These tools are aimed at supporting people holding Justice Conversations. Please choose – or adapt – what suits you and your group.
Worship
These resources, which could be used by preachers or for local arrangements, take as their theme “God’s Justice: Liberation, Provision and Presence” based on John 6:1-21 and Micah 6:8. The service introduces the Justice Conversations, and could lead naturally into conversations within a congregation
Order of service (Pdf)
Prayers (Pdf)
All Age Worship Message (Pdf)
Extra resources for All Age Worship
Upside-down world map (Pptx)
Upside-down world map centred on the Pacific (Pptx)
Sermon (Pdf)
Ideas for hymns and other resources can be found at the Singing the Faith worship planning hub
Bible study
Walking with Micah: Bible Study – God’s Justice (Pdf)
A group study exploring some of what we learn about God’s justice in the Bible, focusing on the Book of Micah
Five-week Bible study course (Pdf)
A five-week Bible study looking at Micah and our calling today
Guided group conversation
A 90 minute conversation plan for a group, which can be held in person or adapted for an online platform such as Zoom
Guided Group Conversation (Pdf)
Exploring Justice: Which horizon? Film
'Which horizons?' images as a PowerPoint (Pptx)
Session plan for children and young people
Creative ideas to help children and young people’s voices be heard. This plan can also be adapted for an intergenerational group. You could deliberately invite people from all ages to participate in a conversation together
Session for Children and Young People (Pdf)
Craftivist session
Craftivism has been described as “a way at looking at life where voicing opinions through creativity makes your voice stronger, your compassion deeper and your quest for justice more infinite”. This session offers different ways of engaging with the question of what a just world looks like through creativity and craft
Craftivist Session (Pdf)
Other tools
Speaking from Experience – a short film in which people speak about their experiences of injustice and their hopes for a just world
Exploring Justice: Which horizon? – an animation encouraging people to look beyond immediate problems towards a vision of a just world
What do I feed back? Sheet for note-takers – to support note-taking during the session
Article for a church newsletter / website - invite your congregation to take part in justice conversations
Training webinar – How to use the Walking with Micah justice conversation resources
A recording of a pre-launch workshop is available here, so you can find out more about how you can use the resources available for the conversations.
Further sources of help
The Justice Conversation resources are intended to aid deep discussion and engagement in each context. They provide facilitators, who will know their participants and what will help them to engage well, with lots of tools from which to choose.
Facilitators are warmly encouraged to adapt these resources as they see fit, whilst ensuring that the conversations cover the following:
- Listening to people who are experiencing/have experienced injustice. The Speaking from Experience film is a way of incorporating this
- Grounding the conversation in the Bible and/or our experience of God. Where is God in this?
- Reflecting on what a more just, equal and life-giving world looks like, and the next steps that we need to take as a Church – and sending in the group’s feedback to the Walking with Micah project via the survey
You may want to choose different sections from across the Walking with Micah resources to facilitate each stage of the conversation. Alternatively, you might choose to use a completely different technique that will better suit your group.
For instance, if you think there may be a danger of some participants dominating the discussion, you could introduce different techniques, such as a ‘speaking object’ (like a ball, talking stick etc.) or allow people to write feedback as well as verbalising it. Or, if you have a group with a wide range of learning styles, could you mix and match activities which enable you to communicate in different ways?
Helpful resources
- In section four of the Voice Activated resource (methodist.org.uk/voiceactivated), produced by the Children, Youth and Family Team, you will find an extensive list of creative facilitation techniques that can be used to encourage engagement in groups of any age.
- For online conversations using Zoom or other platforms, you can use different tools such as Mentimeter (mentimeter.com), Poll Everywhere (www.polleverywhere.com), Padlet (www.padlet.com) and Jamboard (jamboard.google.com or search in your Google apps).
- For help and advice on running an intergenerational conversation, please contact Lynne Norman in the Children, Youth and Family Team: normanl@methodistchurch.org.uk