Lent Lessons from Liverpool

A group from the Diocese of Liverpool has been gathering online each week to work through our new Lent resource, Children in the Shadows Revisited. We caught up with Simone Dawes, the Social Justice Project Development Officer at the Diocese to find out more.  

Simone has been leading the Lent course with Joe Cottrell from Together Liverpool, a charity that supports faith and community groups across the Diocese of Liverpool to take their next step in tackling poverty and injustice in their communities. 

Simone and Joe saw the Lent course as a good opportunity to increase awareness of modern slavery, encourage reflection, prayer and discussion and build some momentum in terms of anti-slavery activity in the Diocese.  

Simone explains: “Last October, for Anti-Slavery Day, we organised a screening of A21’s Global Freedom Summit. This generated lots of interest so we started an email list of people in the Diocese who are keen to learn more about modern slavery." 

"We advertised the Lent course centrally but also to these particular people and others who have shown concern for social justice issues in the past. We had 12 sign ups and each week between 6 & 9 people have gathered online.  

“As the subject material can be distressing and meeting online, at the end of a day, can be tiring, we have found 45 minutes is the perfect length for our sessions. This has meant choosing which parts of the resource to focus on, recognising that we can’t use all of it. 

“Working through the material together and watching the films through Zoom has been straightforward. The films have generated lots of discussion and challenged people to think about their own experience growing up as well as the children in their lives and churches. The participants have expressed shock at some of the statistics around child exploitation and have been moved by the stories on the films.  

"We’ve appreciated the reflections written by Bishop Alastair Redfern, particularly the reflection in week 3 where Jesus encourages the little children to come to him. This prompted valuable discussion about how we include children and show we value them in society and our churches. 

 “Children in the Shadows Revisited has come at a timely moment for us in the Diocese. It is the beginning of something rather than a one-time only experience. We are hoping that the people on the course will want to continue learning more about modern slavery and the church’s response and that some of them will eventually become Modern Slavery Ambassadors in the Diocese. I would encourage any Diocese that is wanting to strengthen awareness of modern slavery to consider using Children in the Shadows Revisited or other Clewer group material to kickstart awareness and action.”