Youth Ministry in Communion (YMIC) is a growing network of churches within the sacramental and liturgical traditions of the Church of England, working together to build exciting and sacramental youth ministry.

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We believe that the sacramental tradition speaks powerfully to young people today. In a world that can often feel fast-paced and uncertain, the rhythms of sacramental life offer something different — a sense of belonging, meaning, and encounter with God. Through YMIC, we’re helping churches create spaces where young people can experience community, discover faith, and encounter the love of God.

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How It All Began 

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YMIC began in 2021 when a small group of church leaders gathered to ask an honest question: what would happen if we worked together? From that conversation came the idea of a shared approach to youth ministry across parishes, rooted in collaboration rather than competition.

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The first YMIC event was a simple experiment — a joint youth evening planned between a handful of parishes, expecting around thirty young people. More than sixty turned up. That evening revealed what could happen when churches unite their resources, imagination, and faith. What started as a single event has since become a movement of shared ministry, now involving over a dozen parishes across the Dioceses of London, offering opportunities for young people to connect, worship, and grow together.

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Our Approach 

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Our work is shaped by three core learnings from the past few years: collaboration, confidence, and communion.

 

Collaborative:
The Church is supposed to be collaborative, but we can often become too obsessed with our own patch and projects. Collaborating in youth ministry has been key to YMIC’s development because we could pool resources: finances, ideas, human resources, equipment, venues etc. Crucially, this meant we could put on attractive youth events that gained a critical mass. Creating spaces where young people could see they’re not the only under 18s in church and openly explore faith with those at the same stage of life has been central to YMIC’s growth.

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Confidence:
Working together to facilitate these engaging events for young people has correspondingly given confidence to each local partner parish church that it is possible to offer good youth provision in a way that is authentic to its own tradition. As St Thomas’ discovered, seeing is believing and these gathered events have built confidence for youth work at the local, parish, level. One of our partner parishes, for instance, having previously had no existing youth work during the week or on Sunday, has since developed detached work with a (non-church) secondary school in their parish, and now see more than 50 attend a weekly drop-in youth club at the church. Building this confidence amongst churches where youth work has often been limited or non-existent, reminds us that young people don’t have to go elsewhere to discover God’s transforming love!

 

Communion:
But this isn’t about churches backing themselves into a corner and rigidly insisting on the ‘rightness’ of their own tradition and spirituality. The Church flourishes when we learn from one another– when the Body recognises the gifts of each member. Simply put, YMIC is not about being partisan but learning from what works well elsewhere, whilst still trusting that the distinctiveness of its own tradition can be a gift to young people too. This has meant learning about the benefits of putting on attractive, invitational youth events– all of which wouldn’t be possible without collaboration and suitable resources. Yet the worship remains distinctive and authentic to the tradition of the partner parishes, feeding from rather than detaching from church on Sunday.

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Growing the Vision - Newly Launched YMIC Southwark 

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Early 2025 saw the Diocese of Southwark launch their own replication of YMIC, adapting our collaborative model to their diocesan context. This marks an exciting new chapter — proof that youth ministry can flourish across traditions and dioceses alike.

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We continue to grow, to take risks, and to trust in what God is doing among young people in the Church. At its heart, YMIC exists to see a Church that is younger, more diverse, and more alive — a Church where young people meet Christ and share God’s love with the world.