Week of Prayer for Christian Unity
observed this January 18 - 25

New York, January 19, 2012 -- The international Week of Prayer for Christian Unity -- actually an "octave" of eight days -- is observed each year from January 18 to 25.

This year's theme is, "We Will All Be Changed by the Victory of Our Lord Jesus Christ" (cf. I Corinthians 15:51-58).

The planners of the event (see http://bit.ly/yKvt5t) describe the theme as "evoking the transformative power of faith in Christ, particularly in relation to our praying for the visible unity of the Church, the Body of Christ. It is in His life, action, teaching, suffering, death and resurrection that we seek inspiration for a modern victorious life of faith.

"As he awaited the suffering and death that was to come," say the planners in a joint message, "he prayed that his disciples might be one so that world might believe. Please join us as we pray for and strive towards the full visible unity of the Church as it will be changed, transformed and conformed to the likeness of Christ." 

The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity -- or the Church Unity Octave -- was first observed in January 1908, according to the Rev. Timothy MacDonald, SA, Associate Director of the Graymoor Ecumenical & Interreligious Institute.

"Celebrated in the chapel of a small Atonement Franciscan Convent of the Protestant Episcopal Church, on a remote hillside fifty miles from New York City," Father MacDonald writes, "this new prayer movement caught the imagination of others beyond the Franciscan Friars and Sisters of the Atonement to become an energetic movement that gradually blossomed into a worldwide observance involving many nations and millions of people."

The observation is sponsored by the Commission on Faith and Order of the World Council of Churches and the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity.

In the U.S., materials for the celebration of the Week of Prayer are the work of Graymoor Ecumenical & Interreligious Institute in collaboration with the Commission on Faith & Order of the National Council of Churches and the Roman Catholic Bishops' Commission for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs.

For additional information on the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, as well as a list of observations throughout the year when Christian Unity will be celebrated, see Graymoor's Web page.

Since its founding in 1950, the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA has been the leading force for shared ecumenical witness among Christians in the United States. The NCC's 37 member communions -- from a wide spectrum of Protestant, Anglican, Orthodox, Evangelical, historic African American and Living Peace churches -- include 45 million persons in more than 100,000 local congregations in communities across the nation.

NCC News contact:  Philip E. Jenks, 212-870-2228 (office), 646-853-4212 (cell), pjenks@ncccusa.org