Community Faiths’ Forum working away
Community Faiths’ Forum
The Community Faiths’ Forum in Northern Ireland met for the first time in May 2010 and is now meeting quarterly. This brings together twenty-five experienced individuals from Christian and other faiths to work together on poverty, community development, and related issues.
The Community Faiths’ Forum is designed to be a forum for discussion of social and community issues. It includes five members from the Baha’i, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim and Sikh religions alongside 20 members drawn from various Christian traditions. Social issues such as poverty, housing, Shared Future and volunteering, and community engagement will always be the primary items on the agenda for discussion and this will have relevance for the entire community and for all faith groups who seek to help disadvantaged, excluded or marginalised people in local communities.
The work of the Forum is still developing but includes a research element, the sharing of best practice, learning from each other’s work and projects, and discernment of the best role faith communities can play in society, particularly in the current era of recession. It is a pilot forum in that it will work in this phase until spring 2012 when a decision will be made whether to continue and extend the Forum’s work and remit.
The Forum is funded through the Voluntary and Community Unit (VCU) of the Department for Social Development (DSD). The Forum’s work is administered by the Churches’ Community Work Alliance NI, and overseen by Eddie McDowell, CCWA Director, on behalf of a steering group consisting of members of CCWA’s management committee. Rob Fairmichael took up the post of (part-time) Co-ordinator of the Community Faiths’ Forum in May 2010.
- Community Faiths’ Forum, CCWA, 218 York Street, Belfast BT15 1GY,
phone 028 9074 0077, mobile: 077 89224910, Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
and website http://www.ccwa-ni.org.uk/cff (or click on the link on the CCWA home page)