WCC NEWS: WCC worship songwriting competition announces winners

Young songwriters will take center inspirational stage at the upcoming World Council of Churches (WCC) 11th Assembly as the WCC announced the winners of its Worship Songwriting Competition on 22 August. The contest aimed to engage and support young people in the assembly's planning and delivery. Illustration by Jeremy Thomas, one of the winners of the WCC worship songwriting competition. 23 August 2022 As part of the project, the winners created a song that is published in the main assembly worship book. “I found out about the competition through a Facebook post that was shared by one of my friends. I’m a member of the Church of Scotland. When I saw the post, I had been in a rhythm of writing some of my own words for songs and hadn’t pushed myself to write tunes as regularly so it felt like a good and timely challenge,” shared Lynsey Martin Kimmitt, a winner of the competition. Deliberating on the WCC 11th Assembly theme, “Christ’s love moves the world to reconciliation and unity,” she said, ”My reflections of peace have been influenced by the opportunity to represent the Church of Scotland when visiting Christians in Taiwan. During these visits, I witnessed a little, through listening, engaging, and learning from others of what it is like to live in the constant shadow of potential conflict, and how the knowledge that there are people who stand with you, praying for you can be so unifying, comforting, and powerful.” Another winner of the competition, Jeremy Thomas, who had been involved in the Working Committee of Unity of Christians in Mauritius associated with the Anglican Diocese of Mauritius, shared how glad he was to receive an email from the youth coordinator of WCC about this competition. “God opened my heart to His global church many years ago and I devoted my life since 2007 to serve for the love and unity within the global body of Christ. Being involved with the Working Committee for Christian Unity, in the preparation of the global Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, I was inspired by the WCC 11th Assembly theme and I wrote this song which was sung by the Unity Choir during the Unity week in Mauritius,” said Thomas. He further added: “As I wrote this song using Mauritian creole and English using a Mauritian rock rhythm to illustrate the diversity, I was also inspired to draw this illustration, where Christ is reconciling two different children as He is the only way to bring real reconciliation. I have seen Christ reconciling people from different ethnicities and denominations, reconciling in amazing ways and I can guarantee that it is only Christ’s love which can move the world to reconciliation and unity.” Learn more about the WCC 11th Assembly Resources for the WCC 11th Assembly See more

The World Council of Churches promotes Christian unity in faith, witness and service for a just and peaceful world. An ecumenical fellowship of churches founded in 1948, today the WCC brings together 352 Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 580 million Christians in over 120 countries, and works cooperatively with the Roman Catholic Church. The WCC acting general secretary is Rev. Prof. Dr Ioan Sauca, from the Orthodox Church in Romania.  Media contact: +41 79 507 6363; www.oikoumene.org/press Our visiting address is: World Council of Churches 150 route de Ferney Geneve 2 1211 Switzerland