wfn.org | WCC NEWS: Peace video messages available

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

World Council of Churches - News Release
Contact: +41 22 791 6153   +41 79 507 6363 media@wcc-coe.org 
For immediate release - 20/09/2004

 MESSAGES OF PEACE ON VIDEO
 AVAILABLE AT www.OVERCOMINGVIOLENCE.ORG/PEACE2004 

"God weeps over God's world, aching because of conflict in Darfur, in
Beslan, in Harare, in Colombia, in Jerusalem, in Belfast," says Nobel Peace
Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu in his message for the International
Day of Prayer for Peace, to be observed on 21 September. And he adds: "God
- Emmanuel, God with us, with you - has no one but you to help God make
this world hospitable to peace and justice."

Although, as Greek Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I affirms in his message,
"violence and war are considered by many as ways of improvement for the
world's situation," the truth is that "all of the ideologies and
convictions on the necessity and effectiveness of violence are wrong and
are to be condemned."

Recalling the experience of Germany, where a nonviolent Christian movement
contributed to the fall of the Berlin Wall 15 years ago, the chairman of
the council of the Evangelical Church in Germany Bishop Wolfgang Huber
states that "wherever people trust in the spirit of peace in the name of
Jesus Christ, they experience that it is a realistic force to be reckoned
with, and that possibilities open up."

These are among the peace messages delivered by more than a dozen
well-known Christian leaders and peace-makers from all over the world who
support the initiative called by for the World Council of Churches (WCC) in
the frame of its Decade to Overcome Violence.  The inspiring two-minute
video messages are also an affirmation of the churches' and faith
communities' work for peace and justice.

This WCC initiative links to the International Day of Peace declared by the
United Nations General Assembly, a world-wide effort intended as a day of
global cease-fire and nonviolence, and as an opportunity for education and
raising public awareness.

The video messages in both webcast and broadcast quality are already
available at
http://www.overcomingviolence.org/peace2004 

Additional information: Juan Michel,+41 22 791 6153  +41 79 507 6363
	 media@wcc-coe.org 

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The World Council of Churches is a fellowship of churches, now 342, in
 more than 120 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, Netherlands. Its staff is headed by
 general secretary Samuel Kobia from the Methodist church in Kenya.