The International Community of Mennonite Brethren welcomed three new conferences at its biennial summit June 4-9 in Lilongwe, Malawi.

The Malawai MB conference, which began in the Dzaleka refugee camp about 15 years ago in the southern African nation, hosted delegates from 22 countries.

The new conferences are in Thailand, Uganda and the Philippines.

MB churches around the world urgently need to develop a younger generation of leaders, delegates said. In some regions, such as sub-Saharan Africa, this can mean focusing on teenagers, or even younger children, given the low life expectancy and the population’s median age.

There was consensus that the churches’ teaching must align with the ICOMB Confession of Faith. Translation and promotion of the Confession has led to plans for a theological council to oversee workshops at future summits and address issues that arise.

Delegates embraced a proposal to alternate global gatherings with regional summits. Web-based gatherings for prayer and teaching and promoting peer-to-peer partnerships will seek to strengthen relationships among conferences.

“There is a need for ICOMB to be more than what it has been,” said ­Elton DaSilva, ICOMB’s new gobal director, according to a report by Nikki White in the USMB magazine Christian Leader. “The next generation both wants and needs ICOMB to take a significant step forward, with a collective mission that reflects the reality of being a cohesive family of faith.

“Each conference has something unique to offer. Our goal is to identify and make those resources accessible for all conferences.”

The meeting’s agenda included the proposed launch of a five-fold ­vision. Delegates affirmed tenets to strengthen family dynamics, offer resources for leadership development, facilitate holistic mission, share theological convictions and nurture global church and conference health.

“There was widespread agreement that a holistic presentation of the gospel, ministering in both word and deed, is more crucial than ever,” White reported. “In this, as with missional reach, partnership is key. Where there is critical need for systems and structures to support both human and economic development, church planting may also mean garden planting.”

Forging a global family identity, DaSilva said, requires that the community’s vision be discerned and owned by everyone.

“It is not about the West imposing it’s views on everyone else,” he said. “It is about a mission and vision that emanate from all of us, to all of us.”

Participants expressed grief over the absence of a delegation from Ukraine due to the war.

ICOMB serves to connect global MB conferences, strengthen their ministries and expand the gospel’s reach around the world.