Word Council of Churches calls for disarmament on Hiroshima anniversary

The World Council of Churches (WCC) has extended their solidarity to those who lost and survived the atomic bombings of 1945.

A statement from WCC Secretary General said, "The pain of this important anniversary is threefold. There are the shattered families, recurring traumas and unnatural deaths that have affected hundreds of thousands of people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki."”

WCC said that on August 6 and 9, “we turn our hearts toward the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, asking God to bless governments and citizens with new resolve to protect the sanctity of life.”

"There is the fact that, 65 years on, nuclear bombs still threaten humanity and deny a lasting peace. There is also the legacy that since 1945 the world is divided into two camps a handful of states that assert the right to have weapons of mass annihilation and the majority of states that do not," the statement further said.

WCC stated, "Such inequity and division is not the heritage of humanity. The Bible urges us to 'choose life' so that all may live. As if in response, 65 years after Hiroshima, more and more people are working to rekindle the vision of a world without nuclear weapons."

More than 4,000 mayors from 144 countries have joined the mayors of the bombed Japanese cities in an association called Mayors for Peace. They insist that "Cities are not targets".

"In several nations, elder statesmen and former military generals have reversed lifelong positions and come out for nuclear abolition. On several continents, parliamentarians, physicians, lawyers and scientists are campaigning with their peers for the abolition of nuclear weapons," said the statement.

In different countries around the globe people of faith are standing together for a world without nuclear weapons. The WCC and member churches are promoting ratification of a new arms control agreement between Russia and the US, rejuvenation of disarmament forums and reform of NATO's nuclear policy.