Earlier this month, 30 students and faculty from the undergraduate and graduate schools attended the Christian Community Development Association’s (CCDA) annual conference. Held October 10 through 14, about 2000 people attended the event, which Clive Craigen, professor of urban studies, described as the “who’s who” in urban ministry. 

The CCDA was founded by John Perkins, author of Let Justice Roll Down and famous for his work in racial reconciliation in Mississippi.  The association of over 500 Christian community-development organizations seeks to equip and inspire Christians to bring restoration to under-resourced communities in America. This year’s conference in St. Louis challenged attendees to step beyond their comfort zones into places of extreme brokenness and marginalization in order to show that Jesus is alive and working to heal (www.ccda.org). 

“This year was probably the best conference I’ve been too,” said Unity Ostercamp, ministries project coordinator in the Practical Christian Ministries department, who attended the event for the third time. “Things can tend to get pretty political when you are dealing with issues like social justice and living among the poor. This year the conference was also very much about Jesus; it was about the gospel.”

Ostercamp, who graduated from Moody in 1997 with the first group of Moody urban studies majors, said the conference allows students to learn about urban ministry in new ways.

“The CCDA conference gives students a chance to network with people who are doing what they hope to do in the future. They get to rub shoulders with people who are living it.”

Kristy Wallace, urban ministries major in the Graduate School, attended a workshop about the relationship between urban and suburban churches. “CCDA creates an environment where people feel free to talk about and think through issues of race,” she said.  Wallace has attended the conference twice and was refreshed by the chance to meet and learn from others who share her passion for the urban church.

Of the 120 workshops, other topics included ministering to families, overcoming addictions, funding ministries, mobilizing the suburban church and providing organizational leadership. John Fuder, professor of urban studies in Moody Graduate School, led a workshop framed around Micah 6:8, discussing how to express holiness by doing God’s work in the city. The 2008 conference is scheduled for Miami, and CCDA will come to Chicago in 2009.

Article by Anna Beth Wildman.  Courtesy of The Moody Student, Volume 73:3, October 30, 2007.