PRESS RELEASE

9th May 2011 - For Immediate Release On Sunday 8 May, Margaret Mizen helped to launch Million Minutes’ first campaign: a million minutes of silence. The silence aims to highlight the need to stand in solidarity with today’s young people who are so often not listened too, ignored and shut out of society.

Two days ahead of the third anniversary of the murder or her 16 year old son, Jimmy, Margaret joined the first day of ‘a million minutes of silence’. Accompanied by friends, family and supporters she led three generations of her family in a walk from St Paul’s Cathedral to Westminster Cathedral, all in complete silence.

Speaking after her silent walk Margaret Mizen said “This has been amazing. We have acted in solidarity not just with the hundreds of people staying silent across the country but also with those young people whom Million Minutes hope to support. Young people today are wonderful and we must continue to promote how wonderful they are.” Mrs Mizen went on to say “Million Minutes is set to turn into something big. I’m very proud and honoured to be a Champion of the charity. I encourage everyone to get involved. It has the potential to change lives!”

Three generations of the Mizen family took part in the silent walk. As well as two of her sons, 26 year old Tommy, and 11 year old George, her 8 month old granddaughter Eva was also miraculously silent for the 3 mile route.

Million Minutes, a new charity, was founded earlier this year to support projects which help young people to transform their lives and to put Catholic social teaching into practice.

Danny Curtin, cofounder and Trustee, said “A million minutes of silence is a smile idea. We are creating a deafening silence to speak up for our young people. They are worth so much, and all too often, they are ignored, overlooked and not enabled to fulfill their potential. With this loud, counter-cultural silence we are saying that something needs to change. As a society we need to support our young people to have their voice heard, to get active and to make a difference.”

Throughout the UK, hundreds of people of all ages joined in the start of the collective silence. In Bolton, young adults at the Schoenstatt Shrine met throughout the day to complete their pledge of 1000 minutes of silence. Members and youth leaders from the Impact group in St Edmund’s parish, Millwall, wore signs to explain to other parishioners that they were staying silent throughout the weekend. They totaled 6,480 minutes between them.

So far 650,000 minutes have been pledged nationwide. There is still the opportunity for others to pledge and to stay silent over the coming weeks. See www.millionminutes.org for more details and to pledge your minutes.

ENDS

Pictures (download below)

George and Margaret

George and Margaret 2

Leaving St Pauls

Margaret – Big Ben

St Pauls Cathedral

St Pauls Cathedral2

Walkers arrive on Westminster Cathedral Piazza

Westminster Cathedral (Photo includes Danny Curtin - back right)

Whitney, Marta, Louise (St Edmunds Parish, Millwall – Impact Group)

Notes for editors:

1. For more information or to arrange an interview with Margaret Mizen please call Danny Curtin on 07957190516 from 12noon on Monday 9 May.

2. Margaret Mizen runs the Jimmy Mizen Foundation with her husband Barry and their family. The Foundation is committed to working for peace among young people.

3. As well as The Jimmy Mizen Foundation, Million Minutes is also supporting the Cardinal Hume Centre, the Young Christian Workers, and a youth leadership project in Somaliland via the UK charity, Progressio. A grant making fund for youth projects throughout the UK will also be launched with the proceeds raised from the sponsored silence.

4. Alongside Margaret Mizen, Fr Christopher Jamison OSB, Paschal Uche and Delia Smith are all champions (patrons) of Million Minutes. Delia Smith says to young people: “What my seventy years on this planet can offer you is my utter conviction of the importance of allowing some time for stillness and silence in daily life. There are three main reasons for this. One is that it gradually enables us to understand ourselves more deeply. Two: this then expands our capacity to understand and relate to others and to the world. Three: as the deeper reflective part of our human nature develops it will draw us inexorably towards God. “Why not begin with Million Minutes? Don’t settle for life on the surface of things. The world needs young people like you to take up the challenge. In the words of St Paul ‘God’s power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine’ (Ephesians 3. 20).” Please note that Delia Smith is not available for interview due to diary commitments.

6. Anyone can volunteer to stay silent and get sponsored for it. More details can be found on the Million Minutes website, www.millionminutes.org

7. Million Minutes is a company limited by guarantee (number 7442390) and a charity registered in England and Wales (number 1140079).

Nearly There!

Across the country people are preparing for their silence, activity on our online fundraising site BMyCharity.com is increasing rapidly and we’re hearing so many more stories about peoples plans, what they’re doing to make the most of the fundraising opportunity along with their hopes, fears and expectations for their silence. Here is a selection of the stories we’re hearing:

  • In Fife we’ve heard about a scout group preparing to stay silent and anxious that they’ll make it the whole way through
  • In Bolton all of the young adult group from the Schoenstatt Shrine will be meeting at the shrine to stay silent throughout the day
  • In Warrington St. Gregory’s chaplaincy group is doing all they to spread the word throughout the school
  • In Macclesfield the team at Savio House Retreat Centre and a group training to volunteer overseas with Bosco Volunteer Action (BOVA) are staying silent together even though the BOVA group have never met each other (never mind the Savio team) before!
  • In Millwall some of the young parishioners of St. Edmond’s parish have signs ready to explain why they are silent at Mass on Sunday
  • All 24 of St. Mary’s Impact group, west Croydon, are staying silent to make up 24 hours and will be making sure everybody in the Parish knows about it!
  • The team from St. Vincent's Centre (of Southwark Youth Service) are ALL staying totally silent for 24 hours!

Want to make sure everybody know what you're doing for Million Minutes? We have an image ready that you can use as your profile picture on facebook or twitter (or anything else you like!). you can find it here, and all you need to do is just save it onto your computer and upload it as a new profile picture, easy!

For those of you who are anxious about you’re silence, we have two new resources which offer you practical tips for managing to stay silent for a whole 24 hours, one is from Sr Gabriel Davison (from BBC2’s The Concent) and the other is from a friend of Million Minutes, Matthew van Duyvenbode. Find them here and here, and as with many other fantastic things they are on our resources page here.

An Invitation from Margaret Mizen:

  • “During Million Minutes, on Sunday 8 May, I am walking in silence from St Paul’s Cathedral to Westminster Cathedral.”

Are you still to make plans for your silence? Why not come to walk with Margaret Mizen from St. Pauls Cathedral to Westminster Cathedral in silence? This is a great opportunity to stand (and walk!) in solidarity with not only Margaret Mizen and everyone else staying silent, but also all of those People are meeting outside St. Pauls at 12.45 to start walking at 1, the walk should take about 2 hours. It would be fantastic to see you there!

The best of luck to everyone staying silent on Sunday, we look forward to hearing about your experiences!

Savio House and Million Minutes

The team from Savio House Salesian Retreat Centre have started their preparation for their ‘big silence’, which is now less than a month away! The chart you can see them holding below is to keep track of their fundraising from friends and family, and to keep track of when each team member is going to be silent.

Alongside a period of communal silence, different team members will be silent for set periods of time in the week prior to the 8th of May as a form of witness. This will help to show the benefits of silence to the young people who come to Savio House alongside raising some money for a great cause.

If you want to support the Savio House team’s fantastic efforts you can offer words of support on their facebook page!

Million Minutes Interns

Million Minutes has been growing and growing since it launched and has recently taken on two interns who are keen to do all they can for youth dignity. Christine Sterlini and Chris Knowles (pictured below) have experience working with young people before, Christine volunteering at Manzini Youth Care, an orphanage in Swaziland and Chris at Savio House, a Salesian Retreat Centre near Macclesfield.

Christine, who has recently returned from her stint volunteering with overseas volunteer organization BOVA said that “it is really exciting being able to be part of such a great new venture”, “I was really keen to do something for young people on returning from Swaziland, and this has been a great opportunity”. Chris who currently finishing his Christian Theology MA at Heythrop College said that “Million Minutes is a great idea at a time when the young can easily get forgotten, I would urge anyone interested in helping the young of today to get involved”.

Head over to the Get Involved page to see what you can do!

Million Minutes at CYMFed

700 people who care passionately about young people gathered from all over the UK and beyond over the weekend at the 2011 CYMFed Youth Congress in London. So where better to take the amazing Million Minutes message?

We showcased our brand new video (see it here) and Julia from St Vincent's (and see more of them here) spoke about a young lad she met through her work who she knew would benefit from Million Minutes. Finally, Million Minutes Trustee Danny said a few words about how it all works (and if you still don't know, check it out here).

If each person in the room stayed silent for 24 hours, we'd reach the Million Minutes target, which was a sobering and amazing thought! So we'll wait and see. Meanwhile, don't leave it to them! Sign up to stay silent here!

Our Videos

Silent Night - Christmas Greetings from Million Minutes

Million Minutes at Flame 2012 at Wembley Arena! Watch our Champion, Margaret Mizen, with some of her family and Million Minute supported project, Safe Gorton.

See highlights of Safe Gorton backstage at Wembley Arena with Million Minutes at Flame 2012

Catch up with Million Minutes backstage at Flame 2012 at Wembley Arena

Million Minutes is one year old! Watch this video to see our story so far, and where we go from here

In this video we explore why silence is a great way to to stand up for, and raise money for, young people. With Fr Christopher Jamison OSB, Margaret Mizen and Paschal Uche.

In this video Fr Christopher Jamison explores the value of silence in life and offers two techniques for finding silence inside ourselves - a deeper time of silence - during the sponsored silence. Fr Christopher leads a time of reflection which can be used individually or as a group.

Use this video to introduce Million Minutes. Start the video whilst your audience are still gathering and chatting. As the volume builds and the noise becomes almost deafening the audience will become aware of the video and their attention captured - as the Million Minutes logo appears on the screen.

New Resources Avaliable!

We've been working hard on some new resources and updating others to help you do all you can to get involved! We have some more in depth info on the benefits of silence from Fr Christopher Jamison OSB and Delia Smith along with loads of activities and ideas for individual and group fundraising. We’ve got a couple of things which should help you tell everyone about the great things you’re doing! Most of these are in the two packs, the participant pack and the spread the word pack, but not all of them. Head over to our Resources page to have a look!

St Vincent's, Whitstable, get creative for Million Minutes

The amazing team at St Vincent's Youth Retreat Centre in Whitstable have been getting creative, looking at how to get young people going to their centre involved in Million Minutes. Not only have they been baking Million Minutes biscuits but they have put up a fantastic display on one of their notice boards to track their progress! Here is what they've said:

Southwark Catholic Youth Service and St Vincent’s Centre are supporting Million Minutes and are getting ready for the big ‘be quiet’ in a variety of ways.

In the common room of our retreat centre we now have a board devoted to raising awareness and money for our Million Minutes pledge.

As well as helping us to track the money we have raised, it also has space for the visitors to our centre, old and young alike, to write their pledges and take information and resources away on how to get involved. Our hope is that every school and parish group that join us over the coming months will take away an action pack and join in the big silence with us!

We will also be going into the parish of Whitstable once Lent has begun and are hoping to get more people involved. We’ve been practising our baking skills, pledging a Million Minute biscuit for every pledge in the parish we get.

Our community at St Vincent’s are very proud to be supporting such an exciting initiative, although we are all slightly nervous. As a group who struggle to be quiet at the best of times and who are quite attached to our facebook accounts and mobiles, we know it won’t be easy! Let’s just hope that lots of people will join us on the 8th of May when we will be silent for 24 hours.

Thanks for all your hard work! We can't wait to hear more about your progress and have a taste of the Million Minutes biscuits!