The Christian Churches will also be present at the Social Forum which is to be held at Porto Alegre from 31 January to 5 February. Dedicated to the theme “Another world is possible”, the Forum is expected to be attended by some 12,000 delegates from all over the world and some 60,000 participants. The organizers of the event also include the Commission of Justice and Peace of the Brazilian Episcopal Conference, whose executive secretary, Francisco Whitaker, was interviewed by the ecumenical press agency “Eni”. “Last year he said the Conference of the Catholic bishops of Brazil was not directly involved in the first Forum, whereas this year it will organize one of its central conferences on the theme of ‘hunger in the world'” during which two bishops of the Episcopal Conference will address the delegates. “Together with Catholics Whitaker added various Protestant and ecumenical organizations will also participate in the Forum”. The Council of the Churches of Latin America (CLAI) has also announced that it will be sending a delegation. A number of personalities of the Christian world, such as the Brazilian writer and theologian Frei Betto, the Argentinian worker priest Miguel Ramondetti, founder in the Seventies of the movement of priests for the third world, and Professor François Houtard of the University of Louvain, in Belgium, have also confirmed their participation in the Forum.
