Our History
The history of Asia Pacific Baptist Youth dates back to 1953 when the Baptist Youth around the world met for the 4th Baptist World Youth Conference in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
One of the first initiation for the formation of ABYF came from Akiko Endo (Later Mrs. Matsumura) whose vision led to an October 10 meeting in 1954 in Sri Lanka. Joel Sorenson, who was the Youth Secretary of the Baptist World Youth, was invited by Willie Wikramasinghe followed by visits to India, Hong Kong, Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, Thailand and Myanmar.
Following the visit of Joel Sorenson, and correspondence amongst the leaders in Asia resulted in the first meeting of Asia Baptist Youth Fellowship on August 20, 1956. Hong Kong, Japan, India, Sri Lanka, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, Myanmar, Taiwan and Thailand answered the roll call parade of nations at the 1st Asian Baptist Youth Conference held in Hong Kong.
In 2006, at the 7th Congress of the Asian Baptist Federation in Chiang Mai, Thailand, the nomenclature of Asian Baptist Youth Fellowship was changed to Asia Pacific Baptist Youth.
Asia Pacific Baptist Youth continues to serve and represent Baptists around the Asia Pacific region as regional body to the Baptist World Alliance Youth Department.
