Hope in the Cities (HIC), in co-operation with Liverpool Hope University and Liverpool Community Spirit, a local multi-faith community partnership, gave a public presentation on the potential of HIC ‘Honest Conversation’ Dialogues, as a ‘tool for community-building’. It took place in the Methodist Community Centre in Toxteth in July 2004.
The event was attended by a variety of people, including representatives of various community organisations, residents associations, local government officers and the police.
Among those who contributed their experience were four of the diverse group of eleven who had taken part in the HIC Facilitation Training in Liverpool in the autumn.
One, who has been involved in community regeneration, said of the training, “It was empowering. It brought people together who do not normally come together. It built trust. Now we can call upon each other.”
Another said, “It changed our own ideas and prejudices, not just in making rash judgements. It was a chance to walk for a mile in the other’s moccasins. By the end of the six days we were all good friends.”
A third told how it led her to be reconciled to a member of her own family.
Those from Liverpool were reinforced by Barrie Brazier, Executive Officer of the Nottingham Race Equality Council. “I, as a community worker, have never seen an initiative that works like this,” he commented. He described how he and colleagues had used the HIC dialogues as ‘a process that can activate action that is sustainable, because real relationships have been built.”
He told how it had helped create a network of people in Nottingham committed to change what they could change. It had led to developing a project linking young people in St. Ann’s, Nottingham, directly to Jamaica, where he had just been with two young people.
John Sephula, a community worker in Leeds, working with young people, said that, taking part in the HIC Dialogues had ‘moved me out of my comfort zone’. ‘It gave listening skills, communication skills. It was an approach from the heart. It helped me use my heart as well,” he commented.
English