Gerard & Gerdine Willemsen
We hope as church that we shall find new ways to make the Christian faith relevant to the secularised Sweden of today.
Gerard and Gerdien Willemsen live in Stockholm since the summer of 2012. Before that, they had been living since 1991 in Lapland, lastly in Kiruna, the most northerly city in Sweden.
After 8 years in Rotebro, a northern suburb, Gerdien serves now as pastor for a local church of Uniting Church in Sweden in the south of Stockholm which tries to reach out to the secularized people there. It is a small congregation but with a wish tocreate contacts in many different ways, in which Gerdien with her experience can give an important contribution. As the only pastor in this church, her task encomprises as well pastoral care, counselling, preaching but also activities aimed at social and youth work. Her experience with different creative methods is very valuable there. Growth does not go fast in Stockholm but new people have joined and also a small youthwork has started.
Gerard does still some work with Sami church work, the indigenous nomadic population of Lapland (an area in the north of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia), and other indigenous peoples. Gerard tries to present the Gospel to thess people groups in an accessible way. This is part of his responsibility for global mission in the Uniting Church in Sweden. This gives also a possiblity to stimulate mission to Europe from Sweden. The mission focus in Europe lies at the moment in Spain, Belarus, Russia and the Caucasus.
