Lichfield Diocese in the English Midlands received nearly 300 missionaries from all over the world last month for a festival of mission entitled - Come to the Feast.

More than half of the diocese's 432 parishes accepted the Bishop of Lichfield's challenge to engage in a week of special mission and outreach during one of the first three weeks of June. Two hundred and seventy seven Christians from other parts of the world, most of them ordinary church members, came to help Lichfield in the special outreach. The climax of the initiative was a festival of mission on the Stafford County Showground on 21 June which brought together 12,000 from all over the England Midlands.

The visitors to the diocese came from Malaysia, Canada, the USA, Tanzania, Zambia, Swaziland, Russia, Poland and Germany. The visitors joined in with every aspect of parish life from barbecues, to traditional evangelistic rallies, to family fun days all of which were designed to bring the Gospel to the local community.

Most of the visitors raised their own airfares to come to Lichfield. Michael Sheard, the Mission Officer for the Diocese, spoke of the success of the initiative. "One visitor spoke of the privilege to share in the mission here and asked people from Lichfield Diocese to go to their country." Many parishes were astounded at the response to their work. One parish in Shrewsbury spoke of the how the friends from overseas has told them what was possible. The Anglican mission societies the United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel and the Church Mission Society both sponsored the initiative.