A flamingo, seasonal festivity and faith

Naomi Dawson, Regional Training Co-ordinator for the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (Europe), writes:

‘I love swimming, I swam competitively as a child and have adored it since. Yet as an adult I’ve not found friends to swim with. When lockdown hit and all the pools closed, swimmers took to ingenious ways of keeping fit. For me I turned to our local river and put an advert out on social media for someone to join me. Nineteen months later, we have a vibrant river swimming group with over 60 regular swimmers.’

And Naomi says she has been able to launch some gentle festive evangelism with an annual ‘festive swim and sing’. She says: ‘Everyone dresses up in fancy dress, brings flasks full of mulled wine and lots of cake. We then do our regular swim but accompanied by musicians in a canoe singing carols.’