Fredrick Nzwili looks at recent global and regional initiatives by the churches to confront the complex political and humanitarian issues underlying current crises around migration - especially in the South.
The impact of global migration on the church and on the most vulnerable is the theme of a 6-8 June 2007 conference in Nairobi, Kenya, oganized by the Global Ecumenical Network on Migration (GEM).
Some 1 billion people will be forced from their homes by 2050 as climate change deepens an already huge global migration crisis, predicts an authoritative new report by Christian Aid - which shows that scapegoating immigrants is the wrong approach.
The leader of the World Council of Churches (WCC) has urged churches in the UK and Ireland to increase their hospitality toward migrants, and allow themselves to be changed by immigration.
A university-based Catholic research institute at the University of Cambridge has published a report which illustrates the shocking conditions endured by many migrant workers contributing to the economic life of the UK.
The head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, has called for the government to consider an amnesty for illegal immigrants in the UK.