The European National Youth Committees Meeting in Warsaw, was attended by over 120 youth throughout the continent of Europe representing 33 different countries (three came from Northern Ireland). After a 3 hour flight from London to Warsaw (and a 3 hour delay) we met Rahim Mazlum (an EBYC member) and various other youth from Sweden and France at the airport. Once we made it to the hotel, we met the rest of the 100 or so youth over dinner.
The main programme started at around 9:30am the next morning with a devotional followed by an introduction from the EBYC on the main focus of the meeting. Two letters addressed to the participants at the gathering were read out, the first of these coming directly from The Universal House of Justice specifically for this event and the latter from the EBYC.
Two main aims for this meeting were outlined, the first, was 'to consult about the future work that might be undertaken by National Youth Committees, in securing victories for the Faith throughout the continent', the second, was to 'explain the method and the meaning of the decentralisation of the EBYC's functions, which will in turn lead to its eventual dissolution in the coming months. This was the first that many of us had heard of the eventual dissolution of the EBYC! Over the next 3 days, there was a mixture of talks from the EBYC as well as from Councillors from Ukraine and Germany about the decentralisation of powers to various institutions. The main discussion over the weekend though centred on this particular passage from a letter sent to the 8th ASIAN Youth Conference in Thailand in December 2001 which set down the two pressing requirements for the Five Year Plan:
“The first is the steady flow of believers through the sequence of courses offered by training institutes for the purpose of developing the human resources. The second, which receives its impetus from the first, is the movement of geographic clusters from one stage of growth to the next.”
Various moving and inspiring presentations (including a one hour audio-visual) were shown throughout the conference and the arts played a pivotal role in the success of the event. The final night ended with entertainments followed by a very moving devotional. The following day, we left for home, inspired, enthused and with a greater understanding of the changing and always important role of the youth in Europe as well as being somewhat saddened to be leaving all the friends that we made behind. ‘I found it an inspiring, productive and moving experience which I will never forget.’ said one of our own representatives.
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