Churches that are more courageous and concrete in promoting peace at all levels: that is what is urged by the young representatives of the Lutheran churches from various European countries and elsewhere in the world. At a meeting held in Geneva at the end of June, they sent a message to the World Lutheran Federation: the “credibility of our Christian communion” depends a great deal on the Church’s commitment to peace, the document declares. The young Lutherans ask for a greater involvement of the Churches in Palestine and Israel: in the European cities where ever more people “succumb through despair to criminal actions”; or in Africa where “many women are tormented by physical and psychological violence” “Instead of speaking of violence in the abstract – say the young people in their document – we have a need for concrete and real measures, starting out from our own environment, from ourselves and from our Church”.
