify their concerns over the complex but separate conflicts in the two African countries.
The World Council of Churches (WCC) central committee elected Rev. Prof. Dr Jerry Pillay as the ninth general secretary at its 17 June meeting. Below, Pillay reflects on his longstanding passion for ecumenism and his expectations for the WCC 11th Assembly in Karlsruhe.
At ecumenical prayers in the capital city, Juba, South Sudanese church leaders called for unity, peace, and reconciliation, as their nation continued to struggle with instability and conflict, a decade after independence.
The general secretary-elect of the World Council of Churches (WCC) believes that growing up during a period of conflict and suffering in South Africa will stand him in good stead when he takes up his position as the head of the ecumenical body in January as a leader who believes in dialogue.
In drought-stricken regions in eastern Africa, churches and church congregations continue to pray for rain, as the weather conditions leave millions of people without food, water and pasture for their animals.
On the International Day of Living Together in Peace declared by the United Nations, members of the World Council of Churches (WCC) fellowship from countries troubled by war and conflict gathered to pray for sustainable peace in the world.
Two World Council of Churches (WCC) HIV initiatives met to review and celebrate the critical and life-changing work of the initiatives and to continue planning for a strengthened WCC HIV response in the new WCC Commission of the Churches on Health and Healing.
As the war in Ukraine triggers an unexpected rise in food and commodity prices in African markets, church leaders are reaching out to communities struggling with food insecurity and shortages.
When heads of Churches in South Sudan unveiled the Action Plan for Peace in the Rwandan Capital, Kigali in 2015, the immediate aim was to stop the war.
A church leader in South Sudan is urging the international community to keep its focus on the growing humanitarian crisis in the world’s youngest nation, as the globe beams its attention on the conflict in Ukraine.
While the World Council of Churches (WCC) deeply appreciates peace-building efforts in South Sudan, the WCC is also calling attention to the dire circumstances in which the people of South Sudan are still forced to lead their daily lives.
