A team from the World Council of Churches has visited Egypt at the invitation of the Coptic Orthodox Church to plan for the 2025 World Conference on Faith and Order.

The WCC said in a statement that it will take place at the Logos Papal Center at Wadi El Natrun, near Alexandria.

The conference, organized by the WCC Commission on Faith and Order, will mark the 1,700th anniversary of the first Ecumenical Council of Nicaea.

The World Conference on Faith and Order will meet from 24-28 October 2025 under the theme "Where Now for Visible Unity?"

That preparation gathering assembled representatives of the whole of Christendom to seek consensus on the central meaning of the Christian faith.

"We were so glad that the World Council of Churches accepted the request and the wish of the Coptic Church to have this event here in Egypt," said Bishop Abraham, Coptic auxiliary bishop in Los Angeles, who is also a member of the WCC central committee.

In November 2023 the WCC accepted an invitation from the head of the Coptic Orthodox Church,. Pope Tawadros II of Alexandria, to hold the world conference at the Logos Papal Centre, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Alexandria.

It is close to the 4th-century St Bishoy Monastery, one of the most important monastic centers in Egypt.

During their July 13-17 July, members of a six-person WCC team visited the St. Bishoy Monastery and the Logos Papal Center.

WORLD CONFERENCE

There they discussed plans for the world conference with the Coptic Orthodox Church committee preparing for the conference, led by Bishop Abraham.

Abraham underlined the important role played by the See of Alexandria at the Council of Nicaea, and especially the involvement of Patriarch St Alexander I of Alexandria and of St Athanasius, who attended the council as a deacon and who would become the 20th Patriarch of Alexandria.

"We have not only been warmly welcomed, we have already begun to have a foretaste of the ancient Christian tradition that the Coptic church is the custodian of," said Rev. Kuzipa Nalwamba, WCC program director for Unity, Mission, and Ecumenical Formation, who led the WCC team to Egypt.

"The juxtaposition of the ancient St Bishoy and the ultramodern Logos centers in the ministry of your church is a gift to the Christian family," said Nalwamba, in her opening words.

Planning began in 2012 for the Logos Papal Center after Pope Tawadros II's enthronement.

The center includes the Church of the Transfiguration, a conference hall and meeting room, and accommodation for visitors.

The meeting heralded a visit to Egypt in November by a WCC delegation that will be led by WCC general secretary Rev. Jerry Pillay.