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Community Organising and Holistic Mission Strategies course

How can embracing community organising as a spiritual practice enhance and reshape holistic mission, whatever our context? And what are the implications of this for ordained and lay ministry?
One of three online community organising breakfast conversations. The next two sessions are 20 May (Church Growth) & 8 October (Justice, Not Just a Charity).

Join us for morning prayer, followed by an opportunity to share your breakfast in theological discussion and reflection with others. This event is organised in partnership with Citizens UK (www.citizensuk.org)

Community Organising in the UK is a fast-growing methodology for working through diverse alliances for change and justice in our communities. But it is also a potent force for leadership development, vocational discernment and congregational development and growth. In this session we will dig deeply into a relational and missional theology that challenges the ‘world as it is’; works towards the ‘world as it should be’; enabling us to see where and how God is at work in our communities. We will also explore how our assumptions about and patterns of ministry, lay and ordained, can be reassessed and transformed.

About the facilitators
Alison Webster is a practical and mission theologian who offers spiritual accompaniment. She is General Secretary of Modern Church, and leads the Exploring Theology programme at Sarum. An experienced group and workshop facilitator, Alison has a particular passion for using the arts to encourage personal and social transformation. She has written widely on social justice, community organising and social action within an Anglican context for many years and is of Methodist heritage. Alison has published four books, most recently, Found Out: Transgressive Faith and Sexuality, along with numerous articles and resource books. She is founder (and now emeritus) editor of two international journals, Theology and Sexuality, and Political Theology.

Keith Hebden spent 7 years as a Secondary School teacher in Leicester and then London where he was Head of R.E. then trained at to be a priest in the Church of England, serving in Gloucester and Mansfield. He then spent two years as Director of the Urban Theology Unit before retraining as a Community Organiser – work he was engaged in since 2009 – and now supports a team of organisers who work with Thames Valley Citizens and a national Living Wage campaign.

Details

Dates & Times

07 Feb 2024

Expired!

8:30 am - 11:00 am

Course code

2847

Other Notes

A multi-tasker’s dream session.

Online sessions of morning prayer, followed by theological discussion and reflection as you tuck into your breakfast.

This event is organised in partnership with Citizens UK (www.citizensuk.org)

This series of three courses is delivered via Zoom.

Each session is £25; the series of three is £60.

To book all 3 sessions, please use the ticket #2846. Sessions may also be booked separately on each date for £25 each.

The discounted price of £60 for the whole series may not be used in conjunction with any other offer.

Free places are set aside for those eligible for Salisbury CMD.

What our students say

PhD Research Programmes

Visual Artist Claire Reed

The complex and sometimes fractious relationship between contemporary art and religion has intrigued me throughout my art career, informing my direction as an artist. It has led me to work in sacred spaces with their immediate and wider communities, to study an MA in Theology, Imagination and Culture at Sarum College, and recently to become artist–researcher at Leo Baeck College of Jewish scholarship and learning.

My aim is to examine the extent to which this creative approach might generate fruitful inter-religious theological insights within a Jewish and Christian ministry training context.

Sarum College combines an open-minded embrace of the imagination and the arts with a supportive, questioning and diverse community. Crucially for me, the Sarum-Winchester PhD programme is one of the very few UK university programmes to offer a hybrid thesis in art and theology in which the creative process and resulting art output along with a written critical component are presented for examination.

This PhD research is a key part of my development as an artist engaged with theology and inter-religious dialogue.

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Stimulating and Challenging

What is Successful Ageing? led by James Woodward

I enjoyed the course immensely from beginning to end – the seamless interweaving of knowledge, ideas and research and the linking with belief and faith.

The content was stimulating, challenging, thought provoking and I was greatly appreciative of the contributions and questions from other participants, your considered and sensitive responses and integration with your presentations.

Thank you!

Netflix, Theology and Pastoral Practice

Peter Butchers on his MA in Theology, Imagination and Culture student experience

How do cultural tropes, like those found in Black Mirror, help bridge the gap between what academic theology espouses and what the everyday Christian believes? In his research as a student on the MA in Theology, Imagination and Culture, Peter Butchers explored platonic philosophy, digital theology and eschatology, and pastoral practice around death and dying.

Rewarding Sabbatical Stay

The Revd Greg Syler, is Rector of Ascension & St. George’s, Resurrection Parish in the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, DC USA, spent part of his ministry sabbatical at Sarum College in spring 2022.

His account of the experience begins: ‘I loved spending nearly three weeks of my ministry sabbatical at Sarum College earlier this year.

Not only did I rest, and rest well in the comfortable care of the Sarum College staff, I experienced very significant renewal and fresh insights.’

The Road Not Taken

Sarum Graduate Mike Truman

January 2022

Five years ago, I told my Warden of Readers that I would not be renewing my licence when it expired in 2019, as I thought my faith was becoming too unorthodox for a Church of England licensed lay minister. As someone who knew me well, she challenged me to actively explore what I did still believe. Thus started the journey that ended last August with the dissertation completing my MA in Theology Imagination and Culture (MATIC) at Sarum College.

Clergy Study Breaks

The opportunity for clergy to get away occasionally from their own context, to have an overnight stay in the beautiful setting of Sarum College and all that the Salisbury Cathedral Close offers is hugely valuable. All the clergy I have suggested who have spent 24hrs at Sarum College have benefit greatly from the experienced mentoring where they can talk, reflect, think, plan and pray.

The support and encouragement they receive is excellent and has a positive on their on going ministry. This is something the Diocese of Rochester encourages and supports financially in preparation for their clergy preparing for Extended Ministerial Development Leave (Sabbatical).

— Canon Christopher Dench, Diocese of Rochester Director of Formation and Ministry

Retreats and Private Stays

When I arrived, exhausted and sensitive, I was grateful not to be asked by Reception were I came from, whether I had had a good journey etc. That was the kind of hospitality I needed: a non-intrusive welcome that was found in ancient cultures and still survives in some societies today, where the host asks questions about a stranger and his journey only when the visitor has rested and been given food and drink.

— guest on a private stay

Biblical Study Breaks

I just found it very refreshing – as a leader of a church I don’t get as many opportunities to step out and do courses (my fault, not the church!) and so I loved it. I think it was run really well online – which is a difficult medium to work with.

Pádraig Ó Tuama (pictured) was outstanding in his balance of getting us to engage and sharing his learning. Also the quick availability of resources provided by Sarum College Librarian Jayne Downey was excellent.

— course participant, Story Theology: Narrative Approaches to Scripture

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Community Organising and Holistic Mission Strategies

Community Organising and Holistic Mission Strategies course