A very comprehensive day about what The Feast does, not just explaining it, but by being practical and sharing stories very well.

I think often your head tells you interfaith work is great, is needed and is exactly what God would ask us to do.  But sometimes the want to tell people about Jesus makes it seem difficult.  It’s really encouraging to see how this works together.

Because we work with small groups of young people, our training works best with small groups.  Everyone can talk and actually experience the process we use with teenagers.

Overwhelmingly the feedback was that they wanted more time to talk and learn. So it now looks like we will aim to run more of these days, with the hope that more youth workers will be confident and prepared to work creatively with their own young people and help them engage well in our diverse world.

Please do get in touch if you are interested to know more about our work and look out for more of these training days later this year.

Eve boldly stood and confidently shared about her experience with The Feast at our City Breakfast (read about here), with another young man Ali (read what he shared here), and totally impressed the crowd:

“Before The Feast, I was a background person. I had a small group of friends, never spoke out in lessons and generally wasn’t noticeable. I was also wary of talking about religion anywhere other than my church. But The Feast taught me how to appropriately ask questions and talk about faith. Being involved also boosted my confidence. I began to stick out more, ask questions and make friends easier. The Feast has greatly improved my life, and I’m really glad that I have had the  opportunity to be involved.

Lots of other teenagers are getting involved with The Feast, and telling others about what they’ve learned. This is impacting and changing the opinions of the people around us. For example, when I went back to America on the summer holidays, all my friends were asking me questions about living in a largely Muslim area: was it scary, and what were they like?  Thanks to The Feast I had got to know some Muslims personally, and I could tell them that they were just like we were, normal people. They had had no idea what Muslims were like, and were consequently afraid. But when they learned about them, they thought that Muslims were quite nice. With this ripple effect, The Feast is spreading knowledge and understanding through Birmingham, making it a better place.

I think that more people should  get involved and support the Feast because they are a really great charity! The Feast is changing people’s lives and how they regard others. They help create friendships between teens, and are helping a new generation get along, even when they don’t see eye to eye.  If we continue to do this, there won’t be as much conflict between religions in future, and we can start working toward mutual understanding all around the world.“

Eve, Ninestiles, Year 9

“Personally, The Feast has made me become confident about talking about my religion and beliefs. Once, my sister and I had gone out to town and on the way back we were talking about praying and going to the mosque. A bystander walked passed and shouted out a racist comment which was the cause of me not being comfortable about talking about my religion in front of Non-Muslims. Now, after meeting with non-Muslims and going to many Feast events, I feel that I can share my religion without being judged for being a Muslim.

I believe that the Feast helps to build a better Birmingham because the Feast inspires young people to make a difference. For example, there was a litter pick that was organised by the Feast and while we were picking up litter a man in a car stopped in the middle of the road to give us a round of applause. Another man noticed us from his window and came out of his house and started helping us. Even though this was a small event, we had made a great impact among the residents and the community. This was a real eye-opener to young people around our area to show they can make Birmingham a better city.

I have a family friend who is Sikh, I have known her for years and even though on many occasions she asked me about Islam I had never bothered to ask her about her religion. The things that I did at The Feasts events challenged me to ask her about Sikhism because I felt it wasn’t fair that it was one-sided where she was asking me and I wasn’t interested to know about her religion and beliefs. But, now that we have these conversations, she feels more valued within the family.

I think that more people should get involved and support us because The Feast challenges you to do things that you never thought to do. For me, it has been a real fun time doing events while learning more about Christians. I strongly believe that more people should donate to us because their money has a great part in making a difference in the community as well as our lives.”

Ali, Golden Hillock School, Year 9.

We really look forward to Chris commencing on Tuesday 28 May.  And look out for more about him personally and some of the ways he will be endeavouring to work with young people from West Yorkshire, from different faiths and cultures, to help them meet and explore faith, create friendships and change lives!

The theme was HOPE, looking at the three steps in The Feasts work, including ‘creating friendship’, ‘growing in your faith’ and ‘changed lives’.  The first activity on Friday night was rock climbing and meant that the young people had to help each other, even though they had never met before and came from different faiths.  This enabled the group to jell and get to know each other without the need of the adult leaders, so much so that when they were divided into their dormitories it was easier for them to get on and make friends.  This drastically helped the dynamics of the group.

Discussion sessions were held after each activity around the theme of hope, with young people contributing positivity.  This lead to the lads making friendships and having discussions throughout the weekend at meal times and spare times.

What impressed the leaders the most was how the young people paired themselves up with someone of  a different faith, with new friendships based around abilities and common grounds rather than age, religion or which area they lived or school they attended, with no input from the leaders.

This made the discussions very easy as common ground had been found between the young people and they felt easier asking question about each other’s faith.  For example in most residentials we have run the young people are asked to write out questions they would like to ask their peers of the other faith.  However on this occasion they went ahead themselves and asked directly, which made it easier as there could be follow up questions which made the discussions go deeper.

It was so pleasing to hear their feedback at the end of the weekend:

‘I would change how I act and joke about other beliefs.’

‘I would like to express my thoughts about my religion, so it could benefit others and help them build a better understanding of my religion and I would like to explore other’s faith.’

Regarding friendship:  ‘I can now go to their house to play with them and chill.’

It certainly does give us hope when events like this lead to young people personally overcoming the prejudices they held of “the others”.  Well done lads!

“Everyone is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it’s stupid.”

I must admit, the thought of a fish trying to climb a tree did make me giggle a little, but then I started to really reflect on this – a lot! It challenged me to realise just how easy it is to judge others as being somewhat inferior to ourselves or as being “weird” or “wrong” simply because they don’t match up to our ideals or live life as we do.

Then that got me thinking about the word “Acceptance”…. What does it really look like in practice?

In today’s society we are surrounded by boxes. We form assumptions of others based on their colour, nationality, religion, class, where they live, what they do, their accent, education or lack of it … even down to the number of friends they have on Facebook or the number of followers on Twitter! With so many ‘defining’ factors…. is it possible to truly ‘accept’ one another?

It’s as though ‘society’ packs us into neat little boxes – some good, some bad, some cherished some loathed – and sends us on our way along the conveyor belt of life where we’re left totally at the disposal of ‘the other’. We are theirs to accept or theirs to reject, with their assumptions shaping their behaviour towards us.

For society to change, we must first recognise that each of us make up ‘society’ . It can only change if each of us recognise our own contributions to this problem and change ourselves!  It’s easy to be accepting of those who are just like us, but what about those who do life totally differently to us, those we don’t fully understand? Can we honestly say we value them equally?

I believe the only way to really start to tackle the issue of prejudice, stereotyping and discrimination is to make the ‘unknown’, known. Not a theoretical head knowledge which is learnt merely through lectures, studies or training, but through each of us individually committing to set aside time and space to allow a real connecting, engaging and appreciating of ‘the other’; recognizing and accepting that their hopes, dreams, fears, strengths, weaknesses, passions, ambitions, culture, views, traditions, beliefs etc. are equally as varied, complex, significant and normal to them as ours is to us. It’s not for us to enforce our way of life and our ‘standards’ onto others, just as it’s not for others to enforce theirs onto us.

So, are there any ‘fish’ you can be more accepting of today?

The Bishop of Birmingham, the Right Reverend David Urquhart spoke about the need for communication and friendships at grassroots levels for communities to thrive.  He endorsed The Feast as project Birmingham should be proud of, and for more people to support and promote it.

Two out standing young people – Ali and Eve – gave inspiring stories of their time with The Feast, and how they felt it was making Birmingham a better place.  We look forward to sharing their talks in full soon.

Finally CEO Tim Fawssett shared that he believed that young people could be a threat for good, pushing back the prejudice and ignorance that so often divides and threatens diverse communities like Birmingham.

Thank you to all those who came, for your encouragement and already for the ideas and energy for ongoing development of The Feast.  Much appreciated!

This coming summer the UK will be the host of (ICC) Champions trophy, with games being played between the eight major cricket nations; Australia, England,  India, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri Lanka, and The West Indies. After the World cup, the Champion’s Trophy is the second most important cricket contest.  In spite of the difficulty of understanding the rules and laws of cricket, these major events bring together passionate people who want their supported countries to do well and to win.

The Feast in conjunction with partners and friends  (Ctec, Attock CC) are happy to announce that the ICC Champions Trophy will be at Attock cricket Club (www.Attockcc.co.uk) on Tuesday 30^th April from 6pm for people to come and have their picture taken. If anyone wants any further information please feel free to contact me (Nahim) on 07976256360 or Attock Cricket club on 0121 7770333. Attock Community Sports and Cricket Club is on 352 Wake Green Road B13 9UU. It would be great to see you there! Watch out for how The Feast will use cricket to help young people explore faith and create friendships later this year. 

This week we learnt our work has been featured in the Spring edition of Moseley School’s glossy MO Magazine (see the feature photo above, from our Harvest food collection for the Sparkhill Foodbank).  We are proud to see young people, from diverse corners of the community, learning to be leaders in friendship building and generosity and peace.  They give us hope for tomorrow, that prejudice and fear-inducing-sterotypes do not need to be our future.

Here are just of the exciting developments we have in store!

• City Breakfast – we are sharing the “best kept secret in Birmingham” to our friends who work in the city centre on Thursday 2 May.  If you are interested please check out the details HERE and do come along!
• Hall Green Lad’s Faith Adventure Weekend
• Exchange between Sparkhill and Tamworth
• Youth Leaders Training Days – it is our hope that many more youth leaders around around UK, and beyond, can benefit from our experience and utilise to benefit their own projects.  Held on 10 & 11 May, with all the details HERE - see you there!
• Youthwork Summit 2013 - Tim is sharing about The Feast at this big national conference for Christian youth workers.
• Drama in Aston
• Baking in Kenilworth
• Lozells Food & Faith Festival – come and visit our stall.
• Jewellery Making in Sparkhill
• Dad’s & Lad’s Father’s Day Special
• Golden Hillock School Mela – we are organising for the school and wider Sparkhill community.

This is just a sample, but we hope gives you a taste of what we have in store.

Please do follow the progress of our inspiring young people and team.  In a world where the news is so often about conflict between people of different races, ethnicities and religions – we believe we are witnessing an emerging generation who can take a stand for a different way to live.