Booking now: National Justice and Peace Network Annual Conference

How do we build a church and a society with the marginalised, the excluded and the most vulnerable at its heart?

What does 'home' mean for those who are homeless or struggling to keep a roof over their heads, for those who have fled their homes, or for those who are rejected or don't 'fit in'?

And for the comfortable and secure, is it a space to defend or to open in welcome? Can we recognise that it is only in relationship with each other and with the Earth that we can all be truly 'at home'?

'In the Shelter of Each Other the People Live' is the theme of this year's National Justice and Peace Network Conference. It will be held 22-22 July at Swanwick in Derbyshire, and is the largest annual gathering of diocesan and religious groups and agencies which focus on justice, peace and ecology issues. Around 300-400 people attend and a Just Fair showcases resources from more than 20 groups.

SPEAKERS

Rev Al Barrett

Rector of Hodge Hill Church, a CofE-URC ecumenical partnership in east Birmingham. He lives on a diverse outer estate on the edge of the city, and has been involved in a journey of community-building there, with friends and neighbours, for the last 7 years. He asks: How are we to do our Christian discipleship so that the voices we pay attention to are not just those in positions of opinion-forming power, or those of tragic victims, but also and most particularly those who, with their talents and passions, their struggles and their hopes, live daily on the geographical, economic, cultural and social edges of precarity? He will suggest some ways forward for our Christian discipleship, more radically transformed by our encounters with our neighbours.

David McLoughlin

Teacher at Newman University. He is a theological resource person for Caritas Europe, CAFOD, Pax Christi, the J&P network and various groups of Religious. He is a founder member of the Movement of Christian Workers and an active member of their Birmingham revue of life group for 30 years. He explores the relationship between theology and everyday life and offers radical readings of the Bible for Christian activists.

Sarah Teather

Director of Jesuit Refugee Service UK since January 2016. She served for 12 years as MP in north west London. She stood down in 2015 and worked with JRS International, visiting refugee projects around the world, before taking up her present post.

John Grogan MP

Elected in 2017 as Labour MP for Keighley and Ilkley, having previously been MP for Selby before boundary changes abolished the seat. He is committed to issues of social justice and peace, voting against Trident renewal.

The Conference will be chaired by Housing Justice and the main celebrant at the conference Mass will be Fr Colm Kelly, Apostleship of the Sea port chaplain for Immingham.

Information and booking forms at:

www.justice-and-peace.orguk/conference/