About CBC
The Christian Broadcasting Council
– Bringing believers together to fulfil
the Great Commission through media
Welcome to our freshly updated website which is part of instilling new life into our organisation for this next season of faith-based mass media. We hope you will join us in our revived quest to promote Christian media; mentor new broadcasters; and lobby for freedom of speech; while providing a comprehensive directory of TV, Radio and online networks and allied services to the broadcast industry.
CBC HISTORY
God USEd US TO HELP BIRTH CHRISTIAN MEDIA IN THE UK
The Christian Broadcasting Council of the United Kingdom dates back to 1986 when the charity was founded to help develop Christian media in our nation. As an umbrella body for Christian media, we started by laying a foundation of prayer and intercession while Christian programming was in its infancy. Since then we have seen God raise up new networks in extraordinary ways.
The original CBC charitable objective was to “stimulate and promote the knowledge of the Christian faith and the propagation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ by means of radio and television broadcasting; through the exhibition of films, videos and DVDs, through the distribution of cassettes and records and via the printed word.”
Though the means have changed with advances in technology, the CBC mission remains to: “Promote the proclamation of the Christian Gospel through the electronic media. Organising conferences and giving awards for excellence in broadcasting and related matters. Support of independent Christian broadcasters. Communication with Ofcom and other Government related agencies.”
Since the CBC started, the UK has seen the rapid development of Christian TV, radio and many new and exciting online opportunities and the CBC has helped to facilitate this. In our prime, we hosted high profile awards ceremonies to recognise high quality Christian programming from both Christian and secular broadcasters.
The last awards banquet was held in 2012 and unfortunately CBC’s role has diminished in recent years. Our former chairperson, Canon Ian Goodling passed away in 2020 and we have been largely dormant except for ongoing prayer led by our current chair, Olave Snelling. During this period the charity has been administered by Cornerstone Vision on a pro bono basis to comply with Charity Commission requirements.
However, our passion for media has never waned and we continue to have high profile patrons and trustees who see the increasing need for an effective advocacy body. We believe it is a new season for the organisation and with fresh impetus and the support of the Christian community we can bring more and more believers together to fulfil the Great Commission via media.
Our CBC Awards recognise British media talent with spiritual content – in Gold, Silver and Bronze categories.
CBC FUTURE
NOW GOD CALLS US TO FOSTER
KINGDOM COLLABORATION IN MEDIA
It has long been the dream of our CBC leadership to to revive the Christian Broadcasting Council and get it back to being fully operational. Things started to take as step in this direction when, in 2021, Media Solicitor, Luke English felt led to work with the charity’s trustees to create a new working committee to revive the original operations and develop helpful new initiatives to support Christian broadcasting.
Luke’s idea was to collaborate with all stakeholders to develop a new website that will connect and encourage Christians in the media industry. As believers none of us are in competition with each other. We are all members of the Body of Christ with a joint responsibility to go into all the world and share the Gospel. And, we all know media is one of the most effective ways to achieve this!
One of the ways we believe we can bring Christians together is through a comprehensive directory of who’s who in Christian broadcasting. This is why we have put the The CBC UK Directory together. We hope that this new online listing will be a huge blessing to all involved in Christian broadcasting as well as to the wider Christian community.
We trust that the project will be well supported and through this Kingdom initiative, we will be able to revive some of the other projects CBC has offered previously including bringing back our annual broadcast awards. Everyone involved in Christian outreach / media and related services is invited to participate.