October prayer diary

The new academic year brings a number of new staff and interns to the Centre and the Jellicoe community – and we would be grateful for your support for them (and the communities in which they will work) in your prayers:

Tom Daggett continues to work with us as a Jellicoe intern at Stepney Salvation Army, and will combine this with a three day a week role as Centre Manager – working with the Director on our growing range of projects.

Emmanuel Forlemu is a new Jellicoe intern at St Peter’s Bethnal Green, building on some excellent work by our summer interns.  Pray for the growing CITIZENS team at St Peter’s, and the links it is making with tenants and residents associations and other faith groups in the area – as they seek to make local streets safer, and address the growing drugs problem in the area.

Caitlin Burbridge will be our first Global Action intern – linking community organising in London’s diaspora communities with movements to renew civil society in other parts of the world.

Liliana Worth moves to co-ordinate our growing Oxford Jellicoe Community, as she starts some further research work

Former Jellicoe intern Arabella Milbank and community organiser Ruhana Ali will be working with our Director, Angus Ritchie and Senior Fellow Vincent Rougeau on an exciting new research project funded by the University of Notre Dame – looking at how different faiths and worldviews work together in east London for the common good.

In addition, the Centre is sponsoring a vital piece of work by Alvin Carpio (community organiser in Haringey) looking at the state of civil society, and the causes of the riots, in Tottenham.  Pray for this, and for all the work going into understanding and addressing these causes – and healing the communities affected by the violence.  Pray for the Centre’s staff and partner churches across east London as we seek to do a wider piece of reflection and action in the months ahead.

Please also pray for

…the priestly ministry of our Director, Angus Ritchie – assisting at St Peter’s Bethnal Green, and now also as Chaplain for Social Justice at Keble College, Oxford

Karen Stromberg, a Hackney resident now beginning a two-year MA in Community Organising at Queen Mary University of London with our first ever Jellicoe Bursary

…the process of appointing a new CitySafe worker in Bethnal Green and a Jellicoe intern from one of our partner Pentecostal churches in Newham – both made possible by some successful fundraising (for which we give thanks!)

…the Near Neighbours programme which is gaining momentum, and will be selecting some new interns in the next few months

…Archbishop Rowan’s inter-faith adviser Toby Howarth as he gives the 2011 Presence and Engagement Lecture – and all whom the Presence and Engagement Network seeks to equip for ministry and mission in multi religious contexts