Your stories: How you can help

‘Fundraising for CSW gave us, as a church, a focus outside of the pandemic’

When COVID-19 put a halt to Purley Baptist’s sponsored abseil plans, the church got creative in its fundraising for CSW. Michele Bailey, a CSW Ambassador, explains.

My church, Purley Baptist, nominated CSW as our charity of the year [for 2020]. I had lined up people to do the [Guildford Cathedral] abseil as the big launch. So, when COVID-19 brought a sudden halt to plans, Emily in our office came up with the ‘20 Challenge’, after reading that CSW works on over 20 countries.

The idea was to do a personal challenge with ‘20’ in it. So, someone set up a running club on Strava – £20 to join; while our assistant minister Tim cycled his personal best – 120 plus miles in a day! And our youth minister Mark and church member Kevin paddled 20km in their kayaks in one day.

Our services were online, but we interviewed Tim in his cycling gear and Mark with his kayak!

Our initial target was £3,000, but we have raised over £5,000! People at church sponsored those doing the personal challenges, along with their family and friends.

Fundraising for CSW gave us, as a church, a focus outside of the pandemic. It kept people missional minded when we could have looked inwardly. It gave us a sense of a family working together – it really blessed us as a church.

‘A journey of prayer’: Get involved with Robert’s sponsored bike pilgrimage

In 2022, Robert de Berry is leading an amazing team of cyclists on a bike pilgrimage to raise money for CSW and Release International. It’s not his first time doing this – he and a team helped raise over £60,000 through another bike pilgrimage in 2017! We spoke to him about his big plans.

Why are you raising money for people facing injustice for their faith?

It affected me personally hearing some of the stories at CSW events, meeting with persecuted Christians and reading about the denial of religious rights to people of other religions. For instance, the atheists who have suffered a great deal in Bangladesh, the Uyghurs of China and the Rohingya Muslims [of Myanmar/Burma].

What are the plans?

The pilgrimage will start on Saturday 14 May from North Foreland Point’s Lighthouse (east Kent’s most easterly point), and will wend its way on an inland route to Land’s End and Penzance by 1 June. After the bank holidays, we will resume from Penzance on 6 June by a coastal route back to east Kent, ending on Saturday 25 June.

Why are you calling this a pilgrimage?

It is a journey of prayer and we are hoping that about 40 churches will host us. Local Christians will be invited to join us in prayer for those who are suffering for their faith.

How can people get involved?

• Become a sponsored bike pilgrim – you could ride with us for the full five weeks or just a day!
• Help as a host or back-up driver – if you can host our cyclists, provide refreshments or carry cyclists’ luggage, it would be a great help.

Get involved

To express your interest in becoming a bike pilgrim, host or back-up driver, please visit csw.org.uk/bikepilgrim where you will also find a map of the route.