Prayers

Prayer for Peace on the World Council of Churches 76th anniversary, 23 August 2024, offered by Bishop Dr Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, moderator of the WCC central committee.

It has been 28 years since the two Koreas began the Easter joint prayer together. It is a prayer that started with glory to God who gave him the strength to work for unification. I hope that unification alone will fulfill its last duty.

Gracious God, when suffering and injustice seem unending, we pray for Sumud — the steadfast endurance and resilience that we find in you. 

Let swords be turned into ploughshares, fear to trust, despair to hope, oppression to freedom, starvation to prosperity, occupation to liberation, and peace and justice could be experienced by all.

‘In his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.’ (Eph 2:14 NRSV)

Prayer for Ukraine by bishop Rosemarie Wenner during the ecumenical morning prayer held on 15 May 2023, when the World Council of Churches (WCC) staff and partners observed the UN International Day of Living Together in Peace.

As tensions continue to rise on the Korean Peninsula, we, as Christians from the North and the South, come together in prayer. We ask for your grace and mercy through the resurrection of your son, Jesus Christ.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) is sharing materials for a “Week of Prayer for Overcoming Racism and Xenophobia” in the week that includes the UN International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination on 21 March and the UN International Day for the Remembrance of Victims of Slavery and the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade on 25 March.

The World Council of Churches invites the global fellowship and all people of good will to join, on 15 August 2022, a prayer for peace and reconciliation on the Korean Peninsula.

Composed by the National Council of Churches in Korea, the prayer will be held on 14 August—the Sunday before Liberation Day, observed in both North and South Korea to mark the date in 1945 when Korea won independence from Japanese colonial oppression. The date was also when the peninsula was divided into two countries.