From April 17-19, 2012, the leaders of church planting networks from leading cities all over the world came together in New York. For three days they connected with each other and discussed the best ways to serve their cities. Our hope is that gospel-centered networks will grow in European cities and that churches will be inspired to work together and help each other to plant new churches. Look for your city network leader on this page: www.citytocityeurope.com/about/network-leaders

 

Our last network meeting was in 2010 in Budapest. More then 125 participants were present to encourage one and another and to share what is happening in Europe. In 2011 we had a larger meeting to reach more people in Europe and to enlarge the network. The proposed dates of the next network meeting in Europe are April 23 – 25 2013. This time it will take place in Prague. In the next few months we will start to organize the conference and begin preparing the program. If you wish to give input or feedback about what should be included, please contact us. Registration will be done through the website after the summer of 2012. So please reserve these dates in your agenda if you want to attend.

 

One of the exciting events of 2011 was the International Church Planters Training Intensive in New York City—a four and a half-week residency program designed specifically for pastors of new churches in global cities. Last September, 13 church planters arrived in New York City to attend this program, and five were from Europe. This year, we have received 15 applications from European cities. Although there are benefits to having European church planters go through this training in NYC, we are prayerfully planning to host an intensive in Europe in June 2014. The group will consist of about 10 – 12 people and will travel to different cities each week, receive training by local leaders and visit local church plants. We will provide more information when more details are in place.

 

We would like to encourage local network meetings. Some of the networks already have plans to meet up and share what is happening. If you have ideas for your own network, please let us know so the facilitator can help set this up and provide necessary materials.

 

City to City Europe has modest resources to fund a limited number of new church plants and apprenticeships. These funds will be distributed in relation to strategic priorities in each city. If you have interest and would like to have more information, feel free to contact us. 

 

As the network grows so do the questions about the limits of how broadly the network can function. Essentially, City to City Europe wants to be an organic, loose fellowship of likeminded churches and church planters seeking to plant effective, contextually relevant, gospel-driven churches in the cities of Europe. It is non-competitive  – a network that serves other tight networks and denominations in relation to urban ministry. It is exclusive/inclusive – while seeking to serve the Kingdom of Christ the network is limited in focus to the urban context, seeks to work only with those who subscribe to historic biblical orthodoxy, gives nearly complete priority to leaders indigenous to the population trying to be reached. It limits itself to the activities related to the planting of new congregations and the replanting of churches in urban centre situations. It is de-centralized - CTCE is independent of any outside organization although it relates to CTC in New York and a growing number of networks across the world. Each regional, city or related network that has connection to CTCE also functions independent of any authoritative influence. Just as CTC seeks to serve the CTCE Network and the churches and sub-networks involved, CTCE itself seeks to serve the various churches and networks that relate to it. The infrastructure of the network includes an executive team, regional networks, city networks, relating networks, an advisory board of donors and advocates.

 

In New York the European network leaders recently talked about whether the network needs more specific theological agreement. The executive team will be discussing whether we need to define theological limits more precisely.