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Community Organising for Church Growth course

Rethinking the Meaning of ‘Church Growth’

How can embracing Community Organising as a spiritual practice enable us to subvert conventional church growth narratives and achieve real growth in depth, impact and numbers?

Join us for morning prayer (optional, at 8.30am), followed by (at 9am) an opportunity to share your breakfast in theological discussion and reflection with others. Those giving input will include: The Revd Polly Kersys Hull of the Centre of Theology and Community (London), and vicar at Holy Trinity and St Augustine of Hippo, Leytonstone, and Angela Sheard, curate at St Martin’s in the Fields, London, along with Keith Hebden (Community Organiser for Thames Valley Citizens) and Alison Webster (Mission Theologian in Residence for Citizens UK).

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 what it means to be an ‘organised church’: how this attracts new people into a church’s orbit through building relationships both internally and ‘externally’ with the wider community; enables disorganising ‘established ways of doing things’ and reorganising ways of being church that include newcomers, give them a voice, and ensure the church is responsive to the context in which it is set.

Details

Dates & Times

20 May 2024

Expired!

8:30 am - 11:00 am

Course code

2453

Other Notes

This is an online session delivered via Zoom. It is the second of three in the Community Organising Breakfasts series.

Online sessions (£25 each) of 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.

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 for Church Growth

Community Organising for Church Growth course