Content about World Council of Churches

Each year on  Sept. 21 the World Council of Churches calls churches and parishes to observe the International Day of Prayer for Peace. This year the WCC is asking the 1,000 people who attended the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation in Kingston in May 2011 to offer a prayer for peace as a follow-up to that important event.

Ask anyone if they can imagine a world without nuclear weapons, and as polls indicate, most will say they can. This is true even in countries that possess nuclear weapons according to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons or ICAN, a new civil society initiative dedicated to the hope of a nuclear free world.

However, governments that possess nuclear weapons send a different signal. Their policies and expenditures say that "well...perhaps someday...but certainly not in our lifetimes."

UPDATE AUG. 31: Fiji cracks down further on church

SUVA, Fiji (United Methodist News Service) — Fiji’s government has banned all Methodist Church meetings except for Sunday worship in an unprecedented crackdown on religious freedom. This includes house groups, women’s prayer fellowship, choir practice, midweek Communion and youth fellowship, as well as the church’s governance meetings. Fijian Methodists, more than a third of the country’s population, are part of the Methodist Church in Britain.

I was on summer holiday during the second half of July, spending time with family, former colleagues and other friends in my native Norway. As it happens, my travels took me into Oslo on July 22. As I was leaving the city, I heard the terrible news of the many murders in the capital and at the Utøya Island youth camp.

UPDATE: As a July 27, Norwegian authorities revised downward the number killed in the attacks from 93 to 86 confirmed dead.

The Norwegian Lutheran pastor who currently serves as general secretary of the World Council of Churches issued a statement Friday say he was shocked by unleashing of violence in his homeland

World Council of Churches News

Christians are urged to share their Easter celebrations and proclamations with their co-religionists of other traditions to emphasize that this year’s observance on April 24 falls on the same day in both the eastern and western branches of Christianity.

The Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, World Council of Churches’ top executive, also encouraged Christians to continue working together for a common date for Easter in the future.

World Council of Churches News

As the sun rises on Sunday, May 22 Christians and churches across the world are being encouraged by the World Council of Churches (WCC) to celebrate God’s peace in their worship services, to hold a Peace Sunday dawn vigil, to plant a tree as an act of peace or to use social media to share prayers for peace with Christians around the world.

Compiled by TPC

Around the world, global and national religious leaders urged their flocks and co-religionists to show their faith in 2011 by advocating for those in need and in peacemaking efforts, even as churches were bombed on Christmas Day.

Archbishop of Canterbury

Ecumenical News International has suspended publication effective Dec. 21 and laid off its award-winning staff of 50 global correspondents, along with editor-in-chief Peter Kenny and managing editor Stephen Brown. The shut down of ENI comes some seven months after the World Council of Churches cut the agency's funding in half in response to complaints about the news agency's reporting.

As we head into the final week of Advent, the Grinch of Church Secrecy has shut down another vital source of genuine news for the world's Christians.