Initiatives

PREDOMINANT IN BONHOEFFER’S THEOLOGICAL STATEMENTS ARE HIS BOOKS ON THE CALL TO DISCIPLESHIP AND ON THE COMMUNITY OF THE CHURCH. IN THEM HE SETS THE STANDARDS FOR WHAT THESE REQUIRE TO BE AND TO DO.

The call to follow Jesus, Bonhoeffer insists, is not an easy deal. Discipleship can never be a matter of cheap grace. It requires sacrifice and even suffering in order to bring justice and equity to poor and downtrodden. The Church, Bonhoeffer argues, is there to express Christ’s Will for the world – to speak up for what is right and to challenge that which is not.

In this context, Project Bonhoeffer’s contribution the SCM’s Faith in Action internships over the past three years has involved supporting individuals by working in various programmes and services, public and private, and have sought to explore and even challenge those practices at risk of failing to provide essential justice and care – particularly when their clients have been amongst the most vulnerable in society.

Ruth-Wilde
Ruth Wilde

Ruth was brought up Methodist but is now an Anglican with Anabaptist sympathies. She speaks French fluently and worked for a number of years in Nantes, France and then Hull and Leeds in the world of business using her French language skills. Since then she has worked as a Pastoral Assistant for the churches of St Mark and St Peter in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire and for Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) on their UK outreach project. It was her two week-long delegation with CPT working alongside First Nations communities in Canada in 2011 that first moved Ruth to Christian activism and she has been exploring Christian discipleship and ways of making a difference in the world ever since.

Ruth has been involved with many projects putting faith into action in her own life, from Street Angels in Leeds to community organising with Citizens UK in Mansfield, and she is also studying theology part-time at the Queen’s Foundation for Theological Study in Birmingham alongside work and volunteering.

In her spare time, Ruth is a trustee for Changing Attitude (an Anglican organisation which campaigns for LGBTI inclusion in the Anglican Church), does the odd French translation for SCM Press, and forms a bluegrass duo called Mary Anna with her wife Ellie.

Jacque-Hall
Jacque

Jacque became involved in SCM at its 2012 conference, during the first year of her Mathematics degree at Aberystwyth University. She graduated in 2014, and focussed on the issue of mental health during her internship with SCM.

Stephen-Atkinson
Stephen

Stephen is a recent graduate from the University of London, majoring in Classical Civilisation. During his Faith in Action internship, he concentrated on the issue of food waste.

As a lover of food, it perplexes him that so much of it ends up in land-fills. He believes God loves food too, and wants for us to respect our resources and see food reaching needy hands, rather than bin bags. Stephen has been putting his efforts into fighting food-waste in his university, and he hopes to see the fight grow across student communities in the UK.

The other issues tackled have been:-

  • Human Trafficking
  • Housing refugees
  • The treatment of Black Youth by the Justice System
  • Making best use of donations for Overseas Aid

Both the work of the interns and the ideas arising from our annual conference sessions have enabled Project Bonhoeffer’s Trustees to begin to consider the way in which the project might move forward. The first phase of internships is now at an end and it has been agreed that, with the resources available, there should now be a period for the SCM to evaluate, develop and disseminate the ideas, issues and initiatives that Faith in Action has brought forward to strengthen and promote the SCM in Britain. Those initiatives include building up sturdier and stronger local SCM branches in university centres across the UK through greater staff support and a range of events – both on-campus, regional, national and even international – that can enable members to share and discuss those issues that important to them in their lives [not just today but also tomorrow], as only in the SCM they are able to do.

For its part, Project Bonhoeffer will continue to bring together the support network of senior – and not-so-senior – friends who not only attend our conferences  but who share a concern to rebuild and regenerate the SCM for future generations of students as it did for them, enriching their lives and often investing them with both vision and vocation

Project Bonhoeffer is proud to have funded the Student Christian Movement Faith in Action Project since 2012 through three phases.

PHASE 1

In each of three years two recent graduates divided their time between working as interns in secular organisations working for peace and justice and based on those experiences, contributing to SCM’s activities at branch and national level.

Joanna Musker

2012/3

Worked in ASSIST Sheffield, An Asylum Seekers Support Group

Hattie Hodgson

2012/3

Worked in the West Midlands Trafficking Task Force

Victoria Mason

2013/4

Worked in Concern Universal, An International Development Group

Stephen Atkinson

2013/4

Worked in Zheroes, Combating Food Waste

Yannick Buditu

2014/5

Worked in the South London Youth Offending Team

Jacque Hall

2014/5

Worked in Northampton MIND

PHASE 2

A review of Phase One pointed to the loss of momentum each year as new interns took up the work and proposed to appoint a full time worker for three years who would focus directly on the aims of the project to embed it securely within the whole life of the SCM.

Ruth Wilde

2015/8

Worked Full Time

PHASE 3

A review of Phase Two agreed that Faith in Action could be better delivered by including it in the responsibilities of all of the increasing number of SCM Regional Staff. One of their number would be the lead worker for Faith in Action.

Emma Temple

2018/06

Worked Full Time

© Project Bonhoeffer 2022

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