WEA

The three main bodies in Christianity, representing about 90 percent of Christians worldwide, released a "historic" agreement Monday on how Christians should conduct themselves when witnessing in a religiously diverse context.

Leaders from the World Evangelical Alliance, the World Council of Churches and the Vatican’s Pontifical Council on Inter-religious Dialogue were in Geneva on Monday to launch the document entitled, "Christian Witness in a Multi-Religious World: Recommendations for Conduct."

The document, a result of five years of cooperation, provides a biblical mandate for evangelism and outlines a set of ethics on Christian conduct in missions. more >>

The first-ever dos and don’ts for evangelism endorsed by evangelicals, mainline Protestants and Catholics will now be available online after the World Evangelical Alliance and its partners launch the document in Switzerland Tuesday.

The Rev. Dr. Geoff Tunnicliffe, international director of WEA, will be among the world Christian leaders who will announce the public launch of the code of conduct, which for the first time ever has achieved such a broad Christian backing, in Geneva on June 28, WEA said in a statement.

“We are very pleased and grateful to God for all those who have worked so hard on the production of this text. The WEA fully endorses this document and recommends it for study and application to all our member alliances, churches, organizations and individuals,” said Tunnicliffe, whose organization represents over 600 million evangelical Christians worldwide. more >>

Christians around the world are praying for Sudan as Southern Sudanese begin Sunday a seven-day referendum to vote whether to remain united with the North or become independent.

The long-awaited referendum marks the conclusion of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended decades of bloody civil war between the predominantly Muslim North and the mainly Christian and animist South.

Southern Sudanese are expected to vote for independence from the North, which they say treats them as second-class citizens. more >>

Correction appended

The new year has just begun but Pastor John Hagee, arguably the most vocal and controversial Christian Zionist in the nation, has already proclaimed that it is not God’s plan to divide Israel, implicitly calling into question the two-state solution that would create a Palestinian state.

In a Christians United for Israel webcast Thursday, Hagee cited several Old Testament verses to support his claim that God made an everlasting covenant with the Jewish people regarding their promised land. He pointed to Genesis 13:14-17, which says in part, “The Lord said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, ‘Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.” more >>

CAPE TOWN, South Africa – To lively African drumbeats and against the lighted backdrop of the trademark African red sunrise, over 4,000 Christian leaders from over 190 nations gathered at the Cape Town International Convention Center to open the Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization Sunday.

It was the first time in over 20 years that the Lausanne Movement, a global network of evangelical leaders who work together for world evangelization, held a global conference. The third Lausanne Congress, also known as Cape Town 2010, is described as the most diverse Christian gathering – in terms of ethnicity, denomination, profession, and gender – in the 2,000 year history of Christianity.

Congress participants represent 198 nations, nearly every stream of Christianity, a diverse age range (40 percent of participants are from 20 to 40 years old), and diverse professions (1,200 participants are pastors, 1,200 are scholars and in the academic field, and 1,200 are from the medical, business, and media fields). more >>

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon launched a $40-billion plan Wednesday to help improve child and maternal health – one of least improved areas out of the eight addressed by the Millennium Development Goals.

Funding from the plan is expected to go toward saving the lives of 16 million women and children over the next five years. Governments, foundations, businesses and non-governmental organizations contributed to the funding, the United Nations reported as this week’s high-level MDG2010 Summit was coming to an end.

Notably, however, four times as much money, or $169 billion, is actually needed to save the lives of 16 million women and children, according to Robert Orr, a senior aide to Ban. Orr told reporters that the initial $40 billion in pledges is expected to bring in more funding in the years ahead. more >>