YouTube, the online video sharing site, has added another Presbyterian minister to its library. Rev. Dr. Hans Kouwenberg has entered the realm of multi-media with a sermon he gave at Knox College last November. The sermon runs in three parts and was about modeling ministry, based on Mark 7: 31-37. A second sermon, given at Rosedale, Toronto, may eventually be added. To listen to the Knox College sermon, visit www.youtube.com and type “Hans Kouwenberg” in the search field. YouTube also features sermons by Rev. Mark Lewis, minister at St. Andrew's, Kitchener, Ont. –AM

The Assembly Council met in November, and Aboriginal issues were discussed in various ways. Lisbeth Duncan, convener, and former moderator Wilma Welsh reported on a trip to the Medicine Eagle Retreat and Healing Place in Manitoba. They were invited along with the PCC's Healing and Reconciliation Animator, Lori Ransom, and staff from Winnipeg Inner City Mission, to talk, forge friendships, and learn about life on the reserve.

ENI — Brazilian Cardinal Claudio Hummes, prefect of the Congregation of the Clergy, asked Roman Catholics worldwide, in the Vatican-based Osservatore Romano newspaper, to engage in prayer to make amends for the actions of pedophile priests and to help their victims. The prayers should take the form of the “perpetual adoration” of the Eucharist, where members of the church take turns to maintain a vigil in front of a consecrated host representing the body of Jesus.

It is all due to a most remarkable man.

ENI — Religious leaders in Uganda are backing government efforts in fighting Ebola by discouraging followers from shaking hands or embracing during greeting. “These are precautionary measures. The general advice in churches is: don't shake hands; don't embrace,” said Rev. Grace Kaiso, executive secretary of the Uganda Joint Christian Council, a grouping that brings together Roman Catholic, Anglican and Orthodox churches.

The Canadian Foodgrains Bank raised about $1,500 thanks to two sold out concerts by Christian artist Steve Bell. Bell travelled to Ethiopia in 2007 to […]

The health of the Presbyterian Church was an unofficial theme at the November meeting of the Life and Mission Agency committee, as the convener, Rev. Daniel Cho, began the meeting with an Arab proverb: “He who has health, has hope. He who has hope, has everything.”

ENI — Celebrations were held in China in December to mark the production of more than 50 million Bibles in the People's Republic by the Amity Printing Company, a joint venture between the United Bible Societies and the Amity Foundation, which is a Chinese Christian agency. The Amity Printing Company is the only body allowed to print Bibles in mainland China.

ENI — Europe's largest grouping of churches has noted the continent's steadily growing proportion of people aged more than 65 years old and is calling for the rediscovery of “the interdependence between generations.”

ENI — Pope Benedict XVI has responded to a letter sent to him and other Christian leaders by 138 Muslim scholars, by inviting a group of its signatories to meet him and the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue.

ENI — Faith-based campaigners and religious leaders say churches should not relax their efforts to deal with the HIV/AIDS pandemic despite UN figures showing a drop in the number of people worldwide living with the virus.

A United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples passed in September is “fundamentally flawed and lacks clear, practical guidance for implementation,” according to Chuck Strahl, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, and Maxime Bernier, Minister of Foreign Affairs in a press release. “It also does not recognize Canada's need to balance indigenous rights to lands and resources with the rights of others.” Canada along with the United States, Australia and New Zealand declined to sign.

The Presbyterian Church's Heather Chappell has released her debut CD entitled The Moon a Bullethole. The album was officially released on Nov. 17 at a […]

Presbyterian World Service & Development launched the Loaves & Fishes Fund, a planned giving fund that enables donors to give equity that is invested and used over a seven year period. Unveiled in October, the fund plays on Jesus' miracle of the multiplying loaves and fishes, creating enough to feed the multitude, with plenty left over.

Trinity Presbyterian Church, Oro, appears to be on its way to rebuilding its congregation. More than 190 adults, along with eight volunteers and 50 children, attended the first service following the departure of more than 1,000 worshippers to former minister Rev. Carey Nieuwhof's Connexus Community Church. Sunday worship is at 10 a.m. led by weekly guest ministers. A children's program is provided, a youth program is being developed, and small groups should soon be functioning.

People must recognize God's delight in His creation, a prominent theologian told an eager congregation at St. Andrew and St. Paul, Montreal. Lethbridge-raised Dr. Norman […]

ENI — A Baghdad-based Anglican priest has declared that Christians are considerably worse off now than they were during the regime of Saddam Hussein, Iraq's former dictator.

Justice Ministries will host a Forum for Ethnic and Racial Minorities in the Presbyterian Church in Canada on April 4-6 at Crieff Hills Retreat Centre, Puslinch, Ont. The theme for the event is Change and Diversity in the Church, and will feature Rev. Paulette Brown, a doctoral candidate at Knox College and former minister at University Presbyterian, Toronto.

The women of Lakeside, Summerland, B.C., had a gee-whiz idea. They started with a table and a tarp and soon graduated to a mini-cafe where they a) got to know each other, b) developed a Presbyterian presence in the community, c) were able to develop their own sense of ministry in an environment comfortable to them, d) got to know the community better and visit with many tourists, and e) raised $3,000 for PWS&D. That's some idea.

ENI — Anglican theologian Rev. John Saint Helier Gibaut, who teaches at a Roman Catholic university, is to head a post at the World Council of Churches that deals with matters of church unity. He will take his position as head of the WCC's Commission on Faith and Order in January.