Methodist Youth Ministry Celebrates 60th Anniversary

The Methodist Church of Great Britain’s youth ministry - MAYC (Methodist Association of Youth Clubs)- celebrates its 60th anniversary in 2005. A series of celebratory events, known as the "6:T" is to be launched to mark the milestone.

6:T Invest, 6:T Intense and 6:T Inspire are the events coming up in the following months.

6:T Invest on 14th May is a garden party at the Guy Chester Centre with those who have contributed to MAYC over the years. Many past staff and friends from MAYC will be invited as special guests to join MAYC representatives from each District. A thanksgiving worship service will be held with a previous National Secretary David Winwood preaching the sermon.

6:T Intense is a national celebration weekend at Cliff College on 15th-17th July. Worship and sharing groups are to be held around the site.

6:T Inspire is a similar event at Truro School on 16th-18th September with workshops, worship, live music, DJ's among many other events.

MAYC is preparing an archive exhibition to reveal what the ministry has achieved over the last 60 years. It is therefore gathering a collection of photos, badges; posters, scarves, hats, T-Shirts, "Youth" magazine, books by National Secretaries, and George VI Memorial Lectures.

The exhibition will be on show at all of the 6:T events and at the Methodist Conference 2005 in Torquay. However, 6:T Invest will be the main venue for the exhibition. A special 6:T edition of Share will be published this month. It will look at the last sixty years of MAYC through personal memories and photographs.

MAYC was originally a Youth Department of the Methodist Church during the time of wars. In 1945, the Methodist Association of Youth Clubs (MAYC) was inaugurated at the first London Weekend. MAYC is nowadays part of the Pastoral Care and Christian Education section in the Church Life unit of the Methodist Church. MAYC has kept its place in the forefront of the nation's youth work. It provides training and volunteering schemes for young people in partnership with other churches and organisations.

A fundamental change of the organisation occurred in 2004 as the new name and new logo were adopted. MAYC will no longer stand for Methodist Association of Youth Clubs, but will now be known as MAYC - Supporting Youth Work in the Methodist Church. This new name reflects the wider role and work of MAYC, which includes youth work development, training, campaigns, music and sports, rather than just an association of youth clubs.

MAYC’s new logo represents a cross and a plus sign showing the positive effects of being part of MAYC while conveying the central focus of Christ in the work and ministry. The colour red indicates that it belongs to the whole Methodist Church.

The Methodist Church is the third largest Christian Church in England after the Anglican and Roman Catholic Churches. There are around 6,100 Methodist churches in Britain with almost 300,000 full members. It was founded by John and Charles Wesley in England in the 18th century.