Organized by the WCC’s Commission on Faith and Order, the conference is meeting from 24 to 28 October 2025 at the Logos Papal Center of the Coptic Orthodox Church at Wadi El Natrun, southwest of Alexandria, Egypt, around the theme “Where now for visible unity?” It is the first such world conference since 1993, the first of this century and millennium, and the first to be held on the African continent, Dietrich told a meeting of the commission the day before the conference opened. The commission meeting offered an opportunity for Faith and Order commissioners to take stock of their work since their last in-person meeting in February 2024, in advance of the world conference, and to begin to set directions for the future. The conference in Egypt is taking place 1700 years after the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea, the first assembly of representatives from the whole of Christendom. The anniversary, said Dietrich, is “not merely as a commemoration but as a question addressed to us: how the faith we confess together will shape the way we live together today, towards visible unity, in a time marked by fragmentation, conflict and division.” In such a context, WCC general secretary Rev. Prof. Dr Jerry Pillay told the commission meeting, “the unity of the church is not a distant ideal but a concrete sign of hope and reconciliation.” The work of Faith and Order has always been connected with discipleship, prophetic witness, and the transformation of the world, Pillay added. “Theology, at its best, nurtures our imagination for unity, strengthens our moral resolve, and inspires the churches to act together for justice, peace, and care for creation,” Pillay said. There have been only five such world conferences since the first in Lausanne in 1927, giving birth to the Faith and Order movement, one of the Christian initiatives that led to the founding of the WCC in 1948. In his report to the commission, Prof. Dr Andrej Jeftić, WCC director of Faith and Order, noted how the Sixth World Conference was bringing together more than 350 Christians from all over the globe. “Moments like this are rare. It has been decades since the commission has had such a broad opportunity to listen to the churches, to the different traditions, to the many regions and generations — and through them, to the voice of the Holy Spirit,” Jeftić said. “My plea to all of us is simple: let us be attentive to this voice, and let us listen well,” he stated. The work of Faith and Order, said Rev. Prof. Dr Kuzipa Nalwamba, WCC programme director for Unity, Mission and Ecumenical Formation “provides a vital space where theological reflection and ecclesial experience converge to deepen our shared search for visible unity in faith, life, and witness.” In her address, Dietrich said the Faith and Order commissioners are both guests and hosts at the world conference. “We arrive here as guests — sent by our churches, received into the hospitality of the Coptic Church that hosts us – at the same time, as commissioners, we also act as hosts,” said Dietrich. “And yet even as hosts we remain guests,” she added. “We do not welcome others into something that belongs to us. The unity we appeal to is not our achievement but a given reality in Christ.” Learn more about the WCC Faith and Order Commission Sixth World Conference on Faith and Order livestreams and recordings Photogallery: Sixth World Conference on Faith and Order, 2025 Learn more about the Sixth World Conference on Faith and Order | 
