The World Alliance of Reformed Churches
| WARC member churches list | What WARC does | WARC history  | WARC information sheet  |
| CANAAC membership list |
| An Anniversary Observed: the slave trade | Seeking Justice in the economy and ecology |
WARC has seven core areas of work
WARC has seven core areas of work and networks to support them:
- Justice in the economy and the earth
- Reformed worship and spiritual renewal
- Communion within the Reformed family and unity of the church ecumenical
- The Reformed tradition interpreted for contemporary witness
- Mission in unity, mission renewal and mission empowerment
- Inclusivity and partnership in church and society
- Witness for justice and peace enablement
WARC's president is the PC(USA)'s stated clerk emeritus, Clifton Kirkpatrick. Other Americans on its executive committee include Susan Davies (United Church of Christ) and Oliver Patterson (Reformed Church in America).
 
Reformed ecumenical bodies meet in joint sessions
In a major contribution to Christian unity, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC) and the Reformed Ecumenical Council (REC) are due to consolidate into a single body, the World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC). WCRC will represent 80 million Reformed Christians worldwide. The REC president has said that "Reformed history is a history of separation" but that unity is a better way. A uniting general council meeting is set to occur in the U.S., on June 18-28, 2010 at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. On June 20, some 5,000 worshipers are expected for a mass worship. Reservation information for visitors and observers will be available by the end of 2008.
A draft constitution, completed in early November, goes to all member churches of each body for comment by March 2009. In May 2009 the full executive committees of both will meet together. The joint working group that is planning the union process will meet next in February 2009. See a full timeline of important upcoming dates.
The new Reformed body is defined as a "communion," thereby articulating the members' commitment for "mutual caring, respect and service of one another, as witness to our common calling by the Spirit of God in Jesus Christ.” WCRC's Reformed identity is "articulated in historic Reformed confessions."
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Setri Nyomi says threats to peace give urgency to quest for Christian unity
  WARC general secretary Setri Nyomi told a November conference in Cyprus, "Civilization of Peace: Faiths and Cultures in Dialogue," that the churches' ability to speak credibly about peace and justice is at stake when they visibly are divided and fail to reconcile differences. The event was sponsored by the Church of Cyprus (an Orthodox body) and
the Community of Saint Egidio.
Disciples and Reformed churches want partnership
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Leaders of the Disciples Ecumenical Consultative Council (DECC) and WARC met in late July and, on behalf of a "comprehensive partnership," agreed that DECC member churches will be asked to consider DECC becoming an associate member of the new WCRC. DECC has 19 Disciples of Christ, Churches of Christ, and united / uniting churches. American Robert Welsh is its general secretary.
 "Making a Difference" links churches in mission and justice
WARC's "Making a Difference Project" (MADIP) is evaluating its three programs: literacy, a Joint Action Team that enables reflection on the postcolonial/neocolonial missiological implications of WARC's Accra Confession, and intercultural youth camps. The youth camps will be evaluated before MADIP draws to a close in March 2009. Jet den Hollander (pictured) is the program's coordinator.
North Americans to collaborate on Covenanting for Justice
 When WARC's North American Covenanting for Justice working group met in Toronto in April, it planned the creation of videos for the web to "bring the Accra Confession to life." The videos will picture how churches and communities in the global North and South struggle for justice related to race, gender, class, ecology, work, climate change, poverty, criminal justice, and education. One group member said, "We need to help people question sources of the problems.” Presbyterian Andrew Kang Bartlett (pictured) is a member of the group.
Caribbean and North American Area Council looks at context
 CANAAC is WARC's area council for 20 churches in the Caribbean and North America. It looks at WARC priorities through the lens of its regional context. PC(USA) minister Neal Presa (pictured) is in his second term as CANAAC's convenor (and serves on the WARC executive committee). Robina Winbush serves on the steering committee. The council will next convene in Grand Rapids in June 2010. Find the current CANAAC goals among its posted documents.
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The World Council of Churches
The WCC's 60th anniversary is celebrated in the U.S.
Before World War II intervened, a provisional committee intended to convene a world assembly of churches in 1941, but not until the post-war era did the WCC finally come into being on August 24, 1948. American Presbyterians have been integrally involved from the beginning. Former stated clerk Eugene Carson Blake, known in the U.S. for articulating the vision of what became the Consultation  on Church Union (COCU), was the second of six WCC general secretaries and the only American to date. See the WCC and NCC web sites for resources on the anniversary, including a downloadable file of the flow of international ecumenical history, 1910- 2008.
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The U.S. Conference of the WCC will observe the anniversary at its 2008 meeting in early December. An international consultation on Ecumenism in the 21st Century will take place in January 2009 in Belem, Brazil. |
WCC membership list | WCC structures | WCC historical overview | WCC Ecumenical Prayer Cycle |
| WCC program areas: priorities, activities, and projects | U.S. Conference for the WCC |
| An Anniversary Observed: the slave trade | Seeking Justice in the economy and ecology |
WCC programs are streamlined
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The WCC, at 60 years of age, now has some 350 members. Its current challenges include the need to respond to demographic shifts within the church worldwide, to do fewer things and do them well, and to communicate a clear vision. The WCC Central Committee, in an effort to work in these directions, has structured WCC programs into six areas:
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PC(USA) minsiter Elenora Giddings Ivory is the WCC staff leader of the public witness area. Robina Winbush and Judy Angleberger are the Central Committee members from the PC(USA).
 WCC exec committee extends Kobia's term
The World Council of Churches' executive committee, meeting in Germany on September 23-26, extended the contract of the current WCC general secretary, Samuel Kobia, until a successor takes office after selection by the central committee in September 2009. Four of the 25-member committee come from the U.S.: Vicken Aykazian, Lois Dauway, Larry Pickens, and Tyrone Pitts (pictured). |
Important areas of study are pursued by WCC bodies
 • The next Faith and Order plenary is set for October 2009. PC(USA) scholar Rebecca Todd Peters (pictured) is a member of Its smaller standing commission that met in June 2008. Current studies include ecclesiology, baptism, and worship; ethical decision-making; and questions of authority. In addition Faith and Order contributes to others' work, including a study on Christian self-understanding in a religiously plural world.
• The permanent committee on consensus and collaboration is seeking the churches' responses on two documents, "The Nature and Mission of the Church"  and "Called to be the One Church."
• The Commission on World Mission and Evangelism (CWME) has decided to hold only a small 200-person mission conference in 2012, to replace a normally expected larger event, since a more diverse major event will be held in 2010 to celebrate the centenary of the first world mission conference. In 2007 CWME affirmed work on evangelism and an interfaith code of conduct on conversion. It will cooperate with Faith and Order on study of The Nature and Mission of the Church and will continue work on health/healing. The next commission meeting will be in October 2008. Presbyterian Marian McClure is its volunteer recording secretary.
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• An Ecumenical Peace Convocation that will bring some 2,000 people to Kingston, Jamaica in May  2011, at the conclusion of the WCC's Decade to Overcome Violence (DOV), will enact a Ecumenical Declaration on Just Peace available. (ENI #08-0134) The convocation will look at present-day suffering and share stories of the church being an "incarnation of peace." "Living letters" teams are visiting areas of violence beforehand, to express solidarity. Angélique Walker-Smith of the National Baptist Convention, USA (pictured) was part of a team going to Sierra Leone and Liberia in early November. The 2009 DOV emphasis is on the Caribbean.
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World Christian Communions
While almost all the WCC's programmatic work is already carried out in consultation with ecumenical partners, it is giving special attention now to coordinating these relationships and deepening its partnership with regional ecumenical organizations (REOs), national councils of churches (NCCs), Christian world communions (CWCs), and specialized ministries. |
WCC - Christian World Communions commission meets for first time
 Decades of work for trust and partnership between conciliar and confessional ecumenists has resulted in the convening of a Joint Consultative Commission of the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Christian World Communions (CWC). It includes the global confessional families of Anglicans, Disciples, Eastern Orthodox, Friends (Quakers), Lutherans, Mennonites, Methodists, Oriental Orthodox, Reformed, and Roman Catholics. The moderator of the joint commission is Armenian Apostolic bishop Nareg Alemezian (pictured left), and the moderator of the Conference of Secretaries of Christian World Communions is Robert Welsh of Christian Church / Disciples of Christ in the U.S.
Christian World Communions present at forum on bilateral dialogues
A ninth forum on bilateral dialogues, meeting in Germany on March 10-15, for the first time included the Salvation Army and the African Instituted Churches. Both Christian World Communions (CWC) and the Faith and Order Commission sent representatives. CWCs were particularly asked to articulate their immediate goals regarding Christian unity as this relates to their dialogues. See the statement adopted at the forum.
An expanded WCC Assembly is a possibility for 2013
Discussion is underway about a possible WCC Assembly in 2013 that would be a combined event with global denominational bodies. The World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC) has called for such a gathering. The WCC's permanent committee on consensus and collaboration has asked WCC member communions to consider a conundrum: What is their feedback on the proposal for an expanded 2013 assembly given the fact that it would accommodate other ecumenical bodies yet in no way expand Orthodox representation? The question of the Orthodox being relegated to permanent minority status by various decisions of the council has been a serious consideration in recent years.
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Other bodies
World Association for Christian Communication
WACC elects PC(USA) mission co-worker as its new president
 When the World Association for Christian Communication's (WACC) congress met in South Africa in October, the focus was on communication in conflict situations. Randy Naylor, formerly of the National Council of Churches staff, is the WACC general secretary. Dennis Smith (pictured with his family), a long-time PC(USA) mission co-worker in Guatemala, has been elected president after formerly having served as the regional president of the Latin America region.
MORE on regional councils/conferences of churches around the globe 
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