New Appointment
We are delighted that Becky Brain (South- West staffworker) will be joining the team this summer (see page 2 for more details)
Student Staff News
Mark Pickering has very quickly settled into his new role as Student Secretary (see interview in the April CMF News) and has taken over as managing editor of Nucleus, supervising the students' co-ordinating committee, and communications with reps. Now that the July Nucleus is at the printers Mark is beginning to organise the Confident Christianity Training Tour for next autumn/spring (see below) Give thanks for the work of three of our student staffworkers who move back into full time medicine this summer after making a fantastic contribution to the life of the fellowship.
Malcolm Savage completes one year full time as North England staffworker at the end of July and after helping to lead summer teams to Armenia and Poland will return to GP training. He will stay involved with supporting students in Sheffield.
James May completes six months part-time with CMF in West London, and is currently carrying out a world view survey of London medical students as part of research for his GP training.
Richard Collins completes six months full time in East London, and recently spoke at the Romanian Christian medical students' conference. He also returns to general practice.
Tim Lewis has completed his first year as staffworker in Ireland and after leading a summer trip to Russia (see below) he will continue for another year.
Ruth Selwood completes two years as West UK staffworker and, with Becky Brain's appointment (see page 2) will move to cover Nottingham and Leicester, in addition to carrying on with Warwick and Birmingham.
All our student staff produce regular prayer letters so if you would like to support any one of them in prayer please let us know. We are still looking for staffworkers for August for North England, London and Scotland, so if you think God may be nudging you please contact Peter Saunders for more details (see advert p2)
Confident Christianity - Autumn/ Spring 2002-3
Confident Christianity is a great day conference that gives some really practical advice and teaching on the why and how of evangelism, as well as dealing with the difficult questions that often get raised in response to the gospel. The aim is to help you step out in confidence and share your faith persuasively with your friends, letting the Holy Spirit loose on them! The last Confident Christianity Evangelism Training Tour finished in Spring 2000, but we are planning another for the autumn/spring of 2002/2003 with a dozen day conferences all over the UK and Ireland. This year we will involve CMF members along with students from local CUs, Lawyers' Christian Fellowship, Christian Dental Fellowship, UCCF Nurses and Therapy 5pm Saturday session, usually at a central church venue. Watch this space for dates and venues. A full set of training materials, along with other resources on evangelism, is available on the CMF CD-ROM and on the website at www.cmf.org.uk/evang/evang.htm
National Conference 2003
The 2003 CMF National Students' Conference will be held at Swanwick on the weekend of 7-9 February 2003. Don Carson, Professor of New Testament Theology from Trinity College Illinois, is the main Bible Reader and the theme is 'Turning Points'. The new date (three weeks later than usual) should allow more students from schools that have a semester system to come. Please pray for the students' coordinating committee (SCC) as they make plans for the conference. About 320 attended last January's conference including 40 students from 20 countries abroad.
New Nucleus Editor
Neil Fisher, Nucleus Editor since October 2001, is handing over to Helen Barratt of Imperial College Medical School from l October this year. Helen brings lots of experience to the job, with two years already on the Nucleus team along with time as a Clegg Scholar with the BMJ. Neil, who graduates next year, has made a fantastic contribution during his time as editor.
New Medical Schools
Exeter/Plymouth and Norwich are opening for students this September - and a new group is also being established in Teesside. Pray for our new medical school secretaries Drs Jo Durban (Norwich) and Helen Keenan (Exeter/Plymouth) as they make contact with Christian students and begin to establish local groups. Pray also that student CMF reps will be found quickly.
BMA Conference
CMF Student members managed to get ten motions passed at the BMA Annual Students' Conference in April, and this year several of these have made it through to the BMA Annual Meeting. CMF has been invited back officially onto the BMA Medical Students' Committee (MSC) for the fourth year running. Much thanks go to Michael Wheble, who has represented CMF on the MSC for the last year, and to Laurence Crutchlow, who represented us at the students' conference.
Student Leaders' Weekend
This year will be held at the Gaines Youth Centre, Worcestershire on 27-29 September. Please get the date in your diaries now make sure that 2-3 from your medical school are able to come. Publicity will be out soon.
Electives Advice
The following two resources (just updated!) are still available FREE to members on request: Planning your Medical Elective Overseas - all you need to know Medical Elective Opportunities - with over 30 mission societies Planning your Elective is also available on the Internet at www.cmf.org.uk/mission/prepelec.htm why and how of your elective, or would like to be put in touch with other students who may have been to the same hospital (or country), contact Peter Armon (CMF Overseas Support Secretary) at the CMF Office. Email peter.armon@cmf.org.uk.
Elective Grants
Healthserve is celebrating its 125th anniversary and would like to give 125 elective grants to students studying in English or Welsh universities over the next two years! Contact HealthServe, First Floor, 106-110 Watney Street, London E1 2QE. Tel 020 7790 1336. Email info@healthserve.org. The Edinburgh Medical Missionary Society offers a similar service to students studying at Scottish or Northern Irish universities for their overseas electives. For more details contact EMMS, 7 Washington Lane, Edinburgh EH11 2HA. Tel 0131 313 3828. Email info@emms.org.
CMF Summer Teams
When Dasha Boguslavskaya, then still a medical student, helped to organise the first ever conference for Christian medical students in her home town of Samara, South Russia, just two years ago, she was amazed when over 60 students from six different cities attended. Former CMF Staffworkers Alex Bunn and Mike Reynolds led the UK team, which helped lead the conference. They have been back several times since, and now through the work that was started through Dasha and others like her, there are Christian medical student groups in over ten cities in the former USSR. This July/August we are sending out eight teams of students and juniors to lead week-long evangelistic camps for medical students in Russia, Central Asia, Armenia, Eastern Europe and the Balkans.
Four of the teams are going to Russia. Two are from London. Bernard Palmer is leading a team to speak at this year's camp in Samara, whilst Mike Reynolds leads a similar camp further south in Rostov. Tim Lewis, CMF Ireland staffworker, is leading a team from Dublin to St Petersburg and Mark Stirling, Edinburgh Medical School Secretary, is leading a doctor/student team from Edinburgh to Chilyabinsk in the Ural mountains. Chris Richards, Newcastle paediatrician, takes a group from Newcastle to Yerevan in Armenia, for the first ever Christian medics' conference there, and Malcolm Savage will lead a Sheffield team to help with an IFES camp in Poland. Another group from West UK are helping to lead an evangelistic camp at a location in Central Asia where there are already several Christian medical student groups established (details confidential). Meanwhile, an Oxford team, under Chris Downing's leadership (South UK staffworker) returns to Albania (see last Janury's Triple Helix) for a second year.
All these ventures are helping to establish and build valuable regional links and partnerships which will bear great fruit for God's Kingdom in years to come. Please pray for all the conferences and camps; for the teams going and for those students coming, that they will really meet freshly with the Lord and that he will do more great things.
