wfn.org | WCC visit to Angola

["WCC Media" <Media@wcc-coe.org>]

World Council of Churches
Update Up-03-38
For Immediate Use
13 October 2003

WCC learning from Angola's "struggle for life"

Cf WCC Press Release PR-03-31 of 2 October 2003

This delegation has come to Angola "to learn from your struggle
for life against the forces of death", WCC general secretary Rev.
Dr Konrad Raiser told some seventy representatives of both member
and non-member churches of the World Council of Churches (WCC)
who gathered at the Council of Christian Churches in Angola
(CICA) conference centre on 8 October 2003.

"The WCC is a world-wide fellowship of churches which have come
together to strengthen their witness to the gospel. It is not an
institution in Geneva that distributes funds or organizes
conferences. It is a fellowship of churches committed to
journeying together," Raiser said.  

Three major emphases of WCC work over recent years, he
explained, have been a Decade of the Churches in Solidarity with
Women in their efforts to attain dignity and equality; the
struggle against racism and apartheid, that continues today in
Angola's reconstruction efforts; and the struggle for justice,
peace and the integrity of creation, that has given rise to a
2001-2010 Decade to Overcome Violence.

Earlier that day, the WCC delegation attended the opening of the
annual general assembly of the United Methodist Church of Angola
in Luanda. The church is part of the WCC through the United
Methodist Church in the USA. The WCC general secretary was
welcomed by church president Bishop Gaspar Joao Domingos, and by
a large number of Angolan Methodists gathered for the assembly. 

Bishop Gaspar expressed joy at this first official visit by a
WCC general secretary to the country, and said that it comes at a
moment when the challenge of rehabilitating people, rebuilding
infrastructure and the country as a whole is being revealed in
all its complexity. 

Commenting on the current post-war challenges, "Hope, faith and
peace are inner resources that you have and that cannot flourish
and take root from outside," Raiser said. 

The 10-day visit to Angola by the WCC delegation began on 7
October with an afternoon and evening of fellowship and exchanges
with church leaders and representatives of the Council of
Christian Churches in Angola (CICA) and of the Inter-church
Committee for Peace in Angola  (COEPA).

For further information, please contact Juan Michel, WCC  media
relations officer,  tel: +41 22 791 6153, mobile +41 79 507 6363,
media@wcc-coe.org  

**********

The World Council of Churches (WCC) is a fellowship of churches,
now 342, in more than 100 countries in all continents from
virtually all Christian traditions. The Roman Catholic Church is
not a member church but works cooperatively with the WCC. The
highest governing body is the assembly, which meets approximately
every seven years. The WCC was formally inaugurated in 1948 in
Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Its staff is headed by general
secretary Konrad Raiser from the Evangelical Church in Germany.

World Council of Churches
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