FAITH GROUPS SAY SMALL ACTIONS - NOW - COUNT

At the United Nations Conference on Climate Change, the question, when it comes to the world of faith, is not, "Who is in the Danish capital for 11 critical days in December?" but "Who is not here?"

     On the streets of Copenhagen, the world's faith leaders and many hundreds of organisations linked to them are all blasting out their messages on what needs to be done about climate change. Alongside them is a polar bear made out of ice, which is melting like much of the ice in Greenland.

     The atmosphere in Copenhagen is frenetic and, like many such international gatherings, government representatives are at one location and civil society in another corner, while up to 30,000 people are expected to converge on the city during an event that is expected to help define the 21st century.

     PETER KENNY reports from Copenhagen...  | more...|

ESSAY: THE CLIMATE CHANGE DEBATE - AN EXPRESSION OF HERD MENTALITY?

Group polarisation is a term well known to psychologists but little known outside their field of study. Yet it may prove to have particular significance during this week of climate change meetings in Copenhagen.

     Group polarisation describes what happens when people of strong views on any subject come together and discuss them. Almost invariably, the views of each individual member become more potent or even extreme; convictions become more entrenched and conclusions less open to question.

     It is, if you like, a form of 'herd instinct', a powerful expression of social conditioning, and events of the past few days suggest that eminent scientists are as susceptible to group polarisation as the rest of us.

     A small storm erupted late last week with the release on the internet of the pirated email correspondence of one of science's most respected advocates of climate warming.

     Professor Phil Jones is director of the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia in Norwich. His team's databases recording global temperature changes have played a central role in building the case for global warming - and, by extension, humanity's responsibility to reduce carbon emissions.

As world leaders gather in Copenhagen, Denmark, to look at the issue of climate change, MAL FLETCHER says increasing polarisation on the issue is leaving us short-changed on the facts...  | more...|

Ian Dearing is an imposing figure with an impressive beard and arms covered in tattoos, often seen astride a gleaming Yamaha XS 1600 Road Star.

     He is passionate about his bikes, and he's passionate about his faith. Ian is the Salvation Army officer (minister), along with his wife, Deidre, at the Salvos' corps (church) in Geraldton, Western Australia.

     On Saturday, 12th December, he will combine both passions, getting out of his uniform and on to his bike to take part in the annual Geraldton Christmas toy run to collect toys for families in need.

    "The toy run has been going for about 15 years, run predominantly by the Ulysses Motorcycle Club," says Ian, who has attended the past three Geraldton toy runs.

     "It's grown over the past couple of years. Last year we had 142 riders; this year we're hoping to get more than 200."

     Motorcyclists around Australia are riding for charity in the lead-up to Christmas, and Ian Dearing is one of them. In an article first published in the Salvation Army's Warcry magazine, he spoke to FAYE MICHELSON...  | more...|

An estimated 33 million people continue to live with HIV worldwide yet while 2.7 million people were newly infected in 2008, the number of people being infected each year is declining.

     Such are the findings of the 2009 UNAIDS Outlook report, launched last week. It showed that the number of new HIV infections has been reduced by 17 per cent over the last eight years.

     The decline is most dramatic in East Asia where new infections has dropped by 25 per cent since 2001 followed by 15 per cent - or about 400,000 new infections - in sub-Saharan Africa - where some 22 million people live with AIDS - and 10 per cent in South East Asia.

     In a statement released for World AIDS Day, Michel Sidibé, executive director of international organisation UNAIDS, joined with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in calling for an end to discrimination and criminalisation of people affected by HIV and for greater action in HIV prevention.

     “For every two people put on treatment, five are newly infected,” he said. “Too often prevention programmes are not reaching those most in need.”

     DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

Amid the gathering of pornstars and exhibitions selling a plethora of sexual-related products at this weekend’s Sexpo exhibition in Melbourne is one stall that may initially seem a little incongruous.

     The Salvation Army will be manning a stall at Melbourne’s Convention Centre where they aim to not only raise awareness about the issue of human trafficking but to connect with people to point them towards God.

     Among those manning the Salvation Army’s stall is Captain Danielle Strickland, the social justice director for the Salvation Army’s Southern Territory. Captain Strickland says the focus of the stall will be to provide those passing by with information on human trafficking drawn from the global Stop the Traffik campaign.

     “The people who are involved with the sex industry are the ones that probably have the most exposure potentially to trafficking victims and traffickers,” she says, saying that the presence of the Salvos will be about raising awareness of that issue and also the consequences of sexual behaviour.

     DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

A petition signed by more than 21,000 people opposed to the proposed national human rights act is being tabled in the Senate today.

     The petition, one of the biggest tabled in the current parliament, was created by the Australian Christian Lobby who have been vocal in their stance against the proposed act.

     Tabled by Shadow Attorney-General George Brandis, it calls on Parliament to reject the proposal for the human rights act or not enact such legislation until a referendum is held on the issue.

     ACL managing director Jim Wallace says while Christians “care deeply” about protecting the human rights of the most vulnerable, “they are aware that the proposed charter of rights would do little to benefit human rights, but much to undermine some basic freedoms Christians take for granted”.

     DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

FOR PREVIOUS:

HUMAN RIGHTS: AUSTRALIAN CHRISTIAN LOBBY TO CONTINUE CAMPAIGN DESPITE RECOMMENDATIONS FOR A NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS ACT...  | more...|

ESSAY: WHY A CHARTER IS NOT THE BEST WAY TO PROTECT HUMAN RIGHTS... | more...|

HUMAN RIGHTS: PROPOSALS FOR NEW ACT SPARK FIERCE DEBATE... | more...|

Three time Dove Award winning rock vocalist Ken Tamplin is looking to add a new (or should I say old) meaning to Rock Of Ages.

     Tamplin's latest project, Rock Of Ages - Beautiful Hymns, (and before you start yawning...it's not only well done with world class players, but quite remarkable and not what you'd expect from this rocker) is truly that...beautiful. In addition, Tamplin wants to make it available as a free download.

     Asked about his reason for dusting off some of Christendom's greatest treasures Tamplin explained, "I feel like there is so much music in today's church culture that is geared mainly toward a high school - college demographic. I know it has its wonderful place, but a lot of modern worship doesn't share the richness, gravity and depth these great hymns offer and, for me personally, leaves something to be desired.

     "I am not one for living in the past, but I wanted to showcase these hymns in a more accessible way. I feel like they have been somewhat demoted to irrelevancy but I think their lyrics couldn't be more relevant.

     DAN WOODING, of Assist News Service, talks to Ken Tamplin about his mission to remake some of Christendom's "classic hits"... | more...|

International Men's Day began on 19th November, 1999, in Trinidad and Tobago through the efforts of Dr Jerome Teelucksingh and was supported by the United Nations. The event received wide support from men's groups in USA, Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean.

     Speaking on behalf of UNESCO, Ms Ingeborg Breines, director of Women and a Culture of Peace, said: “This is an excellent idea and would give some gender balance”, adding that her organisation was looking forward to cooperating with International Men's Day.

     The early objectives of International Men's Day, as proposed by Dr Teelucksingh, still hold good today. They are:
1. Improving gender relations between men and women.
2. Addressing the problems and challenges that men face.
3. Promoting gender equality.
4. Highlighting positive male role models.
5. Creating a safer, better world.

     Of these, Dr Teelucksingh strongly emphasised the importance of positive male role models, “not just movie stars and sports men, but everyday, working class men who are living decent, honest lives.”

     Today - 19th November - is International Men's Day. WARWICK MARSH, co-ordinator of the global International Men's Day website, will be among those attending a celebration of the day at Parliament House, Canberra. Here he writes that the day is an opportunity to encourage the men around us... | more...|

Imagine eating, sleeping and working in a small, claustrophobic cell with another person for ten years and being expected to produce handcrafts for your owner. Actress Ashley Judd asked one such man how he coped. He told her he kept himself going by taking pride in what he creates; by ensuring that he can send "something beautiful" out into the world.

     Call + Response is captivatingly impelling. It echoes the relentlessly consistent call that is resonating through pulpits, music and movies these days urging us to wake up and respond to the desperate needs around us.

     When the church of the future looks back to our place on God's timeline they will surely say, "The early 21st century church broke free of the apathy they had been lulled into; recovered from the shock of finding that large groups of people sought their extinction and drew a line in the sand that said this far and no more!"

     That is what Call + Response is, a line in the sand. It is a very eloquently styled declaration, taking the form of a "rockumentary", that says enough is enough.

      BEV HOLMES-BROWN takes a look at documentary Call + Response... | more...|

ESSAY: THE FALL OF THE BERLIN WALL - HAS EUROPE LEARNED NOTHING?

As Europeans celebrate the fall of the Berlin wall, it is worth reflecting not just on the old Europe with its long-standing divisions, but on the one that has arisen in its place.

     With the fall of the wall, the world saw the end of a particularly evil form of tyranny. For generations, self-appointed national leaders denied their countrymen and women the basic rights to travel and migrate as they wished and to lead prosperous and self-determined lives whilst at home.

     They had grown so hardened to public opinion and disdainful of the basic intelligence of their citizenry that they lived as a law unto themselves.

     When so-called reality TV programmes like Big Brother were at their height of popularity, I often wondered why people thought their basic premise was such a novel idea. Locking people behind high walls, training cameras on them and encouraging them to manipulate each other's behaviour was no new trick - the East Germans had been doing it for decades.

      As Europe celebrates the 20 year anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, MAL FLETCHER warns that European governments may be in danger of once again ignoring the will of the people... | more...|

IN A CHURCH NEAR BERLIN WALL SITE, LEADERS REMEMBER IN CANDLELIGHT VIGILS

Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, officials have returned to a church in what was East Berlin, where protests of candlelit prayers helped bring down communism in East Germany.

     Germany's political and church leaders marked the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall on 9th November with an ecumenical service at the Protestant church in Eastern Berlin, named after the garden where the Bible records Jesus spending his last hours.

     "Today we look back at the fall of the wall 20 years ago," said Roman Catholic Archbishop Robert Zollitsch in his sermon at the Gethsemane church, only a few hundred metres from where the fortified concrete wall divided the city's eastern and western sectors from 1961 to 1989.

      STEPHEN BROWN, of ENI, reports from Berlin... | more...|

ESSAY: RECALLING THE "OVERWHELMING SCENES" OF FAMILIES REUNITED ON THE DAY THE WALL FELL

This month marks the 20th anniversary of one of the most wonderful moments in the history of what was a turbulent 20th century. For millions of Germans it will no doubt be one of the enduring memories of their lives. November 9th, 1989, was the day that the infamous Berlin Wall finally fell.

     I can still recall watching it on TV at my mother's home. As I was watching, my mother who, along with my father, was born and raised in Germany, had tears streaming down her face, unable to believe the enormity of what was happening before her eyes - this beautiful celebration of unity after so many years of division.

      A BBC news report from the time states that, “the first indication that change was imminent (on that day) came when East Berlin's Communist party spokesman, Gunther Schabowski, announced that East Germans would be allowed to travel directly to West Germany. This announcement was intended to stem an exodus into West Germany through the 'back door' which began (the previous) summer when the new and more liberal regime in Hungary opened its border. The flow of migrants was intensified (in early November 1989) when Czechoslovakia also granted free access to West Germany through its border.”

      Born of German parents, NILS VON KALM remembers the day the wall came down and his own emotional visit to Berlin some time later... | more...|

THE WALL FELL IN MANY PLACES

The political and social shock waves caused by weeks of pro-democracy protests in East Germany and then the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9th November, 1989, were felt around the world.

     The South African theologian John de Gruchy recalls how, while spending a sabbatical semester at Union Theological Seminary in New York that year, he had been asked to play host for a few days to the director of an East German institute for Marxist-Leninist studies.

     The irony of a Marxist professor from East Germany being hosted by a white Christian theologian from apartheid-ruled South Africa was not lost on de Gruchy, who for many years was active as a theologian in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa.

     Sitting together in New York watching the news on television, the East German and the South African saw reports of the growing crisis in East Germany and of the simultaneous escalation of protests against apartheid in Cape Town, de Gruchy's home town.

      Twenty years after the world witnessed the fall of the Berlin Wall, STEPHEN BROWN reflects on its significance at the time - in Germany and elsewhere around the world... | more...|

World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary Rev Dr Samuel Kobia comments on the 20th anniversary of event that brought to an end the "cold war era"...  | more...|

YOUR SAY: Where were you when the Wall fell? What did you feel at the time? Did it have impact on your day-to-day life? Have Your Say here...  | more...|

The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, has told leaders from the world's major faiths that they occupy a "unique position" in future discussion on the fate of the planet, and that their communities count on this crucial issue.

     His words came on 3rd November, shortly after he expressed reservations about hopes pinned on politicians for the December UN climate change conference in Copenhagen, after talks with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in London.

     "I'm reasonably optimistic that this Copenhagen [meeting] will be a very important milestone," Ban told journalists after meeting Brown, according to the AFP news agency. "At the same time, realistically speaking, we may not be able to have all the words on detailed matters." He noted, "We need the political will, if there is a political will I'm sure there is a way we can conclude a binding agreement."

      TREVOR GRUNDY reports for ENI... | more...|

David Heenan isn’t one to avoid a challenge. That much was made obvious this week when Mr Heenan, a Christian author from the Gold Coast in Queensland, called on atheist Richard Dawkins to publicly debate him on the issue of whether God exists.

     Mr Dawkins, the UK-based author of The God Delusion and among the supporters of a recent atheist advertising campaign which appeared on buses there, is expected to visit Melbourne in March next year as a keynote speaker at the Global Atheist Convention.

     Mr Heenan, author of The Sceptic's Guide to God, says that given all the press Mr Dawkins receives, it was time for someone to provide an alternate view to Dawkins’ viewpoints - that God does exist - based on facts.

     “I liken it to the Biblical event David versus Goliath. Goliath really strode across the battlefield of that time and...everybody was kind of scared of him - he was such a giant,” he says. “Well, Dawkins is also a giant in the world of atheists, but does that mean that we can’t challenge him? And, indeed, win in a battle with him? I think it’s time people did stand up. I mean, what have we got to be fearful of as Christians? We’ve got God on our side.”

      DAVID ADAMS speaks to David Heenan about why he wrote his book, The Sceptic's Guide To God, and why he has challenged Richard Dawkins to a public debate... | more...|

At the same time that Ukrainian candidates are battling each other for votes in the upcoming presidential election, Christian doctors gathering in Kiev, the country's capital for a 'Spirituality and Medicine' conference, have already cast their vote - for "miracles.

     Some 400 doctors and medical professionals were in Kiev from 30 different countries for the 6th International Christian Medical Conference held on 30th and 31st October, 2009, to explore whether miracles still happen today and, if they do, to provide medical data to prove them.

     Organised by the World Christian Doctors Network, this 'Spirituality and Medicine' conference attracted doctors and medical professional from countries as diverse as Nigeria, Uganda and Democratic Republic of Congo to all over the former Soviet Union and even the tiny Faroe Islands, who all believe in praying for their sick patients - with their permission of course.

     Doctors from all around the world have gathered in Kiev to explore - and find hard evidence to support - the miraculous. DAN WOODING, of Assist News Service, was there... | more...|

Archer Sukkum intently inspected the neat rows of plastic bags in the compound of his two-storey wooden house. He was making sure the rice, cooking oil and canned food were neatly packed for easy pickup by the stateless refugees who would appear periodically at his village. Doing a quick mental math, he figured that each bag of five kilograms of rice would sustain a family for three months. His face broke into a smile. "at least they will survive," he thought, "for now".

     Almost six feet tall and burly, Archer is an ordinary middle-aged man with a smiling face and pleasant demeanour. Known to many as kind and generous, the 49-year-old Karen Burmese looks every bit the church pastor well-respected by his community of mountain villagers.

     In fact, everyone along the hillside hamlet of Om Soong, a mountainous village 155 kilometres southwest of Chiangmai, is familiar with Archer's congeniality and good nature. Children flock to his home at the lower ridge of the mountain, and the occasional villager taken ill is guaranteed a hefty dose of sympathy and medicine from the shelves of Archer's makeshift clinic outside his home.

     MICHELLE MY CHAN reports for Assist News Service... | more...|

The leaders of the World Council of Churches and the Christian Conference of Asia are urging the international community to lift economic sanctions against North Korea following a visit to the communist-ruled country.

     The WCC general secretary, Rev Samuel Kobia, led a delegation to North Korea from 17th to 20th October and was accompanied by the general secretary of the Christian Conference of Asia, Prawate Khid-arn. It was the first time Rev Kobia and Prawate had visited North Korea.  

     A South Korean national church leader, however, at a three-day conference in Hong Kong on Korean unification questioned the stance of Rev Kobia and Prawate on sanctions.

     United Nations' sanctions against North Korea were intensified in June after it conducted an underground nuclear test in violation of international treaties.

     FRANCIS WONG, of Ecumenical News International, reports... | more...|

The Jesus Racing Team's Bathurst campaign came to an early end this year when engine failure brought the car to a grinding halt on lap 22.

    But the team - including drivers Andrew 'Fishtail' Fisher and David Sieders - hailed their participation in the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 as a success nonetheless, noting that more than 100,000 people witnessed the Jesus Ute and Jesus Supercar race around the course over the weekend of 10th and 11th of October along with a TV audience of millions.

    "The name of Jesus was an incredible presence at this entire event and in the national media in a way Australia has never seen before," said Andrew Fisher.

     Photographer DEE KRAMER was there to capture all the action... | more...|

The Australian Christian Lobby will continue its campaign against the introduction of a national Human Rights Act despite the recommendations of the National Human Rights Consultation Committee that such an act be introduced.

     Chaired by Father Frank Brennan, the committee last week handed down its report in which it recommended that Australia adopt a national Human Rights Act covering everything from the right to freedom from forced work to the right of freedom of association and the right to due process in criminal proceedings.

     Among a host of other recommendations, the committee also proposed giving High Court judges the power to make a “declaration of incompatibility” with any proposed act, expanding the functions of the Australian Human Rights Commission and the establishment of a joint parliamentary committee on human rights to review all bills in regard to human rights.

    DAVID ADAMS reports... | more...|

FOR PREVIOUS:

ESSAY: WHY A CHARTER IS NOT THE BEST WAY TO PROTECT HUMAN RIGHTS... | more...|

HUMAN RIGHTS: PROPOSALS FOR NEW ACT SPARK FIERCE DEBATE... | more...|

South-East Asia has been in the boxing ring - over a fortnight, blow after blow landed on communities from Indonesia and Samoa to the Philippines, Vietnam and India. More than a thousand people have died, and millions of families have been affected.

     During all of this upheaval and devastation, negotiators from around the world were meeting in Bangkok, Thailand, trying to forge a path towards a global compact that will effectively address the worst impacts of climate change.

     While we are unable to point to any particular weather event and say; “That is definitely due to climate change”, most studies point in one direction: that floods, typhoons, cyclones will be more intense and more frequent, seasons more unpredictable and droughts longer. Climate change does not cause earthquakes and tsunamis, but the measures that can cut their impacts - replanting hillsides with trees to reduce landslides and renewing coastal mangroves - also play a part in trimming atmospheric CO2.

    In an article first published in The Age newspaper, World Vision Australia chief executive TIM COSTELLO says the devastation in South-East Asia underlines the need to address climate change...   | more...|

Linwood Sessoms, a student at a New York public school, looked destined for a life of trouble. With a disrupted homelife - his father was constantly in and out of jail - he had started “acting out” in class, so much so that it was suggested he be enrolled in “special education”.

     But his mother refused and Linwood decided to make some changes. Having come to the realisation by year seven or eight that he wasn’t going to make it through public school - although his grades were high, his scores in standardised testing were very low - he heard of a scholarship program to attend a Catholic school in Harlem, Rice High, and decided to apply.

     He got the position but the transition was difficult - he found it hard to abide by all the rules he now faced. Because of the principal’s insistent counselling and positive reinforcement, however, Linwood was able to successfully graduate from highschool and then university. He now works at a bank as well as helping other young people through similar circumstances.

     His story is just one of the many inspiring tales of those that attended Rice High School, according to journalist and author Patrick J McCloskey, who cites it as illustrative of the impact faith-based education can have in helping to transform a young person’s life.

    DAVID ADAMS speaks with Canadian journalist and author Patrick J McCloskey about the year he spent at Rice High School in Harlem, New York, and his views on faith-based education... | more...|

INDONESIAN EARTHQUAKES: "CHILD FRIENDLY SPACES" BRINGING A DEGREE OF NORMALCY AMID DEVASTATION

The aftershock last night was magnitude 5.4, the biggest tremor since the earthquakes last week. The epicentre was in Padang Pariaman - the worst-affected zone - so it seems that sometimes when it rains, it pours. On the actual rain front, though, it's good news - 24 hours of clear skies have resulted in unhampered rescue, relief and rehabilitation work.

     "The Three R's": it seems that "Rescue" defined the early stages of this emergency response, "Relief" closely followed and is being distributed by World Vision widely, and today we turned our attention to "Rehabilitation."

      In the aftermath of natural disasters, particularly those as powerful and widespread as last week's dual earthquakes, it is sometimes hard to see past the physical devastation and to take the time to help people, especially children, heal emotionally and psychologically. World Vision has long employed a unique initiative in our emergency response work of setting up "child friendly spaces" (CFS) specifically in areas where children have suffered through traumatic experiences. We toured the first of these child friendly spaces in Kota Padang today.

     CHRIS OLVER, a World Vision Australia videographer, is in Indonesia to document the devastation caused in West Sumatra province on 30th September and 1st October, 2009. Here, on the second day of his visit (7th October), he writes of what he found...  | more...|

UN GROUP DEMANDS BETTER RESCUE EFFORTS

United Nations delegates are demanding better coordination between UN rescue teams and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) during natural disasters such as the recent earthquake in Indonesia.    

     The appeal came at a regional conference in Budapest, Hungary of the UN's International Search And Rescue Advisory Group (INSARAG), a global network of more than 80 countries and disaster response organisations.

     A large number of natural disasters, centred in Southeast Asia the past few weeks, has helped to motivate United Nations delegates to agree to improve cooperation between UN rescue teams and non-governmental organisations.

     STEFAN J. BOS reports for BosNewsLife...  | more...|

HOPES FADING MORE SURVIVORS WILL BE FOUND

Updated 6.30pm, 5th October, 2009

Hopes are fading that any more suvivors will be found in the rubble of buildings in the Indonesia port city of Padang, five days after a couple of powerful earthquakes shook the region.

     The death toll from the earthquakes - the strongest of which measured 7.6 on the Richter scale - has now topped 1,100 but Indonesian officials fear it could go as high as 3,000. Tens of thousands now remain homeless with estimates that as many as 20,000 buildings have been damaged in the quake.

     In the Pacific region, meanwhile, the remoteness of the some of the affected communities has been hampering aid efforts after an 8.3 magnitude earthquake which struck in the South Pacific Ocean off the coast of Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga and sent a tsunami of up to 1.7 metres crashing into the island nations.

         DAVID ADAMS reports...  | more...|

TO SEE A LIST OF AID AGENCIES

RUNNING APPEALS... | more...|

Seventeen years after the war ended in Mozambique, churches are still collecting and destroying weapons, cleaning up areas of unexploded bombs and shells so the land can be farmed.

     When armed conflicts end, the world's attention tends to fade away quickly say those who have endured the violence. In addition, reconstruction can take a long time. Churches in Mozambique know this all too well, as they told a World Council of Churches team that travelled to the southern African nation on behalf of a project that promotes peace.

     It was a Saturday morning when the three-member team made up of church representatives from Portugal, Switzerland and Brazil left Maputo for the community of Chinhangwanine, in Malengani, a rural area some 90 kilometres north-west of the national capital. There, they witnessed a peace project known as Transforming Guns into Hoes (TAE), which is a program of the Christian Council of Mozambique.

    JUAN MICHEL reports... | more...|

The Archbishop of Canterbury, citing nuclear weaponry, has told Japanese university students that the rationality of secular thinking does not assure "understanding and reconciliation".

     Archbishop Rowan Williams was on a week's visit to Japan timed to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Anglicanism in the country where Christians make up only about two percent of the 127 million people.

     He made his remarks in his first major speech of the week at Rikkyo Gaukin University, an Anglican college in Tokyo founded in 1874 by Channing Moore Williams, a missionary of the (Anglican) Episcopal Church in the United States.

     Archbishop Williams told his student audience on 21st September that the recent record of the purely rational and secular approach to intellectual and academic life is problematic.

    HISASHI YUKIMOTO reports for Ecumenical News International... | more...|

    Compassion Australia's inaugural art exhibition, The Face of Compassion, has opened in Sydney. The exhibition features 30 works of art by some of Australia's best artists, bringing to life the stories of children affected by desperate circumstances - children who wake up most days wondering where their next meal willl come from. Also featured are artworks by Dhea Savitri - a 12-year-old child from Indonesia who has been assisted by Compassion...   | more...|

The world knew Gavin MacLeod as Captain Merrill Stubing in The Love Boat TV series, but he has revealed that his personal life was far from joyful - in fact it was all at sea.

     But then he found Jesus Christ as his Savior fell back in love with Patti, his former wife and, after three years of divorce, he re-married her.

     In an extraordinary interview earlier this month before the showing of his latest film, The Secrets of Jonathan Sperry, in Orange County, California, Gavin, now 78, revealed the secret of how his marriage was restored after his encounter with Christ.

     "Patti, my wife and I were divorced in a three year period and we hadn't seen each other during that time," he began. "Then one day, my former wife received a telephone call from Patti Palmer, the first wife of Jerry Lewis who told her, 'I want to take you some place.' That 'place' turned out to be a ladies prayer meting with a lot of beautiful, very famous stars. During that meeting, she was asked if she would like prayer for 'something' and Patti, who said she had never been in an atmosphere like this in her whole life said, 'I'd like to have my husband back.' So the group started praying for me.

    DAN WOODING, of Assist News Service, speaks to former Love Boat captain, Gavin MacLeod about how his life was miraculously turned around when he found Christ and then remarried his wife Patti after three years of divorce...   | more...|

With recent action by Africa a majority of the world's countries have now banned nuclear weapons from their national territory for the first time. The change happened when an all-Africa treaty entered into force in July. International civil society organisations including the World Council of Churches (WCC) played a catalytic role.

     Taking a shared approach to a safer world, Africa became a nuclear-weapon-free zone when Burundi recently became the 28th state to ratify the Treaty of Pelindaba. A WCC delegation visited the central African country in March 2009 to encourage the step. The addition of 54 countries in Africa means that 116 nations are now within treaty zones banning nuclear weapons.

     The WCC Central Committee salutes Africa's new nuclear-free status in a September 2009 statement and invites further church support for such actions. The committee also urges Russia and the United States "to join China, Britain and France in ratifying the treaty protocols that give Africa added protection" from nuclear attacks.

    JONATHAN FRERICHS, WCC programme executive for nuclear disarmament and the Middle East, writes about the recent move in Africa to ban nuclear weapons...   | more...|

When former US President Thomas Jefferson physically cut passages out of his Bible, it was to delete any references to the supernatural in line with his deist beliefs. More recently, when US author and activist Jim Wallis and his colleagues at Sojourners magazine cut out all references to social justice in the Bible, it was to show how incomplete it was without them.

     Now comes the release of a new Bible which picks up on the idea but, instead of cutting out verses, highlights in orange more than 2000 verses which address issues of poverty and justice.

     The new Poverty and Justice Bible - the result of a collaboration between World Vision and the Bible Society - was launched in Canberra this week as some 270 people gathered to take part in Micah Challenge’s Voices for Justice - a two day annual gathering in which Micah Challenge supporters are involved in lobbying the Government and Opposition MPs on the issue of global poverty.

    DAVID ADAMS and PENNY MULVEY report on this week's launch of the Poverty and Justice Bible at Micah Challenge's annual Voices for Justice gathering in Canberra...   | more...|

Like many young people, the beginning of Kevin Rudd's prime ministership signalled to me the dawn of a new era in Australia, at least as far as social justice was concerned. I was in attendance at the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland when the Rudd Government said 'sorry' to Australia's indigenous population, made some long and overdue changes relating to laws affecting refugees and asylum seekers and ratified the Kyoto Protocol. Never in my life had I felt so proud to introduce myself to those representing nations around me that I was from Australia- a country that was beginning to make some serious progress on fundamental social justice issues. These changes resonated deeply with young people who had become disillusioned and disengaged with the Australian Government and frustrated by their lack of leadership on human rights and the environment. It was certainly a turning point in Australia's history.

    ALANA SMITH, national director of World Vision's youth movement, Vision Generation, writes about a new bid to have the voice of Australian youth heard when it comes to climate change policies...   | more...|

     While millions who watched the Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire found themselves deeply moved by the conditions in which children were living in the Bombay slums, what many still don’t know is that the children shown in the story carry an additional burden to their abject poverty.

     They are Dalits, a group of people also known in India as the “untouchables”.

     “They are not normal Indian children,” Joseph D’souza, the international president of the Dalit Freedom Network, said while in Australia recently. “Those children out of Slumdog Millionaire are all Dalit Muslim kids. We work among them.”

     The Dalits - the word Dalit literally means “oppressed” or “crushed” and carries connotations of being dehumanised - are considered outcasts within Indian society which, for the past 3000 years, has recognised four main castes.

    DAVID ADAMS speaks with Joseph D'souza, founder of the Dalit Freedom Network...   | more...|

The global financial crisis is a golden opportunity for a movement for economic justice according to a South African businesswoman and political economist.

     Dr Mohau Pheko, coordinator of the African Gender and Trade Network (GENTA), told a gathering of theologians, advocates, economists and senior church officials in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Friday, 4th September, that the current crisis is “a spectacular failure” of the current system and calls for a radical reconstruction of the global economy.

     “We have to smash the current paradigm so that it does not have roots and legs to rise again,” Dr Pheko told the group of nearly 60 people from 23 countries who are meeting to focus on what churches can do to address inequalities in the global economic system.

     The event, which organisers call a global dialogue, focuses on economic justice and concern for the earth’s ecology. Organised by the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, the consultation builds on the organisation’s statement on global economic justice, known as the Accra Confession

    HANS PIENAAR reports for Ekklesia...   | more...|

Marriage remains on the national agenda in Australia this month with the launch of the second annual Marriage Week.

    To be held from 13th to 19th September, the week - which comes after more than 470 people gathered at Parliament House last month to mark the inaugural National Marriage Day - will see churches across the country holding events to honor and celebrate marriage.

     Organiser Dennis Outred says the events will range from special messages being given at church on Sunday morning, to vow renewal services, dinners honoring the longevity of marriage, film evenings and pre-marriage classes.

     Mr Outred, along with his wife Ann, is a national co-ordinator of The Marriage Course and The Marriage Preparation Course - courses aimed at building healthy marriages which are run under the auspices of Alpha Australia.

    DAVID ADAMS reports...   | more...|

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CALL FOR ANNUAL DAY TO CELEBRATE MARRIAGE AS FIRST NATIONAL DAY TO BE HELD IN CANBERRA...  | more...|

Every man's question is “Am I good enough?”; “Am I a man?”. During the civil rights movement in the US during the 1950s and '60s, some of the banners that people would carry during their marches proclaimed "I am a man!" Why? What does publicly affirming your manliness have to do with civil rights? Well, quite a lot really. For years black men in the US had been called 'boy', which, for them, was yet another degrading term depicting them as inferior to white men.  

     Rowland Croucher says that when he speaks to men's groups, he always asks them a question. He asks them to put up their hand if, when they were between the ages of 11 and 14, the primary person in their life with whom they exchanged verbal communication was their father. After years of asking this question to thousands of men, he has found that the proportion of men who can put up their hand is one in 50. That means that 98 per cent of men had an 'absent' father when they most needed him. Their father was absent either physically or emotionally; the latter meaning he was there but he wasn't present.

     For my birthday a few months ago I was given a book on manhood called Wild at Heart by John Eldredge. In the book, Eldredge talks about the male wound and how every man wants to know he is a man, wants to be affirmed in his manhood.

    As Australia looks to celebrate Father's Day this Sunday, NILS VON KALM takes a look at what it means to be a man...   | more...|

When Lisa Gibson heard that her 20-year-old brother Ken was among the 270 people who died when Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, on 21st December, 1988, she found her view of God shaken in a way she’d never imagined.

     A freshman in college, the 18-year-old had just finished first term as a freshman in college and was looking forward to seeing her brother who, stationed with the US Army in Berlin, Germany, was coming home to spend Christmas with his family in the US state of Michigan after two years away.

     Then came news of the explosion which tore the plane apart, killing all those on board and 11 people on the ground.

     “As a Christian, I was instantly struck with how was I to respond,” Ms Gibson recalls. ”This tragedy definitely shook my view of God.  Like many Christians, I had grown up with a bit of a ‘half Gospel’, believing bad things weren’t supposed to happen to Christians...”

    DAVID ADAMS reports...   | more...|

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CHURCH OF SCOTLAND WELCOMES RELEASE OF BOMB PRISONER...  | more...|

The general secretary of the World Council of Churches has said that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories should be declared a "sin against God".

     "Occupation along with the concomitant humiliation of a whole people for over six decades constitutes not just economic and political crimes but, like anti-Semitism, it is a sin against God," said WCC general secretary Rev Samuel Kobia, in a report on 26th August to a meeting of the church grouping's main governing body, its central committee.

     He noted that at its founding assembly in Amsterdam in 1948, the WCC has declared that anti-Semitism is a "sin against God". Rev Kobia said, "Are we ready to say that occupation is also a sin against God?"

    PETER KENNY and STEPHEN BROWN report for Ecumenical News International...   | more...|

NORWEGIAN LUTHERAN ELECTED TO LEAD WORLD COUNCIL OF CHURCHES

The Rev Olav Fykse Tveit, an ordained pastor in the Church of Norway, has been elected as general secretary of the World Council of Churches.

The announcement was made in Geneva on 27th August by the WCC's main governing body, its central committee.

Rev Tveit, born on 24th November, 1960, is general secretary of the Church of Norway Council on Ecumenical and International Relations. He was chosen during a 26th August to 2nd September meeting of the WCC governing body...  | more...|

25th August, 2009

Astronaut Patrick Forrester (right) will take a small piece of missionary history into space when he lifts off aboard the space shuttle ‘Discovery’ as it commences a two week mission aimed at equipping the International Space Station.
      Mr Forrester will be taking part of a battery box from the Piper PA-14 airplane flown by martyred missionary pilot Nate Saint (above) which is now on display at the headquarters of the Missionary Aviation Fellowship in the US state of Idaho.
      Mr Saint was one of five missionaries who were killed by Waodani Indians in Ecuador on 8th January, 1956. Several of the tribesmen that were involved in the killings were later led to Christ by relatives of the slain men.
      Mr Forrester, who is making his third shuttle flight, says he hopes the gesture will help renew interest in missions.
     "My deepest intent is to honor Nate Saint, the Saint family and all missionaries around the world,” he said.
      The battery box part will be returned to the MAF when the space mission is complete and will be displayed, along with a certificate confirming its presence on the space flight, at the organisation’s headquarters.

UPDATE: The shuttle launched successfully on 29th August.

~ www.maf.org

The Church of Scotland has praised the decision by the Justice Minister, Kenny MacAskill, which means the Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, has been released from prison on compassionate grounds.   

     But there are deep frustrations that the end of al-Megrahi's appeal and his release will now allow the British government and the Libyan authorities to get away with what some believe to be a cover-up over the true circumstances of the terror tragedy in December 1988.

     The Rev Ian Galloway, convener of the Kirk's Church and Society Council, commented: “This decision has sent a message to the world about what it is to be Scottish. We are defined as a nation by how we treat those who have chosen to hurt us. Do we choose mercy even when they did not chose mercy?"

     "This was not about whether one man was guilty or innocent," he added. "Nor is it about whether he had a right to mercy but whether we as a nation, despite the continuing pain of many, are willing to be merciful."

    A report from Ekklesia...   | more...|

I am grateful for this opportunity to speak on this important issue, one of the great issues facing Australia. I am not an expert, and do not speak from first-hand experience of the human suffering that lies within the question. I am in danger of speaking glibly in the face of an immense tragedy which has engulfed Australia since 1788, and in the face of the ongoing effects of that tragedy still present all around us.

     However I am saying what needs to be said, and I want to encourage Christians to take leadership in these matters.

     All lands belong to God, and He distributed them to many nations, setting the time and places where they would live. The land is God’s land. To respect and honour God is to know that He made Australia, and to treat the existing indigenous peoples who were here in 1788 with respect. The appalling theory of terra nullius treated people as if they had no significance. This was an insult to them, and an offence against God their maker.

    In an edited extract of the John Saunders Lecture given earlier this month, Dr PETER ADAM, principal of Ridley College, says that saying sorry for Australia's past is not enough...   | more...|

More than 40 per cent of Australians believe captured enemy soldiers can be tortured in certain circumstances but 93 per cent say those who break the “rules of war” should be punished.

     Such are the findings of a survey by the Australian Red Cross, released earlier this month to mark the 60th anniversary of the Geneva Conventions.

     Rebecca Dodd, national manager of international humanitarian law for the Australian Red Cross, says the organisation was “concerned” to see figures showing 43 per cent of Australians believed it was OK to torture captured enemy soldiers in certain cases to obtain important military information “when we know that obviously torture of any kind is a crime, whether it’s committed against detainees or civilians”.

     “There’s no doubt that was a surprising result,” she says. “But it’s a bit juxtaposed to the fact that, having said that, you have 96 per cent of the population saying that absolutely civilians should be distinguished and protected in times of armed conflict (and) you have a situation where 93 per cent of those surveyed thought that international justice was important and having those laws enforced. So there was a whole range of results.”

    DAVID ADAMS reports...   | more...|

It's 39 years since you started carrying your cross with your first journey in LA. What initially prompted you to do so?
"I had made a large cross to hang on the wall of 'His Place', our Jesus Coffee House on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood in 1968. Late in 1969 Jesus spoke to me at 5am in the morning as I was praying and said to take the cross off the wall of our building and carry it on foot across America and identify His message with the people where they are."

How did that develop into the ministry which has seen you carry the cross over 38,000 miles all around the world?
"I just walked on at the call of Jesus to carry the cross in every nation and major island group. I walk, people come to the cross and I share the love of Jesus and the message of salvation in Him. I pray for and bless people in Jesus Name. It is simple. I love Jesus and I love people."

    For the past 39 years, Arthur Blessitt has been walking the globe, carrying a 12 foot (3.6 metre) wooden cross as he visited every nation and island group in the world with the message that the cross of Jesus is for everyone. Mr Blessitt, who recently released his autobiography simply titled The Cross, spoke with DAVID ADAMS...   | more...|

From the first time I ever read of Wigglesworth I have been captivated by his ministry, so much so that I read virtually everything I could lay my hands on about the man. While many world renowned ministers are barely remembered countless thousands still read Wigglesworth's messages and memoirs. His name is still relevant in Christian circles as when he was alive. Yet, with all of this information available, I, like many Australians and New Zealanders, was unaware of the powerful affect this 'Apostle of Faith's' ministry had upon the churches 'Down Under'. Wigglesworth journeyed to Australia and New Zealand several times during the early twentieth century where he conducted some of the greatest revival and healing meetings these nations have witnessed.

     Several years ago, while speaking for Pastor Mike Knott at the Elim Church in Wellington, I was excited to discover that Wigglesworth had spoken in that very church - AND - they had within their archives some of the original material from his meetings. I was champing at the bit when offered the opportunity to examine this material! I spent hours eagerly pouring over those records. I even obtained a copy of film footage of this great British evangelist's visit to the 'Land of the Long White Cloud.' (I was under the impression there was no film records of the man).

    Pastor and author COL STRINGER's soon-to-be-published book, Smith Wigglesworth in the Land of the Holy Spirit - Australia and New Zealand, takes an in-depth look at the visits of the Pentecostal movement pioneer's visits to the two nations in the 1920s. Here, read an excerpt from the new book...  | more...|

The importance of marriage in today’s society will be the focus when more than 400 people gather in the Great Hall of Parliament House in Canberra this Thursday to mark Australia’s inaugural National Marriage Day.

     Mary-Louise Fowler, secretary on the committee organising National Marriage Day, says the intention of the day is to promote the social benefits of marriage.

     “(It’s) to say that marriage brings certain benefits to society and to individuals and to children in particular,” she says. “And that with the destruction of marriage and the breakdown of the family based on marriage...is, in fact, the cause of many of our social problems. But until we face that reality about marriage and the part it plays in people’s health and welfare and well-being, then we won’t really get very far ahead.”

     DAVID ADAMS reports...  | more...|

There is much hope in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that the guns will soon fall silent. But the trail of human rights abuses the combatants leave behind compels the churches to intervene.

For the civilians it may not matter on which frontline they find themselves, says Dismas Kyanza, the Church of Christ in Congo (ECC) emergency officer for North Kivu, since all armed groups are committing atrocities.

     "There are the local armed groups, international armies, national armed groups and foreign armies. The national army which is supposed to protect the civilians is also guilty," Kyanza told an international delegation that visited eastern DRC from 8th to 15th July on behalf of the World Council of Churches (WCC). The trip was part of the Living Letters series of visits through which small ecumenical teams visit churches in countries in conflict to listen, learn and show solidarity.

     FREDRICK NZWILI reports...  | more...|

Church-linked campaigners for justice in the fight against hunger have urged new approaches to trade that uphold people's right to food, as the World Trade Organisation launched its World Trade Report 2009.

     "Food cannot be treated like any other commodity," said José Pablo Prado Córdova, president of the board of directors of the YMCA Guatemala and vice-chairperson of the Food Strategy Group for the Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance, an international Christian network committed to joint action on critical global issues. "Many current trade policies undermine food systems."

     The Geneva-based WTO's trade report published on 22nd July warned against protectionism as a response to the global economic crisis, noting that governments are facing pressures to adopt measures which may restrict trade.

     STEPHEN BROWN reports for Ecumenical News International...  | more...|

My name is Vanessa Archibald however everyone calls me by my nickname 'Vanoosh'. I was originally born and grew up in Durban, South Africa, however, I have lived in Australia for over 11 years and I come from the beautiful northern beaches suburb of Manly in Sydney. I am a registered psychologist and I used to work as an injury manager for a large insurer in the workers' compensation industry.

Currently, I live on a missionary ship called the Logos Hope, which is part of a non-profit organisation called Operation Mobilisation (OM). I signed on for a two year 'Global Action' program and joined the OM Ship Ministry in September 2007 with a pre-ship group called PST Cuxhaven - Cuxhaven, Germany, was our joining port. I spent two weeks prior to that at a global orientation conference in De Bron, The Netherlands, with hundreds of other missionaries from around the world who were going out into different fields.

     In the first of an occasional series looking at life experiences from an individual's perspective, CHOE BRERETON spoke to Vanessa Archibald about her time aboard the OM missionary ship, the Logos Hope... | more...|

In our ‘post-Christian’ world, it can take a life-threatening illness like cancer to compel many people to consider their own mortality.

     Cancer is just one of many serious and potentially life-threatening illnesses. So what’s special about cancer? Many people who have a brush with death of another kind talk about finding good in the midst of profound struggle. Yet there is something profoundly unsettling about the idea of cancer cells ‘invading the body’, of your body being at war with itself.
      The word ‘cancer’ is synonymous with death in most people’s minds, so a cancer diagnosis immediately forces you to face up to your own impermanence.

     Cancer reflects an essential characteristic of what it is to be human: we can be struck down by illness or injury. We are perishable, and one day our bodies will give out. Death seems to come as an enormous shock to us dwellers in the Western world, even though there is nothing more inevitable.

     SALLY COLLINGS, author of Positive - a collection of accounts from people who have seen good things emerge from their cancer journey, reflects on responses to cancer... | more...|

What are you hearing from friends and family living in Iran about the recent situation there?
"We hear that people are living in a state of fear and confusion in Iran. They are frustrated and tension is very visible in their daily lives. Of course, we hear that they still do their grocery shopping and most of them still go to work and live their everyday lives. However, there is this deep hidden fear and mixed emotions that they have to live with daily. As time goes by, the public get even more frustrated from the government and the forcing of Islamic laws."

     How is the situation in Iran affecting Christians living in the country?
"If this is how brutally the Iranian government cracks down on it's own Muslim protesters who shout 'Alaho Akbar' (God is great!), just imagine how much worse it could be for Christians protesting and calling Jesus' name for help. So, the Christians in Iran are not excluded from fear of the uproar."

     Joseph Hovsepian, son of martyred Iranian Bishop Haik Hovsepian, speaks with DAVID ADAMS about what's been happening in Iran in the wake of the June re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, his heart for the Farsi-speaking church and why he and his brother made the documentary of his father's death, A Cry From Iran... | more...|

At 10:56pm on 20th July, 1969, astronaut Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon's surface, declaring as he did so: "That's one small step for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind". In an event watched by millions around the world, he became the first human to set foot upon the moon. Here, we relive the event through images taken by NASA to mark the historic occasion... | more...|

Who would have believed that Sister Act, the 1992 movie starring Whoopi Goldberg "on the run, disguised as a nun," would inspire the formation of some 30 Japanese Gospel choirs? 

     And if that wasn't enough to take in, they are run by Ken Taylor, a Filipino-born former night club entertainer who found Christ and became a musical missionary to Japan.

     I caught up with Mr Taylor during a recent visit to Tokyo and he agreed to talk about this extraordinary phenomena that is sweeping across the normally sedate country.

    He tells me that when Sister Act - the sugary farce featuring Whoopi Goldberg as a lounge singer hiding out in a convent and enlisted as the convent's new choirmaster who teaches the nuns to sing slightly modified versions of songs like My Guy (now My God) and I Will Follow Him - came out, the musical style caught on like wildfire in his adopted country.

     DAN WOODING, of Assist News Service, tells of how a former nightclub entertainer came to be running 30 Gospel choirs in Japan...  | more...|

SAINTS OF PAST AGES: JOHN CALVIN, 500 YEARS LATER

If you had to list the greatest 20 books ever written in the world, what would you include on that list? If “greatest” means those that most impacted the world in significant and tangible ways, we might want to list: Plato; Aristotle; Augustine; Copernicus; Newton; Shakespeare; Darwin; Marx; Freud; and others. But would we remember to add a book that came from the pen of a 26-year-old religious thinker named John Calvin?

     In a five part series on John Calvin, JIM REIHER begins with a look at Calvin's early life... | more... |

ESSAY: INCLINED TOWARDS CALVIN

The French writer Stendhal, visiting Edinburgh in the early 19th century, found no entertainment available on the Sabbath except a promenade through the city. Even this had its dangers: "Slow down," his companion advised. "People will think you are enjoying yourself."

     This anecdote about a country much shaped by the ideological heirs of John Calvin encapsulates the popular image of Calvin as repressive, puritanical and domineering. English historian Paul Johnson compared Calvin to Lenin, saying he was notable only for his ferocity, his passionate self-righteousness and his intolerance.

     Friday being his 500th birthday, it is timely to redraw this caricature of the man who provided not only the most important theological impetus for the 16th-century Reformation, but was also a founding father of representative democracy, of capitalism, and of public schools.

     In an article first published in The Age newspaper, BARNEY ZWARTZ says John Calvin gets a bad rap... | more...|

PROTESTANTS CELEBRATE 500 YEARS SINCE CALVIN'S BIRTH

Protestant Christians are celebrating the 500th anniversary of the birth of Jean Calvin, the French-born church reformer who inspired a movement that now has tens of millions of adherents worldwide.

     Calvin was born on 10th July, 1509, at Noyon in northern France, and is known throughout the world for his role in the Reformation while he lived in Geneva, a once independent city state that is now part of Switzerland.

     Religious and political leaders gathered on 10th July at Geneva's Cathedral of St Pierre, the church where Calvin preached during the Reformation, where they heard a call for the theologian to be commemorated as a source for a contemporary response to social issues.

     "We need to focus on how to care about all that God cares for: justice for all, for all human beings and for all of creation," said the Rev Setri Nyomi, general secretary of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, which groups 75 million Reformed church members.

     STEPHEN BROWN reports for Ecumenical News International...  | more...|

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CELEBRATING CALVIN: YEAR TO MARK 500th ANNIVERSARY OF PROTESTANT REFORMER'S BIRTH LAUNCHED IN GENEVA...  | more...|

Changes to the world’s climate are causing widespread hunger in what Oxfam has warned could be the “defining human tragedy of this century”.

     A new report by the international aid agency says that without immediate action, 50 years of development in poor countries could be lost.

     Titled Suffering the Science - Climate Change, People and Poverty, the report says that climate change is already having an impact in a range of areas with attributable increases in world hunger, the spread of diseases and the number of people affected by natural disasters and that, without action to address it, the situation for the world’s poor is only going to get worse.

     Julie-Anne Richards, climate change policy advisor with Oxfam Australia, says the report calls for action in two areas: addressing climate change to ensure the situation doesn’t worsen; and providing developing nations with resources to cope with the changes already taking place.

     DAVID ADAMS reports...  | more...|

The United States' and Russia’s preliminary agreement to cut their nations’ stockpiles of nuclear arms has been hailed as a “step forward on the difficult but essential journey that the world must take to free itself from the spectre of self-destruction”, by the World Council of Churches’ General Secretary, Rev Dr Samuel Kobia.

     In a statement released in Geneva, Rev Dr Samuel Kobia describes the move as “encouraging”.

     “As possessors of most of the world's nuclear weapons, it is necessary that these two powers lead nuclear disarmament by concrete example,” he says.

     The comments follow announcements from US President Barack Obama and Russian president Dmitry Medvedev that they had signed a declaration to reach a new nuclear arms reduction pact which would replace the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) due to expire on 5th December this year.

     DAVID ADAMS reports...  | more...|