YMCA World Council 2022 to go ahead in Aarhus, Denmark, 3-9 July 2022

Date: 13 April 2021

The 20th YMCA World Council will go ahead – as planned – in Aarhus, Denmark from 3-9 July 2022.

The Implementation Committee for the event has been in close consultation with the wider YMCA Movement and with YMCA Denmark, the hosts, and decided that all appropriate measures will be taken as it continues to monitor the global Covid situation, and that the event will go ahead.

Given that Covid may still restrict the ability to travel, the Summit – for the first time ever – will be in hybrid form: part in-person, and part on-line.

‘We are thrilled at this decision’, said Mathilde Thue, Chair of the Strategy Committee of the World YMCA Executive Committee, which has overall governance responsibility for the World Council.

‘This hybrid approach ensures that no one in the global YMCA Movement will be excluded from a vital forum in which we convene and reinforce each other as global Movement, looking back over the last four-year cycle, and ahead to the next.

‘Huge issues will be on the table in Aarhus, including the culmination of the Youth-Led Solutions Initiative in which young people will showcase their own solutions in the face of global climate, jobs and mental health crises. We will also continue to discuss how we ‘reimagine’ ourselves out of Covid as the ‘adaptive YMCA’ of the 21st Century, while creating the type of society we want to see.

‘And for the first time ever, we hope to agree a 10-year strategy to 2030, to align our vision with that of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and clearly set out our vision, purpose and plans.’

‘Covid is a generational crisis – and a generational opportunity’, added Stephen Butz, co-chair of the World Council Implementation Committee. ‘As our first global meeting since the crisis, this landmark event will help make sense of what has happened to the world and the important role we all have in charting the YMCA’s future.’

Stay updated through the 20th YMCA World Council page on the World YMCA website. Full details of the Council will be communicated as they emerge, and a separate website housing all Meeting content, including registration details, will be created.