Ecumenical council gathers in shadow of bleeding Mother Africa.(World Council of Churches Eighth Assembly)(Abstract)

The world church turned its attention to Africa this month, visiting a continent where the Body of Christ is growing faster than anywhere else on earth. It also saw that body mortally wounded, impoverished and diseased.

War, communal and domestic violence, a towering debt burden, corruption, human rights violations and the growing specter of HIV-AIDS were never far from the deliberations of the nearly 5,000 persons who attended the World Council of Churches Eighth Assembly here Dec. 3-14.

Participants arrived from 339 Protestant and Orthodox churches in some 100…