Europe comes to Birmingham
Last month city mission workers from 10 European countries came together for a Birmingham conference and joined with our supporters for a great celebration.
From 26th to 29th September BCM hosted the European Association of Urban Missions conference which is held in a different city once every three years.
A fantastic bunch of 80 mission workers from England, Scotland, Czechia, Finland, Germany, Norway, Poland, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland came together to learn and share experience.
Major Alison Raybould is the Salvation Army's Anti-Trafficking and Modern Slavery Co-ordinator for Scotland. She spoke about the immense scale of this crime, that the numbers of people tricked and trapped into sex work, drug dealing and unpaid labour cannot be quantified as it is a hidden crime. And yet day by day slaves are freed as Alison's team follow the example of William Booth who said, 'Faith and works should travel side by side, step answering to step, like the legs of men walking. First faith, and then works; and then faith again, and then works again - until they can scarcely distinguish which is the one and which is the other.'
Professor Steve Sturman and Dr Felicia Wong of the Christian Medical Fellowship dealt with 'Mental Health and the Legacy of COVID', encouraging everyone to recognise that 'my world is not your world' and that we have all had different experiences of, not just the virus itself, but lockdowns, fear and isolation too.
John Stevens of the Federation of Independent Evangelical Churches shared a review of the UK church and highlighted that, whilst there is a general fall in the numbers of people attending church, those churches which are growing preach Jesus Christ. He argued that people do not go to church to hear about politics or social action as that can be accessed elsewhere - but God's story of salvation in the Bible is the message that makes churches unique.
Other speakers covered climate, addictions, caring for the elderly, Ukraine and more. On the final evening the delegates came together with BCM supporters for a celebration at St Martin's Church when the Chinese Evangelical Church Choir, the Choir With No Name and sax player David Grant gave truly uplifting performances.
