This year the Association of Interchurch Families are taking part in Thy Kingdom Come 2023, the global ecumenical prayer movement and call to prayer that encourages us to partner with God, in prayer and mission, to see more people encounter the love of Christ, and so we will be posting a reflection, blog, video or item every day of 'Thy Kingdom Come' from an Interchurch Families perspective, and we hope you will journey with us through these 10 days of prayers.

With that in mind what better way to start the ten days of 'Thy Kingdom Come' that this year has the theme of 'Praying and Living the Kingdom - Empowered by the Holy Spirit' than to open the booking to the Association of Interchurch Families Annual Weekend which is presented in a Hybrid form so that not only our Members can attend, but rather we can embrace those not able to attend in person, our international friends, and those with an interest in knowing more to attend to via Zoom...

And our theme this year totally reflects with the Thy Kingdom Come theme too as we highlight just how Interchurch Families are praying and living the Kingdom, empowered by the Holy Spirit and Love as 'Interchurch Families - Beacons of Receptive Ecumenism'!

The Theme for 2023 is:
Interchurch Families – Beacons of Receptive Ecumenism

October 14-15th, 2023.

Though the Members only in Person event is held at The Hayes Conference Centre, Swanwick, Derbyshire,

the weekend is open to all Online Via Zoom.

The Church of England defines Receptive Ecumenism as ‘... both a way of thinking and a process that enables unity to be built by receiving gifts from others. It challenges us to not think of what others might benefit from receiving from us, but instead invites us to recognise our needs and to put ourselves in the place of being a recipient.’ Put simply, our church traditions should not be asking themselves “What do they need to learn from us?” but rather, “What do we need to learn from them?”. The hope is that if all our church traditions were to ask themselves this question and act upon it, we might all draw closer together in Christ’s family, while also deepening our own identity.

To married couples this sounds very familiar, for it is in the nature of marriage that couples should aim to learn from each other to help them grow together. For interchurch couples, learning about each other’s denomination helps us to develop a local sacramental practice of domestic church that is part of that growing together. At our weekend we will explore how the experience and practice of interchurch families might offer our churches a lived example of Receptive Ecumenism in action.

We will be guided throughout the weekend by three inspiring speakers:

• Revd. Diane Ryan, an Anglican wife in an interchurch marriage, and author of an essay on Interchurch Families and Receptive Ecumenism published in the volume mentioned below.
• Dr Gregory Ryan, editor of “Receptive Ecumenism as Transformative Ecclesial Learning” and the Roman Catholic husband of Diane.
• Fr Dominic Robinson SJ is the parish priest of the Church of the Immaculate Conception, Farm Street in London, and involved in Churches Together in Westminster.

The sessions and worship will be broadcast simultaneously on Zoom to allow non-members, international friends, and members who cannot attend in person to participate on-line.

Booking for the “on-line only” event can be made via the Online Via Zoom link... Please note any non-members that book using the Members Only link who have not been members for the preceeding 12 months will have their booking cancelled.

Booking links can be found here: Upcoming Events (interchurchfamilies.org.uk)