Security forces in West Papua continue to hunt down students who were involved in the March 16th demonstration in Abepura. Around 1,000 people are said to be hiding in the hills near Jayapura while twenty people have been hospitalised after being beaten by the police. Approximately 200 Papuans have now crossed onto Papua New Guinea to seek protection from police ...

St Patricks Iten in the Kenyan Highlands seemed like any regular local school until 1976 when Brother Colm O’Connell arrived for what was supposed to be a two-year assignment to teach geography. But the following year, the cleric who belongs to the Brothers of St Patrick order started coaching athletics and since then he has produced an astounding list of ...

Indigenous people from around the globe have had a special place the church for much of its life but, all too often, place has been destructive of their physical, spiritual and cultural heritage as the first nations of the colonized world. Seen as objects of mission rather than people of the living God, these first nations are now represented in ...

The US National Council of Churches is calling on the government in the United States to close its detention centre on Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, following a United Nations report that recommended the immediate closure of the facility. The NCC’s general secretary, Robert Edgar, sent a letter to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice reiterating a request made in 2003 and ...

The world’s churches are "missing in action" while one thousand children die each week in squalid camps in northern Uganda, a former foreign minister from that country has said at a global meeting of church leaders in Brazil. "The worst place in the world today to be a child is in northern Uganda," said Olara Otunnu, who served as United ...

Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop of the US Episcopal (Anglican) Church, says he is undergoing treatment for alcoholism. In a letter to the Episcopal churches in New Hampshire state, where he serves as bishop, and made public earlier this week, Robinson said he would spend all of February at a treatment centre, whose location he did not disclose ...

Pope Benedict XVI has pledged to continue working with the World Council of Churches – the world’s biggest church grouping – in promoting Christian unity. "We look forward to continuing this journey of hope and promise, as we intensify our endeavours towards reaching that day when Christians are united in proclaiming the Gospel message of salvation for all," said Pope ...

Mark CornfordIf I had been asked this question ten years ago I would have answered with something like “the Uniting Church is no better or worse than any other church”. I had a general agreement with most of the theology of the Uniting Church, historically it was where I had grown up, and I had a vague sense that this ...

NRL referee Tim Mander was set to blow the whistle on youth issues when he took on the role of CEO of Scripture Union Queensland, one of Australia’s leading Christian youth and children’s organisations, on January 9. The move comes just months after being named the world’s number one referee. SU Queensland is renowned for its camping and holiday programs ...

The Uniting Church has claimed that the drug RU486 should be evaluated by proper trials in the same way as any other therapeutic drug or procedure and that the question of the drug’s safety should be viewed separately to a debate on the moral and ethical issues of the abortion procedure itself Rev Elenie Poulos, National Director UnitingJustice Australia wrote ...