Youth in the Presbyterian Reformed Church in Cuba are preparing themselves for a new millennium that will show ever more clearly, they say, the predatory nature of a globalization that intensifies inequality among human beings, and to whose destructive effects young people are especially vulnerable. The second national assembly of the Presbyterian Reformed Youth took place in Havana in November. It brought together 48 young people from the three presbyteries of the church to address pressing problems in Cuban society, such as prostitution, growing individualism, and social disorientation.

National youth work in the Cuban church began in 1932. The Presbyterian Reformed Youth, led by moderator Omar Maren Turcaz and secretary Dr Cosmé Reyes, has resumed this tradition after a 16-year break.

Equatorial Guinea

What does it mean to be Reformed in a society where most people live in extreme poverty and in constant fear of a dictatorial regime which clings to power and cares nothing for democracy or human rights?

This question formed the backdrop to a two-week course of biblical and theological continuing education in Bata in August. The course was led by Arturo Piedra, a Reformed church historian from Costa Rica, Iris Barrientos, a doctoral student in biblical theology from Argentina, and Susanna Grogg-Roggli from Switzerland. More than 80 ministers and members, young and old, from congregations of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of Equatorial Guinea (IRPGE) took part in the school.

The two-week course was a modest attempt, coordinated by the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, to compensate for the lack of a church seminary. The IRPGE hopes to run similar schools in the future, which means finding roughly $15,000 in funding each year. In a desperately poor country, the IRPGE is also attempting to electrify its churches and other premises, using solar energy.

France

After fighting cancer for several years, Alain Blancy died at the end of September. He was 73. Blancy, a pastor of the Reformed Church in France, was assistant director of the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey between 1971 and 1981. To many in WARC, he was best known as an interpreter, serving in this capacity at the 23rd general council (Debrecen 1997). WARC general secretary Setri Nyomi described him as "a man with a rare capacity to interpret the Reformed tradition in ways which brought it to bear compellingly on the issues of today," and paid tribute to his contribution to Reformed life at French, European and international levels. "He combined a penetrating intellect with a warm, compassionate humanity and a strong sense of humour," Nyomi said.

South Africa

On December 14, Stellenbosch University bestowed an honorary doctorate on arguably its most controversial graduate - Christiaan Beyers Naudé, an Afrikaner nationalist who became a stalwart of the struggle against apartheid.

Naudé's sense of justice was shaped by Afrikaner suffering during and after the Boer war. In the early years of apartheid, however, acquaintance with black South Africans living in squalor modulated that sense of justice into a new key. In 1963, while moderator of the Southern Transvaal Synod, he broke with the Dutch Reformed Church when invited to become director of the newly-formed Christian Institute. Fourteen years later, because of its involvement in the socio-political struggle of the black community, the institute was banned, and Naudé himself was restricted for seven years. In the 1980s, he was general secretary of the South African Council of Churches. He came to play a key role as a mediator between the Nationalist government and liberation movements such as the ANC. Long ostracized by his church, he has in more recent years been widely recognized as an outstanding prophetic voice.