World Mission Conference 2008

3rd - 5th November 2008 at Hayes Conference Centre, Swanwick.

This year’s annual conference was the last of three that had the 2008 Lambeth Conference as their focus. Two years ago we explore hospitality as a window to understanding our involvement in God’s Mission. Last year we shared plans for the pre Lambeth Hospitality Initiative looking at how the visiting bishops and their spouses might inspire our involvement in God’s mission globally. This year we looked back on both the Hospitality Initiative and the Lambeth Conference asking what we might take from them as we moved forward.

We celebrated the time many of the bishops and their spouses spent in dioceses in Wales, Scotland and England before travelling to Canterbury. This time was clearly appreciated by our visitors and by sharing in the life of all the dioceses enabled many within our congregations to feel a closer link with the Lambeth Conference itself. The variety of activities put on by the dioceses was immense and each diocese hosted a ‘family gathering’ that prepared the bishops and spouses for what they then encountered in Canterbury.

We were helped in our thinking in our thinking about the Conference itself by three bishops who attended and the spouse of one who was involved in the Spouses Conference. Archbishop Valentino Mokiwa (Dar Es Salem and Archbishop of Tanzania) Bishops Idris Jones (Glasgow and Galloway) and Mike Hill (Bristol and Chair of PWM) together with Mrs Alison Jones all shared their reflections on the Lambeth Conference and what they felt were the key themes and what we, the wider Church, might take out of it.

High on the list of ‘what did it achieve?’ was that it provided a space where serious but generous conversations took place and difference was spoken of in ways that led to greater understanding. As we moved to what the mission agencies and dioceses present might take from the Conference for their own lives the need to keep such conversations going also featured highly.

By the end of our conference those present contributed to an agenda for future possible direction and action for agencies and dioceses. A strong plea was made for more work to be done on the relationship between these two expressions of how the Church of England engages in its global mission relationships. Both the agencies and dioceses – through their links and global mission activities – are in different places than they were 5-8 years ago; participants expressed a real desire to clarify these. But the conference also pointed towards the need to follow the bishops’ example at Lambeth and engage with Scripture and with the Millennium Development Goal agenda.

During the conference we were asked, by the Anglican Church in D R Congo, to pray for their dire situation. We readily took this into our prayers but also expressed our support through an offering at the final Eucharist. This reminder of the role of the Church as a beacon of hope in the midst of far from hopeful situations put other internal Anglican Communion matters into a sharp perspective.

Stephen Lyon

November 2008

Day for Darfur  Sunday 13th April 2008

World Mission Conference 2006

30th October - 2nd November 2006 at Hayes Conference Centre, Swanwick.

The theme of the conference was "Hospitality - a way into understanding mission".
 
      "Welcome is one of the signs that a community is alive.  To invite others to live with us is   a sign that we aren't afraid, that we have a treasure of truth and peace to share".

With this quote from Jean Vanier, Bishop James Tengatenga of Southern Malawi opened and closed this year's World Mission Conference. 

During the four day conference, organised by the Partnership for World Mission (PWM), almost 200 participants, including delegates from Botswana, Canada, Estonia, Kenya, India, Ireland, Malawi, Malaysia, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Uganda, the US, South Africa, Sweden, Tanzania and Zambia, visited the Hayes Conference Centre in Swanwick, Derbyshire. Attendance had also increased on previous years, with a larger number of representatives from outside the Church of England attending, as well as people involved in the diocesan development advisers network.  A broad and dynamic discusssion took place on the universal nature of hospitality and the different appraoches to it in the Anglican Communion. 

The conference was divided into three main sections: hospitality that listens; hospitality that reconciles; hospitality that transforms, with headline presentations from Bishop James and from Kenneth Kearon, Secretary General of the Anglican Communion.

Focus was also put on the biblical representation of hospitality in mission and how this can be practically applied at home and abroad, with Clare Amos, the Director of Theological Studies at the Anglican Communion Office setting the scene, and Rebecca Nyegenye, chaplain at the Ugandan Christian University at Mukono, and Cathy Ross, CMS Mission Interchange Advisor developing the themes reflecting on the Emmaus Road, Martha and Mary and the Prodigal Sons.

The worship and times for reflection and interaction all served to explore the issues in detail and put them into practice. As Bishop James concluded:

   "When we have reached a point of mutuality and offer hospitality to each other we grow into knowledge of the other.  My needs, hopes and aspirations become your needs, hopes and aspirations.  We are able to see each other's shortcomings and be gracious about them.  We cease to be afraid to ask for help because of fear of being misunderstood.........  Our acts of hospitality will not be ends in themselves, but will be the means by which we proclaim the love of Christ to the world.
 

Full Report on the 2006 World Mission Conference click here

If you would like to read the texts of the Keynote addresses, please click on the following links:

Hospitality that listens - Bishop James Tengatenga        listens

Hospitality that reconciles - Kenneth Kearon                reconciles

Hospitality that transforms - Bishop James Tengatenga transforms

The contents of the bible reflections can be read by following these links:

Mary and Martha - Rebecca Nyegenye      Bible ref.1

The Prodigal Sons - Cathy Ross                  Bible ref.2

The Emmaus Road - Rebecca and Cathy    Bible ref.3

Report on the 2005 World Mission Conference click here

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