L e i p z i g – The Baptist World Alliance’s Youth World Conference, which took place from 30 July to 3 August in Leipzig/Germany, called for a more radical faith in Jesus Christ in the struggle against injustice and poverty. The American Shane Claiborne (Philadelphia), co-founder of “The Simple Way” community, claimed: “Believing in God means bringing God’s kingdom down to earth.” Of all the speakers involved, he made the greatest impression on the 6.300 participants from 89 countries. The 33-year-old Claiborne complained that the church frequently restricts itself to “funny games” instead of truly striving for the elimination of the world’s greatest problems. Following a stint with Mother Theresa (1910-1997) in Calcutta and a sojourn with Christians in Iraq as a protest to the war, Claiborne has worked primarily with Philadelphia’s homeless. “There are things in the world worth struggling for – but there is nothing worth killing others for.” In Philadelphia he was taken to court for helping and feeding the homeless and spending nights with them in parks. Yet the judge released him, calling him a “freedom fighter”.

Sixteen-year-old student Zach Hunter (Atlanta/USA) demonstrated that one does not need to be an adult to join in the struggle for greater justice. As a 12-year-old he had already worked for the elimination of modern forms of slavery which have placed more than 27 million world-wide in chains. He has campaigned against the use of child labour in the stone quarries of Asia as well as for girls ensnared by forced prostitution. He has already written two books and started a campaign which collected 170.000 signatures. Any Christian can start similar projects, he assured: “There would be less suffering in the world if Christians were more involved in overcoming its problems.”

In a Bible study on the tax collector Zacchaeus, Missions Consultant Nick Lear (Didcot), Chairman of Baptist youth work in Europe, spoke out against a lifestyle marked by greed. The relative luxurious lifestyle of the world’s well-to-do countries occurs at the expense of others: “We demand the lowest prices and never think about whether those producing the wares are receiving a fair wage.” Rich countries are consuming more than their share: five percent of the world’s population living in the wealthiest countries consume 45% of all meat and fish while the poorest countries have neither. The richest countries consume 58% of the world’s energy, the poorest, only 4%. The richest have 87% of all cars – the poorest, less than 1%.

In a conversation with journalists, the Englishman David Coffey (Didcot), President of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA), called for solving the world’s most pressing problems through partnerships between Christians and non-Christians. Politicians and governments are incapable of meeting the present-day challenges of poverty, pollution and justice alone. “Change and reform never began as great movements. We need thousands of small people’s movements.” Christians do not always have solutions for current challenges, but they can at least offer their passion. Coffey took issue with the assessment that Christianity’s glory days are over in Europe and that vibrant Christian life is now only to be found in other regions of the world – Africa and Asia in particular. Leipzig’s World Youth Conference proves that as followers of Jesus Christ, European young people also desire “to change the world”. Approximately two-thirds of the conference’s long-term participants were Europeans.

On Saturday, a colourful cultural programme entitled “Leipzig Live” - and partially evangelistic in nature - took place in the city centre. It had been prepared primarily by the Baptist congregations of Leipzig. Concerts as well as pantomime and dance performances took place on three stages. A donation campaign raised 5.200 euros to support a water project in Ethiopia organised by “World Vision”, a Christian aid ministry. Many references were made to the peaceful revolution of 1989. Christian Führer, a former pastor of the Nikolai-Church and the initiator of Leipzig’s Monday-evening demonstration movement, conceded that demonstrators had lived very much in fear of government violence. Yet the faith of Christians proved to be stronger than fear.

The Youth Conference opened with a multi-media-show on the history of Germany consisting of video clips, pantomime, song and a string quartet. A 35-minute show done in English covered a span of 500years of Germany history. It began with the Reformer Martin Luther (1483-1546) and the composer Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), moved on to the founder of the Baptist movement in Germany and on the European continent, Johann Gerhard Oncken (1800-1880), and ended with the Football World Cup of 2006. The dark sides of history including World War II and the Holocaust were not ignored. The presentation climaxed with the call to bring the message of God’s love to all people. All participants were presented with a pearl in a cloth sack. This was to remind them of their preciousness in the eyes of God.

One of the 50 seminars was held by Estonian Helle Liht (European Baptist Federation staff member, Prague) entitled “The Cry of Creation – What is it For?” In her seminar, Liht called for a creation-supporting lifestyle. It was the first time that an ecology seminar was part of a BWA conference. Liht encouraged others to get started in their own lives and communities, for example by planting trees or cleaning an area of refuse. People should also work on knowing where the products they consume come from, and how the producers have been treated. She called on Christians not to consume any food without thinking about its origins because a considerable about of food is produced with the help of child labour. In questionable instances people should choose fairly-traded goods rather than the lowest-priced ones.

The European Baptist Federation’s General-Secretary, Tony Peck (Prague), gave a positive assessment of the whole event. “This is a good thing.” Even small unions with very few members - Macedonia has only two congregations – sent 10 participants to Leipzig. Teenagers could discover in Leipzig “that Baptists are indeed a world-wide movement: that’s a terrific experience.”