BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: Relief efforts also continue in Kenya, where the disputed December 27 election ignited deadly conflicts between tribal groups. The United Nations Security Council urged immediate support for mediation efforts led by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. The vast majority of Kenya's 32 million people are Christians, and the international religious community is raising concerns about the Kenyan situation. Kim Lawton reports.

KIM LAWTON: Prayers for peace this week as Kenyans forced to flee their homes gathered at a Catholic church in Nairobi. According to the Red Cross, more than 1,000 people have been killed in the conflict. Faith-based groups are struggling to deliver desperately needed aid. Estimates of the number of internally displaced range from 300,000 to nearly a million, many of them children. Aid workers say they are overwhelmed.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE AID WORKER: We still have a lot of people who have not been reached by this help.

LAWTON: The crisis is taking a heavy toll on churches in this country, where nearly 80 percent of the population is Christian. Many of Kenya's schools, medical clinics, and other social institutions are church-run. Services have been disrupted, workers evacuated, and numerous church-owned buildings looted or destroyed in the chaos.

Reverend CLIFTON KIRKPATRICK (Presbyterian Church USA): It has really torn into the heart of the church, as well as into the heart of the church's message of reconciliation and their hopes and dreams that people could live together in peace and in harmony and in justice with one another.

(speaking to group): Kenya, as all of us know, has been in just a downward spiral of violence since the elections at the end of December.

LAWTON: Reverend Clifton Kirkpatrick of the Presbyterian Church (USA) is just back from a fact-finding trip to Kenya. He was the only American in an ecumenical delegation sent by the World Council of Churches. The delegation had deep concerns about the impact of the turmoil, not only for Kenya but across the African continent.

Rev. KIRKPATRICK: If a place that was seen as the hope of Africa -- Kenya -- could come apart ethnically, could degenerate into the kind of violence we saw in Rwanda, what hope was there for so many of the other places in Africa that seem far less stable?

LAWTON: The delegation called on the U.S. and other nations to strongly support the mediation efforts led by Kofi Annan, and the delegation called on churches to be greater forces for reconciliation across ethnic lines. Kirkpatrick acknowledges that task is complicated by some churches' political involvement.

Rev. KIRKPATRICK: Churches have often taken sides in this conflict and have at times compromised their moral authority. So many of the churches, like every other institution in Kenya, are organized on ethnic lines.

LAWTON: Still, Kirkpatrick says his delegation did see signs of hope. In the aftermath of the tragedy where dozens were burned to death after they took refuge in a church, Christian leaders from rival tribes have organized a joint memorial service next week.

Rev. KIRKPATRICK: I think the churches have really had a wake up call out of this and are taking major moral leadership calling for reconciliation.

LAWTON: The big question, Kirkpatrick says, is whether churches, and the entire international community, can indeed find meaningful ways to resolve this crisis before it spirals into widespread ethnic cleansing.

Rev. KIRKPATRICK: I think the real hope of the moment is that the world, the churches, the people of Kenya will say yes to that challenge. But it is a dangerous time if those efforts don't happen at this time.

LAWTON: I'm Kim Lawton reporting.