WCC Pilgrimage Blog

My body, my sacred space

Many of us hate our bodies – bodies which do not match up to the media ideal; hating our bodies because of the liberties taken without our consent; hating ourselves for being born woman.

Tags: FellowPilgrims, Human dignity, just community of women and men, JusticeAndPeace

I am a woman and I thank God for that every day of my life. But being a woman means living every day to meet the demands that society, family and our work places (even the church) impose on us. Because I am a woman, I am expected to be perfect, and this is where I see one of the faces of violence: “forgetting who I am in order to become the superstar everyone expects me to be”.

Tags: just community of women and men, JusticeAndPeace

It is time to stop the ‘Curse’

Ruth V. E. Phillips

I am a 51 year old pastor who grew up in a Caribbean family which was punctuated with fights and beatings between my grandparents, my aunts and their husbands or boyfriends, my mother and my father, and my mother and my sister’s father. All on my mother’s side of the family. I made up my mind that that would not be me!

Tags: Health and healing, JusticeAndPeace, transformed, Children's rights, just community of women and men, Human dignity, spiritual life

We cannot baptise violence

Ezra Chitando

The 16 days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence serve as a reminder to the world that such violence remains widespread. Women from diverse social, economic, political, religious and other backgrounds are vulnerable to violence. Sadly, religion has denied many women survivors of gender-based violence access to justice.

Tags: human rights, just community of women and men, JusticeAndPeace

Counting in the most vulnerable ones in Eritrea

Susan Bevan, Bernard Ruh, Ikali Karvinen

When Finn Church Aid was invited to engage again in teacher education in Eritrea in 2014, we emphasized that our work is firmly rooted in two facts: we are based in faith and in human rights. As the Psalmist says, we hear and respond to those who are vulnerable and abused.

Tags: just community of women and men, transformed

Bethlehem shepherds, water shortage and trees of hope

Rosemarie Wenner

This Christmas Season I will have concrete places in my mind when I listen to the story of the shepherds in the fields of Bethlehem. I will think of the Bedouin community in Suyica, near Yatta, a Palestinian city in the West Bank. They live in tents and in caves because they are not allowed to build houses. Together with about 20 Methodists from around the globe representing the World Methodist Council, we visited them in October.

Tags: water, FellowPilgrims, Solidarity with churches in the Middle East, JusticeAndPeace

Phenomenal woman

Dionne Gravesande

Without peace, there is no justice. Too often, we pursue justice at the expense of peace, and peace at the expense of justice. To conceive peace apart from justice is to compromise the hope that “justice and peace shall embrace” (Ps 85:10). When justice and peace are lacking, or set in opposition, we need to reform our ways. Let us rise, therefore, and work together for peace and justice.

Tags: PilgrimsOnTheMove, just community of women and men, spiritual life

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Children on the Move

Lidia Lebang

"It is discouraging to see people flee because of war and persecution, and it is even more disheartening that children—the most vulnerable—are part of that terrible experience." Lidia Lebang shares her impressions from the World Children’s Day celebration held by the World Council of Churches and UNICEF at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva last week, and the differences big and small that Christians can make in the lives of individuals and of the community.

Tags: Youth, climate change, Children's rights, Refugees and migration

Fifty years after Uppsala 1968, the pilgrimage continues

Gunilla Ikponmwosa

I was not yet born in 1968, but I have heard the stories: How the World Council of Churches Assembly in Uppsala, Sweden changed the world church agenda and put focus on social justice and equality. To live and to practice the Gospel. To show the reality and embrace of the Incarnation.

Tags: just community of women and men, FellowPilgrims, WhatIsAPilgrimage, spiritual life

Our hope and our prayer

Olle Alkholm

50 years after the 1968 Uppsala Assembly of the World Council of Churches, Rev. Olle Alkholm, vice president of the Uniting Church in Sweden, shares a personal reflection, based on his only memory from that year.

Tags: Christian Unity, FellowPilgrims, PilgrInspire

Deepavali lights celebrate the victory of justice

Meera Baindur

The festival of lights called Deepavali (or Diwali) in India is deeply connected with the idea of hope, aspiration and abundance. Deepavali is the celebration of victory that is promised to a person who leads a morally responsible life. It is a victory of justice, represented by the oil lamps that cast away the darkness of oppression.

Tags: JusticeAndPeace, Inter-religious

Lord, when did we see you hungry?

Kristine Greenaway

‘Keeping hope a challenge’, as Al Walaja homes suffer demolition

Ecumenical Accompanier

“You are never safe, you never know when they will come.” When Israel issued Ilham with a demolition order for her home in the Palestinian village of Al Walaja last month, she knew that it was not an empty threat.

Tags: human rights, JusticeAndPeace, Solidarity with churches in the Middle East, EAPPI, FellowPilgrims, Human dignity

Reflections of Ecumenical Accompaniers: being present, bearing witness

Ecumenical Accompanier

Ecumenical Accompaniers walk children to school, accompany shepherds, serve as a presence of peace, and share what they see. They are the fruit of the WCC-EAPPI, and offer reflections from a variety of settings and the life around them.

Tags: JusticeAndPeace, Solidarity with churches in the Middle East, EAPPI, FellowPilgrims, Human dignity

Preaching in Toronto about the Pope’s visit to Geneva

Kristine Greenaway

When I was asked to preach recently, it seemed obvious that I would speak about the visit of Pope Francis to Geneva in June at the invitation of the World Council of Churches. This would give me the opportunity to talk about ecumenism with people who might not be familiar with either the word or the concept. It would also be the chance to draw attention to the 70-year quest by the WCC for practical ecumenism, that is to say an ecumenism that is about Christians working together to love their neighbour and care for creation.

Tags: Christian Unity, FellowPilgrims, just community of women and men, spiritual life

Assembled by faith, united in Christ, strengthened by God

Doug Chial

This week we continue celebrating the foundation of the World Council of Churches at the Amsterdam Assembly in 1948. Since its founding 70 years ago, the WCC has held assemblies in Evanston, New Delhi, Uppsala, Nairobi, Vancouver, Canberra, Harare, Porto Alegre and Busan.

Tags: Christian Unity, transformed, spiritual life, PilgrimsOnTheMove

Prayerful patience as Zimbabwe waits for election results

Andrew Williams

I participated as an international observer in the Zimbabwe 2018 harmonised elections, representing the World Council of Churches. I am very impressed with the work of the Zimbabwe Council of Churches.

Tags: WhereWillYouGo, transformed, JusticeAndPeace

We pray and hope, for Zimbabwe's elections

Kerstin Pihl & Sven Eckerdal

Kerstin Pihl and Sven Eckerdal are currently in Zimbabwe to monitor the first election to take place since Robert Mugabe was forced to leave power in November 2017. Here comes a first snapshot of the situation in the country.

Tags: human rights, FellowPilgrims, just community of women and men, JusticeAndPeace

Water and the human right to food

Luise Steinwachs

Water is a key resource both to provide drinking water and to generate food and energy for a growing world population. A fifth of the global population lives in regions affected by water stress - in regions where more water is used than can naturally be recharged.

Tags: human rights, PilgrimFocus, Food, PilgrimsOnTheMove, JusticeAndPeace, water, Human dignity

Youth involvement requires trust, mutual support and formation

Renato Valenga

Youth participation in the World Council of Churches (WCC) brings a lot of challenges ahead of the young people involved in the ecumenical movement. It is possible to find reflections about the lack of participation of young people in WCC since the first assembly.

Tags: Youth, FellowPilgrims, transformed