World Methodist Council — Thematic Keynote - El Salvador, 15 August 2026 My thinking as I prepared: JOY, in the Wesleyan and global Christian witness, is not the absence of suffering but the sign that suffering does not have the last word. It begins as longing, is costly won, survives as defiance, matures into communal practice, and ends in universal doxology. That five-step dance defines our lives as people who live in the joy of the Lord. ________________ From the lands of the Adnyamathanha, Barramattagal and Awabakel in my homeland of Australia, I pay may respects to the custodians of this land of El Salvador, and I bring greetings from the Council for World Mission – an ecumenical partner of the World Methodist Council on key commitments and projects, like NIFEA the NEW INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL and ECONOMIC ARCHITECTURE. Introduction On the way here, I took a stopover in Los Angeles. While there I FOUND MYSELF in the hospital… the hospital had closed to conventional medicine and no...