ALPHA LIFE
WELCOME We are delighted to welcome you to the first issue of the Alpha Life Journal. The Alpha Life Journal features interviews and stories to reflect the dynamic work that many of you involved with Alpha have made possible in the UK and around the world. Over the years, we have seen so many people begin their journey of faith on Alpha. We hope you will find the stories within these pages encouraging and inspiring. Lots of love, Nicky and Pippa Gumbel
CONTENTS 2. 4. 8. 10. 14. 18. 21.
Editor Ruth Yimika Awogbade Graphic Design Why Not Associates Contributing Writers Isolde Walters James Nixon Jane McKeever Julia Evans Katherine Blake Phil James Rachel Chivers Yosola Olorunshola
FAITH MATTERS A NEW KIND OF CULTURE SAYING YES TO RISK A PLACE CALLED HOME BREAKING THE CYCLE ART & SOUL ALPHA 360 – GLOBAL UPDATE
Contributing Photographers Alex Douglas Beetle Rhind Lucy Aspray Nathaniel Aspray Cover Shot Hamish Stephenson Connect with us online at: Printing Windsor Contact Alpha International, Brompton Road, London SW7 1JA
Alpha.org alphalife@alpha.org Facebook.com/alpha Twitter.com/alphacourse Instagram.com/alphacourse
© Alpha International 2014 No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and Alpha International.
FAITH MATTERS Nicky and Pippa Gumbel, the leaders of Holy Trinity Brompton, speak openly about their personal faith, the growth of Alpha and who does the washing up.
What were your upbringings like? N My father was an agnostic German Jew and my mother was not a churchgoer. P I was born in Germany in a nominal Christian home. I didn’t really know what a Christian was – and I certainly didn’t have a relationship with Jesus.
Who is Jesus to you? P Jesus is my Saviour and my friend. He is the source of life. He is the wisdom of God. N He is my Saviour and my Lord, but there’s a verse in John’s Gospel that says, ‘I have called you friends,’ and I think that is amazing, to be friends with Jesus. That is what life’s about.
What were your lives like before you came to faith? P I had no real concept of a future, of a bigger framework, at all. I was just trying to get through life as best I could. It was very superficial. I was living for the now. N I was in my first year at Cambridge University and we were having a lot of fun – a lot of parties. I was almost commuting to London for the party scene. It didn’t seem superficial at the time.
Society and cultural attitudes have changed massively since Alpha started. How has Alpha adapted to meet the demands and questions of today’s world? N We have been leading Alpha for twenty-four years and it is very different from when we started. Back then, for example, people were really interested in the Bible, and prayer sounded boring. Now, the Bible is one of the hardest talks to give because people don’t like authority, and prayer is one of the easiest, because people are interested in spirituality.
Did anything hold you back from committing to faith? N I was a pretty convinced atheist, so I didn’t really have any questions. I had thought it through and decided there couldn’t really be a God. I thought Christianity was boring, a way of killing your fun. It wasn’t very attractive. What made you decide to explore? N I became a Christian through our good friends Nicky and Sila Lee, who had become Christians. They made me want to investigate it all. P Someone explained to me what was it was to have a relationship with Jesus. That was when the penny dropped and I realised there was a different way of looking at life. You both came to faith just before you entered your twenties. How did that affect you? N The biggest decision you can make in life is about faith, followed closely by your marriage partner and what you do. In our lives, those second two were clearly shaped by our faith. P It made my life meaningful. I think, without that, I would have made a lot of mistakes and been influenced by a lot of other people.
Alpha has grown dramatically over the last twenty years. Do you ever feel the pressure of it all? N I don’t think Alpha has really started. There’s a big world of 7 billion people out there… and only 24 million have done Alpha. How do you stay passionate about your work? N To me, this is not a job: this is life. And it is a wonderful life. It is a huge privilege to work with a group of friends who are all passionate about the same thing. P We love what we do – we love seeing people’s lives changed.
Follow Nicky @nickygumbel and Pippa @pippagumbel
60 SECONDS WITH...
In regards to faith, what does integrity and authenticity mean to you? N It’s about being real and not pretending to be something that you are not. It is the opposite of hypocrisy. P When I became a Christian, I swung into a rather zealous, try-to-convert-everybody sort of person. It took time to figure out how I really wanted to live. It’s about trying to live with honesty and accepting who you are.
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How did you first meet? P Someone had given me Nicky’s telephone number… so I rang him up. Had you met him before? P No. N Just say why you rang me up. P I wanted to get into a nightclub that we always used to go to – Nicky was a member and I needed him to get me in. N Before we came to faith! How long have you been married? P Thirty-six years... N Sandy Miller married us at HTB on 7 January 1978. In our marriage, Nicky is the… ? P Nicky is the… what would I say… I haven’t the words to describe you. N You need multiple choice. P The cook. Or the dish washer. He is very good at taking out the rubbish. In our marriage, Pippa is the… ? N Pippa is everything. Everything apart from taking out the rubbish. P I had to think of something! Nicky is spiritually inspiring in our marriage. What is your favourite place in the world? P We love the vicarage; it’s a real home for us. We love Rome. And we love wherever our family is. N My favourite place is home. The key in the door is the best part of any trip. Getting home. P Like his father. How many times have you led on Alpha? N I took on the role of leading it in 1990 and have led every one since, so I think this term will be seventy-one. P I have been involved in about the same amount with morning Alpha.
A NEW KIND OF CULTURE Words by James Nixon Photography by Lucy and Nathaniel Aspray
James Brown, 23, helps to run Alpha at St Thomas Crookes Church in Sheffield, UK. He is embracing the chance to be a part of a cultural shift in his local community. At seventeen, James tried Alpha. He had questions about life that he wanted to explore, so his youth worker advised him to give it a go. What was unexpected, though, was that some of his family decided to try Alpha too. ‘Alpha was a great learning process for me, but, more significantly, it became our family time. Once a week, we would come together and talk about the big things of life, what we believed, our hopes and dreams. We were transformed by the process – that’s why I am so passionate about Alpha.’ James’ energy for Alpha has now found an outlet. He is excited to be involved in introducing Alpha to a new generation. ‘We are enjoying being brave and taking risks. Running Alpha in the city makes it feel significant. Anyone who makes a loud enough noise can gather a crowd, but there is purpose behind what we are doing – introducing people to Jesus.’ In 2014, as part of the Alpha launch in Sheffield, people were encouraged to invite friends personally, using themed postcards. This resulted in hundreds of guests attending the Alpha
launch party at St Thomas Crookes – a milestone to celebrate. ‘We are giving young people the opportunity to invite their friends to explore the meaning of life. We are making it personal. They can say to their friends, “Hey, this is what I believe, why don’t you come and find out a bit more? I would love to hear what you have to say.”’
about food. We buy a lot of cake so people can eat together and if someone can’t afford a coffee, we will buy them one. Eating together is really important.’ The small groups watch each week’s talk on Alpha TV, which live streams the talks from HTB. Group discussions are enhanced by input from a mixture of students and young professionals.
‘The hashtag “TryAlpha” has also really connected ‘In the future, we want to invite 60,000 students with our community on social media. It has been in Sheffield to explore the meaning of life. We want to be a church that invites a whole really successful.’ generation to Alpha. At St Thomas Crookes, we have encouraged our key demographics to Now Alpha is underway in unexpected places around the city centre, including a pub and two think creatively about how they can run Alpha in their context and challenged them to run coffee shops. two courses a year. We are already seeing our communities running more than that. We know ‘This was an intentional decision. We want to that Alpha is going to be a big part of our future.’ create new cultural norms, whereby it is natural for people to explore the meaning of life in coffee shops and pubs, not just inside the church. We are hoping that there is a new wave of people who will one day say, “I came to faith in a pub.” It is an experiment.’ ‘We have seen so many people responding to our invitation that we have had to be creative
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YOUTH FILM SERIES
Invite a generation to explore life, faith and God. Twelve episodes exploring the basics of the Christian faith, filmed in Vancouver, London, Paris and Jerusalem. Alpha has already reached 24 million people and now it’s ready for a new generation. Eat together, watch the film and then chat about it. It’s free. All you have to do is sign up.
Find more information and sign up at alpha.org/youthfilmseries
WAKE UP EAT BREAKFAST LOG ON #RUNALPHA Everything you need to run Alpha, wherever you are. To support Alpha financially, please consider a regular donation. To get started, go to alpha.org/give Alpha.org/run
SAYING YES TO RISK Photography by Alex Douglas
When faced with a ‘now or never moment’, Becca Grew overcame her worries and took a courageous step towards sharing her faith with her friends – one thousand friends to be exact. When Becca decided to take a risk and run Alpha in her final year of school in Cheltenham, South West England, her first reaction was uncertainty. Having grown up in a Christian family, Becca felt excited about the opportunity to share her faith with her schoolmates. At seventeen, with one year left of school, she realised the opportunity wouldn’t be open to her forever. But she was hesitant. Could she pull it off? What would her friends think? It took faith to take the initial step, but, in her words, ‘Life gets exciting when you choose to be courageous.’ Becca describes how she was struck by the way courage is described in the Bible: ‘God says, “Be courageous.” It’s an instruction, but it’s also a choice. You can decide to have courage. When I looked at it like that, it made the decision simpler. Initially, I focused on my human limitations and asked whether I had the ability, but the real question was, “Am I willing to do it?” We first make ourselves available, then God gives us the ability. It happens that way round.’ Once she made the decision, things started happening fast. ‘On that first week,’ Becca recalls, ‘I was offered the chance to speak to a thousand people in the school assembly about Alpha. I’d never really spoken much about my faith at school before. I hadn’t realised it was “Spirituality Week”. They had no one to speak
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from a Christian perspective, so they asked me. I showed a video and talked about Alpha and the reaction from students and teachers was incredible – there was so much interest.’ ‘Things started to fall into place; I found a room for us to use and people from my church offered to pay for food. I was thrilled when thirty-five students came to the first session – including people I didn’t expect to be interested – they simply wanted to explore and share their views.’ Becca’s decision to run Alpha has had a lasting effect. Students came to faith and decided to run Alpha again this year. Seventy students came to the first session. The experience has also impacted Becca personally: ‘Now, when God asks me to do something, I am more trusting. I’m willing to step out and take risks. It also made me realise that when you do something for God, it’s a partnership. It won’t get done without you.’ So, what does courage mean to Becca? ‘It’s just saying yes,’ she concludes, smiling. ‘Do that, and everything else will follow.’
Watch Becca’s story online at alpha.org/becca
Evania’s earliest memories are of travelling the world. Struggling to find a place she could call home, and often experiencing life as a game of ‘pass the child’, alcohol became the main constant in her life. When she found herself living on the streets, an opportunity for a free meal offered more than she expected. As told to Yosola Olorunshola Photography by Alex Douglas
‘Today, my upbringing would be called dysfunctional, but as I grew up I wasn’t aware that anything was wrong.’ Moving between Argentina, New Zealand, Fiji, Tahiti and England with her parents, Evania’s early years were exciting but ‘confusing’. Boarding school did not bring the stability that was expected. ‘That was my first moment of total abandonment.’ Holidays spent with various family members began to have an impact on her behaviour. ‘I call it my career as a childhood alcoholic. There was always alcohol around and often my cousins, step-siblings and I would want to try what the adults were having, so we’d have a little bit of wine with some water in it.’ At school Evania experimented with other substances, sniffing glue and smoking marijuana. Although she was expelled several times, a love of horse-riding helped her complete her studies, allowing her to qualify as a British Horse Society instructor. She volunteered with racehorses and showjumpers before working as a performer in Australia, playing the guitar and Spanish dancing.
fell through and the money ran out, she was left with nothing and didn’t know where to turn.
It was at this point, aged twenty-one, that she met the man she later married. ‘He worked as an entertainer too. He was a good person, a really good person, but unfortunately what I didn’t know was that he was also an addict. He used to get violent and it got worse and worse because he was getting more and more addicted to I don’t know what. We had to split up in the end.’
She decided to follow his advice. ‘I didn’t have 10p on me. It was a history of being on the streets, in and out of hostels.’ While in London, Evania met a group of fellow rough sleepers who became her close friends. ‘I have to admit, we did all beg for money in the daytime, for tobacco and other stuff. I know we were in a negative situation, but we were a comfort to one another.’
After her marriage broke down, Evania moved back in with her parents. ‘All of us were drinkers and in the entertainment world there are often a lot of exotic substances. I never thought I had a problem though, I just thought I was doing what everybody else did.’
It was in London that a friend, Jim, invited her to Alpha. ‘I met him in 2006 and he had his Bible out and was going on about HTB and Alpha and I just didn’t want to know really.’
‘I was in Cambridge when I got talking to this homeless lad. I told him my situation and he said, “Why don’t you try going to London? I think you’d get some help there.”’
She describes her anger and resentment at the idea of God. ‘My mother was brought up as a Catholic and we were forced to go to church all the time at boarding school, but I totally turned against it. I’d see all these kids who had a dad and a proper family and even though I wasn’t conscious that anything was wrong, I wondered why other people had something I didn’t have.’
Seeking new opportunities, Evania returned to England with her mother. Her mother’s remarriage placed a strain on their relationship, but they remained very close, and her death left Evania devastated. ‘All hell broke loose.’ During this difficult period, Evania depended on friends and family for a place to stay, using the money she had inherited from her mother to find homes for the pets they had owned together. For a while, she lived off the remainder of the inheritance. However, after some investments
These feelings deepened as Evania experienced life on the streets. ‘I didn’t want people to talk to me about God. I thought, “You talk about God? My life’s a mess – where is God?”’
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‘I didn’t want people to talk to me about God. I thought, “You talk about God? My life’s a mess – where is God?”’ But, in 2009, Jim convinced her to give Alpha a try. ‘I thought I’d just come for the food. When I saw the queue I wanted to leave, but something made me stay.’ The atmosphere was the first thing that struck her. ‘I just felt welcome. Everybody was warm, friendly, caring. I liked that nobody was trying to force anything on you and that everyone showed a real interest in each person’s story. I think that’s very important because sometimes we just need to talk.’ As she continued to attend Alpha, she noticed her life begin to change. ‘I had walked with a limp from a horse-riding accident many years ago. One night, after the talk about why Jesus died for us, I started to feel this warmth. I thought there was a heater behind me, but there was nothing. A few days later, I was looking at my hair in a shop window and as I walked away, I noticed I was walking straight for the first time in years.’
through – the feeling of functioning as a number, existing with no selfworth, no hope – and I saw that what’s helped me can help them too.’ For Evania, life has been a complex journey. Still living in temporary accommodation, her faith and the close community she has found at church and the William Wilberforce Trust keep her going when things get difficult. ‘Even if we’re having a bad day, or feel like there’s a war going on around us, we can know that God is walking with us and that one day we will be rescued. Even if he takes his time, there’s a reason. I see the world as a beautiful place, with beautiful people. If we’re patient, he always reminds us of the blessings.’
Watch more of Evania’s story online at alpha.org. To connect with the William Wilberforce Trust visit williamwilberforcetrust.org
Evania now believes it was the Holy Sprit who healed her. ‘The Holy Spirit was at work, though I wasn’t aware of it.’ She decided to attend Alpha a second and third time in order to understand faith more deeply. ‘Things really started to click the third time I did Alpha because I made amazing friends. It was like I had found my family.’ Since discovering a relationship with Jesus, Evania feels her life has gone ‘up and up’. ‘When you find yourself in the gutter, you can’t go any lower. It’s like you’re at sea without oars in a boat that’s full of water. Finding God is like suddenly being rescued. He empties the boat, puts a motor and sails on it, and you find that you’ve got to do something with it.’ To help break free from her addiction to alcohol, Evania went on to complete The Recovery Course. ‘When you surrender to Jesus, he will give you a high that is superior to any drug or alcohol frenzy. You find that the Holy Spirit feeds any craving you might have.’ Reflecting on her past difficulties, Evania now seeks to use her experience to encourage others. She was recently invited to volunteer with Union Rescue Mission and share her experience of Alpha with those living on the streets on the notorious Skid Row, Los Angeles. ‘It was an absolutely amazing, once-in-a-lifetime experience. When I spoke to people out there, I recognised the symptoms of what I’d been
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breaking the cycle After years of trying to put his life back together, the last thing 24-year-old Ben wanted to do was to lose control all over again.
As told to Yosola Olorunshola Photography by Beetle Rhind
I was born in Santiago, Chile. My dad is English and my mum was Chilean. When I was born, I had a brain haemorrhage, and I had to have a lot of surgery before I was two years old. My mum went through quite a traumatic labour and was suffering from mental health issues, so she rejected me. Over the years, she was very abusive. When I was three years old, my mum left me on the streets, hoping I would get lost, and my dad found me wandering around outside on his way back from work.
‘Going on Alpha helped me to forgive.’
My dad helped me through it all. My parents did not have a healthy marriage and things became quite difficult in the end. After a failed custody battle, I made the choice to move to England with my dad. for so many people – he knew things about them that you couldn’t know without being told. I sat there and I prayed and said, ‘God, if you’re real, this guy is going to pick me next.’ And, in a split second, this guy spoke to me. I thought, ‘Oh wow, I’ve just tested God.’ You could say it was coincidence but I don’t think it was. What was happening in that room that day was quite surreal.
I didn’t have a great time at school. I only started learning English when I was about eleven or twelve and I was bullied because I couldn’t speak the language. I did badly in exams and didn’t apply myself to work because nobody seemed to want to help. Things started to pick up when the British Cycling Squad scouted me at school. I was thirteen at the time. They came around and did some tests and I ended up beating the record. There were training camps every weekend, so I’d go to Manchester or Wales and then we’d race abroad. I went to Belgium quite a lot. Cycling was a welcome distraction, but because I got so heavily involved, I completely flunked my GCSEs.
The guest speaker said something about a struggle, about coming out of a hole. A few people had said something similar to me around that time. They had a picture of me coming out of a hole with my hands at the top and they felt I was just about to come out of it all. The picture was very relevant at the time, but I still couldn’t fully commit to faith. After sorting my life out on my own, my biggest fear was losing control. I’d managed to get to where I was, a fairly decent life, and was worried that if I let God take control and said, ‘Now it’s your turn, Jesus,’ he would get rid of everything.
During this time, my dad and I started to drift apart and I left home when I was around sixteen. I moved down to Southampton and worked in a coffee shop, trying to earn a bit of money and do the cycling thing at the same time. When I lost my lottery funding, I had to give it up. I had no direction and felt very alone. Soon after the cycling fell through, I was in a bad car crash, which nearly wiped me out. I was in hospital in intensive care and when I got out I was living on a mattress on the floor of someone’s house. It was a low point and I thought, ‘I might as well just top myself here because there’s nothing to live for. I’ve got no one around.’ In the end, I couldn’t go through with it. I don’t know where the drive came from, but something pushed me to try and sort my life out.
I had got caught up in trying to achieve certain things – whether it was in my career or my personal life – as a way of trying to cover up emotions and situations from the past. Today, we’re pushed to believe that we should have everything. But there’s no end point to that. I realised that I could keep striving continually but that there would be nowhere to draw the line.
I got a job in IT near London and made friends with this guy, Chris. We had a shared interest in cars and cycling and he was just a nice, genuine and caring guy. We’d been friends for a while when he asked, ‘Why don’t you do Alpha this year?’ I went along, even though I was quite hostile to Christianity at the time. I met some great people, but I found Alpha really challenging. Each session seemed to raise more questions than it answered. I had questions like ‘Why does God allow suffering?’ I remember going home after each session and searching online for ‘tough questions to ask Christians’. However, each week, I found my thoughts and priorities slowly changing. It felt like I was discovering a different, more fulfilling way of life. My Alpha group leader, Pete, told me that he still has questions. Faith isn’t a destination; it’s a journey. Still unsure about the whole thing, I started to go to church on a Sunday. One day, a guest speaker came to speak and he had incredible visions
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I heard a great analogy at church. The speaker showed us an extension cord and said that in today’s society we’re convinced that we should take the plug and plug it back into one of its own sockets, feeding our own egos. He said, ‘What Jesus teaches us to do is to have these four sockets empty and then plug yourself to the power point. That way, you can help other people out too.’ I realised that, despite what I had overcome and achieved on my own, God has much more in store for me. Faith has helped me find the space to forgive my mum. She passed away two years ago and we had not spoken since the day I left Santiago, but I have accepted that her illness and addictions were out of my control. Going on Alpha helped me to forgive and leave a lot of bitterness and anger in the past. I lived with bitterness and anger for a long time, but living with forgiveness is much more fulfilling. My faith has helped me see that it is possible to break certain cycles. It’s true what they say – Jesus heals.
#TRYALPHA LIFE IS SHORT. LIFE IS AN ADVENTURE. LIFE IS THIS. LIFE IS THAT. SO WHAT DO WE DO? DO WE SPEED UP OR SLOW DOWN? DO WE QUIT OUR JOBS AND SEE THE WORLD OR DO WE STAY PUT AND CLIMB THE LADDER? MAYBE ALL THAT MATTERS IS THAT WHILE WE’RE HERE ON EARTH, WE NEVER STOP EXPLORING WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT. ALPHA IS A SERIES OF INTERACTIVE SESSIONS EXPLORING THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. THERE IS NO PRESSURE, NO FOLLOW UP AND NO CHARGE. AND IT’S FUN.
Explore life #TryAlpha Visit alpha.org to find an Alpha near you.
Art & Soul Charlie Mackesy is a sculptor and painter who went on Alpha over twenty years ago and has been involved ever since. He talked about Alpha and how his art and faith in God fit together. As told to Isolde Walters
‘Church is a tribe like any other, not a good tribe, but a tribe that has smelt the coffee of grace.’ I liked atheism because it seemed sane. I didn’t much like the name ‘God’ because of what I thought it signified: the sin-obsessed, cosmic policeman represented by self-appointed bouncers at the gates of his heaven. When I was twenty, my best friend died. We had shared a house together, had dreams together, and those dreams died with him. I went on this long journey of drawing and thinking, analysing and reading, asking questions. I wouldn’t go to church, I wouldn’t involve myself with anything that looked like religion, but I recognised, as a lot of people do, that Jesus was good. He became a possibility of reconnecting with hope.
Painting facilitated my journey into God; it was a form of meditation and prayer. I don’t feel obliged to make images that reference him. Sometimes I make images that help people but I’m just as happy painting the Royal Albert Hall with flowers coming out of the top of it, or a man sitting in a café. If we believe in God, then everything is somehow interlaced with him.
Watch more of Charlie’s story on alpha.org/charlie Follow Charlie @charliemackesy
Jesus is primarily grace and someone to talk to who doesn’t make you feel guilty or like rubbish. He opens a doorway to wonder, gives you a reason to paint, a reason to get up in the morning. What changed was understanding that ultimately nothing really matters. I mean, everything matters but nothing matters. The things we worry and obsess about – the clothes, the houses, all of it – if we’re loved, what does any of that matter ultimately? When I realised that this was not all there is, I felt free from it all.
I went on Alpha. It was small, slow and had real depth. The friendships formed there have continued to this day. These very kind people gently appeased all my prejudices about organised religion. I felt I belonged there. My beliefs have changed and changed again since that time, but that sense of belonging hasn’t. The reason I love Alpha and have done thirty consecutive courses is because there are no presumptions or assumptions; you sit in a group and are honest about everything. It’s open. There’s no judgment. What I discovered in church was the validity of context and community. It’s a tribe like any other, not a good tribe, but a tribe that has smelt the coffee of grace and knows that we are weak and that love is really the only way.
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60 SECONDS WITH...
One day in summer, I was sketching the back of the Brompton Oratory for an architect. It was really hot and I wandered into the church next door, looking for somewhere to cool down. I saw a noticeboard, covered in photographs of people under seventy, which I was quite drawn to. I came back the next Sunday and then to six more in a row, on my own, not talking to anyone.
Favorite film? Spinal Tap If you could be stuck in a lift with anyone, who would it be? A lift service operator Best advice? ‘Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none’ – Shakespeare
ALPHA 360 – GLOBAL UPDATE
Find out what’s happening with Alpha across the globe
1. Meeting Pope Francis A team from Alpha attended Mass with Pope Francis at the chapel of the Casa Santa Marta in the Vatican on 28 February 2014. They spoke briefly with Pope Francis after the Mass. alpha.org/catholics 2. Relationship Central in Asia Nicky and Sila Lee travelled to Hong Kong, Taiwan and China to run a series of training workshops and marriage retreats. In Hong Kong they launched The Parenting Course in Cantonese. Over 6,500 Relationship Central in Asia courses ran in 116 countries. relationshipcentral.org 3. World Youth Day Alpha joined 3.5 million young people at World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro for an international gathering with the Pope. The Alpha team ran taster sessions of Alpha in English, Spanish and Portuguese. 4. Prison Impact Over 32,000 people attended Alpha in prisons in sixty-nine countries. In Ghana, the prison authorities attributed the drop in re-offending – from 67 per cent to 20 per cent since 2005 – to Alpha.
5. Paul Cowley’s Lifetime Achievement Paul Cowley, Executive Director of the William Wilberforce Trust, was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Longford Trust. Human rights advocate Bianca Jagger and Channel 4’s Jon Snow presented Paul with the award in a ceremony held at Church House, Westminster. williamwilberforcetrust.org 6. Bible in One Year Explosion Over 120,000 people now subscribe to the Bible in One Year – a free daily Bible commentary written by Nicky and Pippa Gumbel. Bear Grylls: ‘The daily reading and commentary makes the Bible manageable for the busy person – it is full of moving stories, funny anecdotes, empowering messages and down-to-earth advice.’ You can now download the new app version of BIOY on iTunes and at htb.org/bioy 7. The Guardian The Guardian newspaper recently featured The Marriage Course, including an in-depth interview with Nicky and Sila Lee. ‘Nicky and Sila Lee help couples to stay together by running marriage courses. There’s no counselling, no airing of dirty linen in public, no group therapy – and it seems to work.’
8. #TryAlpha Trended in UK Alpha has been trending on Twitter in the UK, with 13 million impressions as people shared #TryAlpha tweets. Follow us @alphacourse 9. Thirty Countries at Worship Central Conference Over 2,000 people from thirty countries gathered for the Worship Central Conference in Westminster. The Worship Central Course is now running in over eighty countries worldwide. worshipcentral.org 10. Alpha Rebranded In 2013, Alpha launched a new brand identity and, in response, saw a surge in interest from fifteen- to thirty-four-yearolds. In 2013, 32 per cent of those aged fifteen to twenty-four registered an interest in Alpha, compared with 20 per cent in 2012. The greatest interest in Alpha was recorded among those aged twenty-five to thirty-four (34 per cent compared with 13 per cent in 2012). alpha.org/branding