Lynne McNeil reports from the Guild’s annual gathering, which took place in Dundee in September.

THE MODERATOR of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland has called for the Church’s Guild and congregations to become ‘schools of love’.

Speaking at the Guild’s annual gathering at the Caird Hall in Dundee and echoing this year’s theme of ‘Go in Love’, the Rt Rev Dr Derek Browning said the US writer Brian McLaren had suggested that one way of helping churches today was for organisations such as the Guild and congregations to become ‘schools of love’.

He said: “Stop and think about it, and I know that many congregations and Guilds are doing thousands of other things, but have you every wondered ‘who specialises in teaching people to love? Who aims to take people at every age and ability level and help them become the most loving version of themselves possible. There is no curriculum of love. We test people’s beliefs before we ordain them, or make them Guild Conveners, or Moderators, but we don’t assess whether they embody the skills and practices of love.”

He added: “When we, as Christians, put love at the top of our agenda, it’s not simply putting a statement on a poster that says: ‘all are welcome’, or a charming graphic on your website, or on a mission statement. We need to weave it into the practices of our community when we gather, Sunday by Sunday, month by month, year by year.

“We need to find ways to address the pressure points where people are struggling to live, their neighbours, their families, their colleagues the stranger, themselves, the earth and God. We need to find ways that help us deal with all the issues of injustice in our world and communities. We won’t be able to fix them all at the one moment, but we might be able to make a difference to some, in a small way, or in a big way.”

Photos: The Guild’s annual gathering in Dundee

Credit: Chris Hoskins

He paid tribute to the Guild’s longstanding commitment to love and justice, recalling his first encounter with the organisation through its centenary project in the 1980s working with drug-addicted prostitutes in Leith and said it had a track record of raising and addressing issues that were ‘uncomfortable and difficult.’

He added: “Love is what we are because of what we do and because of the One we are commanded to follow. If we have love, if we live love, then we are Kingdom people.”

More than 2000 people at the Gathering were joined for the first time in an ambitious technical project by 21 Guilds from the north to south and east and west of Scotland as the Gathering entered the digital age, with Guilds in Fochabers in the north and Kirk Yetholm in the Borders being the first to link in to the annual celebration.

More than £500,000 has been raised by Guild members for its six partner projects during the first two years of the three-year partnership. The money raised for the six projects so far is: Ascension Trust (Street Pastors) £95,209.59; Care for the Family (Let’s Stick Together) £84,942.19; Christian Aid (Caring for Mother Earth in Bolivia) £79,730.91; Feed the Minds (Breaking the Cycle of FGM) £110,387.12; Mission International (Haiti Project) £66,588.12 and Prospects (All Friends Together) £72,978.16.

Earlier National Convener Marge Paterson invited outgoing National Convener Rosemary Johnston to provide an overview of the year. In her review, Mrs Johnston appealed to the wider Church of Scotland to engage with the Guild.

“The Guild should be seen as a member of the Church family. I feel that the Church at every level should engage with us. We have a vast range of gifts, both practical and spiritual and intellectual,” she said.

Musical interludes during the day were led by the Guild’s National Secretary, Iain Whtye and Associate Secretary Karen Gillon who led the Gathering on a trip down Memory Lane in the morning with Sunday School songs from yesteryear (complete with actions) during the morning session. The Heart and Soul Swing Band provided a lively and uplifting set in the afternoon, whilst Stuart Muir, Dundee City Organist, was on hand to accompany the day’s worship, which included the hymns Love divine, all loves excelling, There is a redeemer, My Peace I give unto you and I, the Lord of sea and sky.

Dr Pam Cairns, a retired GP who now lives in Carnoustie, offered moving insights into her journey which led her and her husband Alan from Kirkcaldy to travel the world with the Vine Trust, where she served as volunteer Medical Director of the charity from 2004 and 2006. She and her husband worked to develop and promote the Amazon Hope Medical and Dental Project in the Peruvian jungle.

Dr Cairns, who has since founded the charity the Free to Live Trust to improve the lives of street children and victims of modern slavery, offered some shocking insights into the lives of street children. Boys, she said, were abandoned by their mothers who cannot afford to feed them whilst girls could be sold into slavery in the sex industry.

Offering insights into trafficking, she said: “I thought prostitution was a lifestyle choice but how I have learned over the years.”

There were, according to official figures, 45.8 million slaves in the world, with more than 70 per cent female and the majority under the age of 25.

She said modern slavery was also more prevalent than the Government believed in the UK, but that action was being taken to tackle the issue.

In a graphic address she described the journey which had led her to form the charity which has built a home for the abandoned children of trafficked sex workers in Pune, India.

“Love is what we are because of what we do and because of the One we are commanded to follow. If we have love, if we live love, then we are Kingdom people.

Guild Week takes places this year from November 1 9 to 2 6.