Search results

In a letter co-addressed to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the United Nations special rapporteur on situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory, the World Council of Churches expressed concern over the high rates of human rights violations and violence currently taking place in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

On 15 March, a group of Ecumenical accompaniers from the WCC were invited to share Shabbat dinner with the Kol HaNeshama congregation in Jerusalem.

Ma’alul, a Palestinian village destroyed in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, saw a visit by ecumenical accompaniers in mid-March. “I would have liked to invite you to a real home, not just as a refugee,” said Jad Saba Yusef Salem as he received the group of accompaniers to the village. Today, 95-year-old Salem is one of few remaining survivors from the 75 families who used to live in the village back in 1948.

WCC News met with the Very Reverend Archimandrite Dr Alexi Chehadeh, who leads the Department of Ecumenical Relations and Development for the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and all the East in Damascus, Syria. He is an impressive role model and peacemaker in Syria.

”10 minutes is the rule, so you make a lot of noise in your room at 5.50 if the other EA isn’t up.” Shepherding is early morning business, and international accompaniers from the WCC-EAPPI play a particular role, as they offer protective presence to Palestinian communities on the West Bank.

On 27 March, a hug between a 7-year-old girl, Majida, and her grandmother reflected the bright light of possibility that the ecumenical Humanitarian Corridors project continues to bring to refugees arriving in Italy. The child was waiting with other family members at the Fiumicino Airport in Rome as her grandmother arrived, safely and legally, in Italy from Lebanon.

The Coptic Church does not have to worry about the future of its monasteries. Many young Copts want to become monks or nuns. That was not always the case. In the late 1960s, monasticism in Egypt was close to extinction.

Hany Saweres and Edmon Kamel are icon painters in Cairo with a special mission: to paint the 21 martyrs who were beheaded by the so called Islamic State in February 2015 in Libya. A church in their memory is currently being built in El-Minya (Upper Egypt) – with funds from the Egyptian state.

“The Amazon, the green heart of the Earth, is mourning and the life it sustains is withering,” begins a statement released by the World Council of Churches Executive Committee as it met in Amman, Jordan from 17-23 November.

WCC general secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit joined other speakers at a side event of the 34th session of the UN Human Rights Council on 7 March. The speakers, which also included Metropolitan Hilarion, chairman of the Department of External Church Relations for the Russian Orthodox Church, addressed the topic of “Mutual Respect and Peaceful Coexistence as a Condition of Interreligious Peace and Stability: Supporting Christians and Other Communities.”

The 54th meeting of the WCC Commission of the Churches on International Affairs (CCIA) began today in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, marking its yearly regional focus on Africa. During the meeting CCIA members are discussing the commission’s previous work and its outcomes focusing on Middle East, as well as setting strategic directions for activities until 2021.

Bishop Munib Younan of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land was named a recipient of the Niwano Peace Prize for his work toward interreligious dialogue among Christians, Muslims, and Jews in Jerusalem and worldwide.

For Ramzi Zananiri, executive director of Jerusalem and the West bank at the Department of Service to Palestinian Refugees, which is part of the Middle East Council of Churches, the current situation in the Holy Land is "heart-breaking", and he says the Palestinians are "hostages" under troublesome realities.

For Hind Khoury the issue of water justice is quite simple. She believes there is no water justice in Palestine because access to clean water for drinking and sanitation exists in Israel but not in the Palestinian territories it occupies.

When Palestinian Bishop Munib Younan talks about the thirst, he links it with a quest for justice in both Palestine and Israel.

The WCC’s Seven Weeks for Water Lenten campaign through its ecumenical initiative — Ecumenical Water Network — has gained much attention recently, but the campaign is not new.

The WCC sent an open letter to the Gatestone Institute in response to the institute’s web articles criticizing the WCC’s “Seven Weeks for Water” campaign. The campaign focuses on critical water issues affecting the people of Palestine, particularly in the occupied territories.

When Fernando Enns thinks of water in a German context, he is reminded of thousands and thousands of refugees who have come to the country fleeing the conflict in Syria.

A water crisis for Palestinian people was highlighted by the general secretary of the WCC, Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, at the launch of the Seven Weeks for Water campaign in Jerusalem.

The WCC Ecumenical Water Network is inviting member churches and supporters to reflect on water during Lent. For many in the world, water is either taken for granted or in desperately short supply.