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Land rights, equity in development resource flows and life-enhancing epistemologies were among the themes emphasized by faith-based organizations at the World Social Forum in Montreal, Canada on 9-14 August.

In the Washington DC region on 18 April, Jim Winkler, general secretary of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA, welcomed a contingent from the WCC who, with others, will be spending 18-25 April on a WCC-sponsored racial justice listening and support visit to several US communities which have suffered violent incidents related to race.

Ecumenical cooperation among Christian traditions is “an indispensable path to evangelization,” according to the 2013 apostolic exhortation from Pope Francis titled Evangelii Gaudium, or “the joy of the gospel.” The latest issue of the journal International Review of Mission analyses the encyclical’s teaching in light of two other documents on mission agreed by the Commission on World Mission and Evangelism and the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization.

How and in which ways are money and finance shaping the world economy and society? What ought to be the roles of money and finance and what can we do together as faith communities to make the prevailing international financial architecture more just and compassionate?

Participants in the 2015 Agape International Political Camp have explored the concept of security and issued a call for a “pedagogy of and for peace” founded on justice.

The possibility of a new economic framework is the chief focus of the newly published issue of The Ecumenical Review. Informed by years of ecumenical work on the relationship of poverty, wealth and ecology (including the proposal for a “greed line”), the 14 contributors offer an array of insights from specific contexts and religious standpoints – Dalits, South Africans, Latin Americans, Indigenous spirituality, feminist theology and non-Christian religions – into the values and structures that can create an “economy of life” for all.

The social and ecological cost of expanding mineral exploration and extraction was highlighted by churches at the World Social Forum.

National elections, gender-based violence, environmental issues and human rights in the Democratic Republic in Congo (DRC) were in focus during a two-day forum organized by the member churches of the WCC in the DRC.

A wealth of substantive engagements with and responses to contemporary trends in the theology and practice of mission and evangelism are featured in the newest issue of International Review of Mission.

At the recent World Social Forum, ecumenical voices warned about the grave consequences of extraction of natural resources and mining, which they say generate a tremendous amount of social and ecological debt.

Church representatives at a recent Oikotree Global Forum in Johannesburg, South Africa stressed the need to support peoples'€™ movements promoting justice in the economy and ecology, a concern, they say, that lies at the heart of the faith.

In Africa, trade, aid and investments from the European Union (EU), United States (US) and China have not fully addressed the roots of poverty, inequality and ecological degradation. Churches, therefore, need to engage in a “development dialogue” to support alternative economic agendas, which can help eradicate poverty, while safeguarding Africa’s natural riches.

In La Paz, an ecumenical delegation delivered to Bolivian government officials a statement on ethical principles for a new global economic system. The statement was received by Bolivian minister of the presidency Juan Ramon Quintana at the government palace on 9 January.

“It is not possible to talk about a new financial architecture without linking it to the pain and struggles of the people,” said Rev. Dr Collin I. Cowan at an ecumenical conference on a new financial and economic architecture, currently underway in Brazil.

A framework and criteria for a new financial and economic architecture will be discussed at an ecumenical conference in Brazil this week. These criteria will embrace ethics and justice to address ecological concerns. The debates at the event will highlight the concerns of millions of people affected by the financial crisis.

What are the connections between widespread poverty and ecology? Seventy-five scientists, activists, philosophers and theologians are meeting from 26 to 30 September at the Orthodox Academy of Crete, in Kolympari, Greece, to understand the intertwined dynamics of economic development and environmental sustainability.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) “ is defined by all the three key words in our name. We are global, in all continents, and therefore also in solidarity with one another, seeking peace in all its meaning for the whole earth,” said the WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit.

By Susan Kim (*)