Member Church News: Sanctuary, Advocacy, Art, Credit

Members of a small congregation in Toronto, Canada, are celebrating. On Sunday the member of parliament for their riding came to the church to announce that the federal government has granted residency status to a Roma family that had lived under “sanctuary” protection in the church for 18 months.

A Catholic-Protestant initiative is bringing refugees from Lebanon and Morocco to Italy on humanitarian visas to spare them deadly sea crossings. Most are old, sick or women with young children. Read or listen to the story.

“You are the candle that turned the darkness in my life into light,” said Farah, a young mother in northwestern Syria, expressing her gratitude for the assistance her family receives through World Renew.

The recent dedication of a Presbyterian Mission Garden containing three large rocks marked the centennial of Silliman University Church (1906-2016) in the Philippines.

This Lenten season, the All India Council of Christian Women the Women’s Wing of National Council of Churches in India invites fellow pilgrims of justice and peace to engage in advocacy to end the culture of gender based violence.

The Waldensian Evangelical Church of the River Plate (in Uruguay) has elected its first female moderator, Pastor Carola Tron (who is also a member of the WCRC’s executive committee).

In Guatemala, an ecumenical service focused its prayers on unity, the new government and the Peace Accords.

United Church of Christ (USA) advocates for Cuba celebrate coming return of commercial flights, call for end to embargo.

Sanctuary Architecture and Theophanic Expectation: It’s good to be mindful of how powerfully worship space shapes worshipers says Ron Rienstra in Reformed Worship.

Charles Sim, an elder in the Church of Scotland, calls on churches and members to consider credit unions as an ethical form of finance.

Swiss artist Gerry Hofstetter will be lighting up buildings to note the impact of Huldrych Zwingli and the Reformation.

A World Council of Churches course this August offers the opportunity to analyze the challenges of contemporary multi-cultural and multi-faith contexts, to understand the values and aspirations especially of young people living in these contexts and to learn from the experiences of other Christians and their churches about concrete, successful approaches to address these challenges.