In a world that has been surprised, shifted and shaken, the shock has shown what we already knew but liked to ignore - that life is fragile and temporary.

Anna Goodman, from City Church in Cambridge, shares her thoughts after getting to know more about Who Cares?

The unknown can be scary; so many questions, so few answers. It's a vulnerable place and time to be living in.

Paul McCartney famously wrote a song called, "Who cares". It contains the lines, "Who cares about the pain in your heart? Who cares about you? I do." By asking the question, "What hurts the most?" The Who Cares? initiative offers hope to a fragile and scared world. Who cares about you and the pain in your heart? They do.

I recently had the delight of spending the day with the team from Who Cares? Reflecting on this special time, I was struck by three things:

1. Their authenticity. These people really cared, it was tangible and contagious. They genuinely desired to bring hope from a heart of compassion that was not superficial and fleeting but was the driving force to everything they were doing. 

2. Their commitment. Listening about their short-term and long-term plans and aims it was clear that Who Cares? had been well-researched and invested in - they were in it for the long-haul, they weren't about to run away and abandon you.

3. Finally, the fruit. You can tell the health of the tree by the fruit it produces. Hearing the impact that Who Cares? had made in the communities where it had been established was a remarkable testimony to the health of this particular 'tree' - the fruit was abundant. Lives had been significantly changed as a result of what they had done.

I walked away from my time with Who Cares? like I'd been given an apple. I could either eat it and enjoy it all to myself, or I could pass on the seeds of their vision to others so that an orchard could be grown. Personally, I knew that I wanted to plant some seeds because at the heart of Who Cares? is something that offers life and light to our dark and wobbled world.

Hugh Pearce, Redeemer Church Colchester, reflects on North Essex’s response phase

We have not long finished the responding phase of Who Cares? in the Colchester area and I am sure there will be much more fruit to come in the months ahead as people opened up about their pain, built relationships and have ongoing contact with many who have responded to their questions.

The overriding encouragement for me has been seeing people released to engage others in spiritual conversations. Jesus said that the harvest is plentiful and we need to pray for workers…for many the struggle is how to start a conversation about their faith and love for Jesus. Who Cares? enables everyone to do that - asking the question ‘What hurts you the most?’ Inevitably leads to queries about why we are doing this in the first place, or letting them know our church is running this initiative…these conversation can simply be letting people know we are Christians, and many lead to further conversations of greater depth and fruitfulness.

Finding out the hurts of our own church community and the arenas our members are involved in has been sobering and helpful - it has meant we can equip our people, care for them and their friends better.

This is initiative has been so helpful, above and beyond the areas we thought it would be.

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RUN Who cares? in your local area

HUGH PEARCE, PASTOR OF REDEEMER CHURCH COLCHESTER EXPLAINS JUST WHY THE COLCHESTER AREA ARE PREPARING TO RUN WITH WHO CARES? IN 2019

"We're a relatively young church plant, only three and half years old and a large proportion of our church attendees are students. It’s great to have all that enthusiasm and energy but the flip side is that the a large proportion of the congregation is quite transient and so it's quite hard to sustain certain initiatives. Yet we really have a heart to want to serve and engage with our local community. WHO CARES? provides us with an excellent opportunity to do precisely this and engage in social needs as well as evangelism in an easy fashion. 

I first heard about WHO CARES? a few years ago via Newday and then I happened to meet Rob Tervet who told me more about how it works in practice. What we love about this model is that as churches and organisation come together, we benefit from the wider profile the campaign brings, but we still have a very local face.  

In November 2018 we held an initial vision event to gage the level of interest from other churches and organisations in the Colchester area and based on that, we're planning to hold a vision night in March this year to a much wider audience. Here we'll be asking for commitment to participate. We're excited that the Bishop of Colchester and the Baptist Super-Intendant have confirmed their participation. 

We're eager to get underway !

Since October 2017 Stowmarket Parish Church has been asking their congregation, local groups and visitors to the Stowmarket Christmas tree festival, one simple question – ‘What hurts you the most? Having spoken with over 1,500 people, they received over 500 anonymous response cards which have been analysed to understand what is affecting people in the town. The top issues identified  were: Family and Relationship Problems, Injustice, Physical Suffering and Negative Emotions. Death and Loneliness also featured as key issues particularly in responses received the week immediately before Christmas. A dedicated WHO CARES? working group within the Parish Church is now looking at what can be done to offer help and hope to people affected by these issues. We’re holding a series of drop in chat sessions

Rev Michael Eden, St Peters & St Mary’s Church, Stowmarket

In 2014 Wellspring Family Church (WFC) in Dereham, participated in Who Cares? as part of the Norfolk wide mission programme.

WFC decided to extend the reach and appeal by taking a version of the Who Cares concept into primary school. 1 town and 3 village schools were selected. Jon Beardon explained:

“So many children are experiencing all sorts of hurts that they don’t know how to express. A tailored version of Who Cares? gave the children a ‘language’ to discuss their emotions and feelings”

Working closely with the staff from each school, and after first undertaking the survey with staff, a special assembly was held introducing all the children to the concept. They then completed the survey. Results were quickly analysed and categorised and about 7-10 days later, the team returned to give the children feedback. However this was delivered using various educational tools, for example, the children created graphs of the findings, represented findings through drama sessions.

The parable of the Good Samaritan was used to demonstrate issues such as caring, and history lessons looked at how Christians of the past have responded to various hurts e.g anti slavery, Banardos etc. Creation of a blob tree - a visual representation of emotions. The day was summarised and concluded with and assembly which included songs and a bible story, prayer and blessing.

Suffolk churches ran the Who Cares survey Spring 2018. A total of 6,144 responses were achieved.

In East Suffolk many responses highlighted Negative Emotions as one of the main hurts and accounted for 18.7% of the results across all age groups for this region. This was found to be significantly higher than any other category, accounting for over a quarter of all responses for those in the 18-34 age bracket.

In West Suffolk, Injustice came out as the top category and included both global (e.g concerns over war and famine) and more personal issues ( lying and bullying). Almost a fifth of the responses in West Suffolk related to Injustice and is reflective across all age ranges except for the under 18s, where Negative Emotions featured more highly.

One final, intriguing observation is that despite many communities facing financial difficulties, money concerns did not feature significantly.

The Who Cares? survey was run in and around the Basingstoke area of Hampshire, with many churches participating. A total of 11,798 responses were collated and analysed.

There were three key categories that featured most, these were Negative Emotions accounting for 19.77% of the findings Family (18.26%) and Relationships (16.89%). In the case of those aged under 18, Relationships accounted for the greatest number of hurts (31.46%). Those aged 18-34 and 35-65, noted that Negative Emotions and Family were the biggest hurts. This finding is consistent with the overall data.

The data was also analysed by gender, although not everyone selected to identify their gender in the survey, but where it was, Family (20.03%) accounted for the greatest hurst for females where as 22.47% of males identified Negative Emotions as their key hurt.

In 1967, psychiatrists Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe conducted a study with over 5,000 patients on the connection between significant life events and illness. The resulting chart – known as the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale – which contained 43 causes of stress in 1967, was updated to 55 causes in 2006. It appears we are finding more ways of feeling stressed!

Not far from the top of the list are finances, work, family, personal concerns, relationships, and death – issues that many people face, regardless of how secure they may appear.  Who Care’s survey, whilst not scientific,  has provided an updated view of the issues that cause stress, anxiety and hopelessness.  

Churches in parts of Hampshire and Suffolk undertook surveys during late 2017 and their findings can be found elsewhere on this site

We’ve now done Who Cares? in three counties with over 150 churches. We are believing God for 12 new areas over the next 3 years. Please join us in praying that God would open doors for our message. We have three key prayer areas, for which we ask your support

• Opportunity:

  • We’re seeking God for the opportunity to meet with leaders in three areas this year with whom we can share our vision for Who Cares?

• Finances:

  • For financial provision of £90,000 to deliver the three year vision

• People:

  • For the provision of the right people to make our dreams happen

We regularly get answers to “What hurts you the most?” on our website. Here is a sample of them. We hope they move you to pray for our hurting nation:-

• Feeling lost.

• I cant talk to my family

• Love

• I love others, but don’t feel loved in return. I know love asks for nothing in return, but I’m just human

• Discrimination

• That my dad lives in another country

• When people make fun of me

• When I feel left out

• The constant emotional abuse from my ex-husband

• My husband has cancer. I feel so alone

• That the person I love, no longer loves me

• Being a victim of rape and feeling like no one will believe me

What hurts you the most?