10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches: you, too, can participate

The Tenth Assembly of the World Council of Churches gets under way this week, meeting in Busan, South Korea from October 30 through November 8, 2013. WCC assemblies have been held once every seven years since the inaugural 1948 Amsterdam assembly. The explosion in social media and live streaming technologies since the last assembly (in Porto Alegre, Brazil in 2006) will make it possible for interested persons globally to follow and have forms of participation in the Tenth Assembly as it happens. Below is a WCC press release providing information on the Assembly, social media forums connecting people with the Assembly via Twitter and Facebook, downloadable mobile applications, and a link to the official WCC web site for the Tenth Assembly that in turn makes available program books and other resources in PDF, press releases, and live video streaming of worship services and plenary sessions.

WCC assembly ready to open, watch from afar

25 October 2013

Final preparations are underway for the opening of the 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches (WCC), to be held in Busan, Republic of Korea.

At the Sansung Presbyterian Church in Busan, more than 50 volunteers gathered Thursday and Friday, 24 to 25 October, to pack the welcome bags for assembly delegates and several thousand other participants who are expected to attend the 10-day assembly.

The bags include an array of assembly publications including worship and Bible study materials, programme and resource book and information about the work of the WCC since the last assembly, held in 2006 at Porto Alegre, Brazil.

During the two days of work, the volunteers individually filled some 3,000 bags with books and other gifts for the assembly participants.

The assembly, which has the theme “God of Life, lead us to justice and peace”, opens 30 October with an opening prayer service in which some 5,000 people, including 2,500 Koreans, will participate.

The opening service will be broadcast through an online live stream from the Christian Broadcast System in Korea, the oldest Christian television network in Korea.

The live stream will broadcast several other events from the WCC assembly. A schedule of programming is now available on the WCC assembly website.

In addition to a number of live stream broadcasts throughout the assembly, access to the assembly from afar will be facilitated through a number of other sources.

The WCC Assembly website will feature daily news stories and updates about the assembly.

For tablets and mobile phones, a downloadable free mobile application that will feature daily stories, photos and links to videos from the assembly is available through the iTunes Store and Google Market.

Each day a 15-minute video broadcast, Madang Live, will be available on You Tube and show highlights and feature stories from the assembly.

And the assembly will be trending through social media networks such as the WCC Twitter site, @oikoumene, @OlavTveit and the assembly Twitter site, @wcc2013.

The WCC Assembly Facebook event is now a running space on social media, engaging some 600 people from around the world through sharing of information, articles and links about the assembly. Information on the visitors’ programme organized by the Korean Host Committee of the WCC has also been made accessible through wcc2013.kr (in Korean).

 

Official website of the WCC 10th Assembly