NCC General Assembly concludes its meeting at Hunt Valley, Maryland.

The 35 member communions of the NCC came together in General Assembly November 8-10, in Hunt Valley, Maryland (near Baltimore).

I want to highlight two important resolutions that the GA passed on Wednesday.

First, the Assembly unanimously declared that "any and all use of torture is unacceptable." Read the statement here: http://www.ncccusa.org/torture.html.

Second, it passed a resolution on Protecting Civil Liberties. In the post 9/11 environment, where because of the repercussions of the USA PATRIOT ACT, many persons from Muslim, Sikh and other religious communities sufferred needlessly. Read about it here: http://www.ncccusa.org/news/051110liberties.html

Today, Thursday, we had the first reading of a cutting edge document entitled, "Fearfully and Wonderfully Made" a policy on Human Biotechnologies. This will provide the Council a powerful platform from which to provide leadership to the churches as they navigate this critically important scientific development.

On Thursday evening, the Assembly joined in worship as we installed The Rev. Michael Livingstone as NCC's next president. Rev. Livingstone is strongly supportive of the work of Interfatih Relations amoung the NCC's member communions.