In Depth:  Mark Loughridge

Two years ago saw the start of Kinfire, a new and unique conference/festival for Christians in the Republic of Ireland. About 600 gathered for the inaugural event – fast forward just two years and a larger meeting space was needed for the 850 who had registered to come!

Great teaching abounded, especially from local pastors on the main stage, including Mark Smith (pictured), and from a variety of speakers in the seminars – including Michael Ots on evangelism and Crawford Gribben on the exciting early history of the Irish church.

Last year saw the inaugural ‘Kinfire Festival’ – a holiday conference for Irish reformed/conservative evangelicals – with about 500 in attendance.

This year over 700 people gathered in Kilkenny from 15–18 August. It’s hard to put into words how amazing it is to see those numbers of brothers and sisters in Christ gathering to worship from all over the island. This is new for us in Ireland.

Great Bible teaching, great fellowship, great fun, great encouragement – all these marked the inaugural Kin(cid:30)re Festival in Kilkenny, Ireland. Six hundred Christians from all over Ireland gathered to worship, learn, fellowship and hang out together.

The idea for Kinfire was born out of an online prayer meeting hosted by the Irish Gospel Partnership (IGP),that attracted over 300 people from all across Ireland. The question was asked: ‘What if we were able to get this many people together in person to spend time together around God’s word and to be encouraged by simply being together?’ And so Kinfire was born.

At least two new churches have been planted in Ireland in tandem with the recent ‘What’s the Story?’ (WTS) outreach initiative in Ireland.

Christ City Church in central Dublin (some members pictured) had been looking to plant a church in the more residential area in the south of the city to reach the people there.

letter from the

A recent survey carried by Aontas (an association of Irish evangelical churches) has found that there are 115 towns with a population of over 5,000 people where there is no evangelical witness at all.

At present Ireland has the lowest percentage of evangelicals in the English-speaking world. Because of this very low percentage, it is difficult for the church in Ireland to produce sufficient leaders to meet current needs. Therefore, there remains a constant need for missionaries.