The poetic planter

This is the sixth episode from our Proximity Conference series. Ben Atkins lives on an estate called White Hawk in Brighton, He tells Abi about his journey from satanism to church planting. We hear how a prayer walk led to a huge reduction in gang murders and the power of community organising efforts. Ben also reflected on the spiritual responsibility of churches towards young people and the duty to pursue justice for those facing poverty.

Episode quotes:

“Four months ago I tore my calf in two, I still can’t walk properly. I pride myself on being very active, but I can’t anymore and since then I have had to move around the neighbourhood really slowly and I’ve seen the way that other people begin to look after me after four years of giving everything for this place. Going slow enough to accept help from neighbours and strangers in a new new level, I almost feel like I’ve become a Christian again, there’s something in that divine invitation of being weak and realising that God never wanted our productivity, he never wanted our strength, he just wanted us.”

“There’s a great old person’s word, when you hear someone described as cantankerous. I love that idea of always being on the look out for Holy trouble, to see where you can cause it. In our last church there was a real fly tipping problem in the neighbourhood, so we would go round and write blessings on the fridges that were dumped against walls. Or guerrilla gardening, something I learnt from Cris Rogers, always having a packet of seeds in your pocket to throw in a random bit of land, always looking for somewhere to throw your Holy Antiseptic.”