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About the Rural Pioneering course

Exploring the reality and challenge of rural ministry. What could a collaboration between parish and pioneering offer for the future of the rural church?

This course will focus on exploring some of the current issues in rural ministry and how pioneering might offer creative methods and examples for engaging in a fresh way with ministry in the countryside. This course is for anyone interested in growing faith and community in the rural context.

Session 1: We begin the day with a brief overview of pioneering, reflecting on the history, theology and practice of pioneering ministry with a specific focus on rural contexts.

Session 2: Naming the Elephant. We will engage with some of the current issues and challenges in rural ministry. We will identify the problems and pitfalls of pioneering and parish and explore what might need to die in order for other things to grow and flourish.

Session 3: Through case studies and shared experience, we will explore some ways in which pioneering and mixed ecology might offer creative solutions for the future. We will reflect on the long term impact of pioneering and on the skills required in leadership to create a permission giving space where new expressions of church are able to flourish.

Session 4: There will be time to pray, reflect plan, dream and ask questions of those who have led rural pioneering projects or enabled them and explore what it might mean to begin and continue pioneering in the countryside.

Pioneering in the rural context is being open to the work of the Holy Spirit and seeking to connect with people outside the more traditional Sunday worship patterns in order to help people come to know and discover God.

Examples of rural pioneering might be as simple as creating a group of people who meet outside to walk together, to chat together, to seek the presence of God in nature: Forest Church, Muddy Church or walking church might fit this model.

Jo Neary is Rural Tutor in Ministry and Mission at Sarum College and has been Pioneer Priest in the Beaminster Area Team since 2012.
Sally Taylor is a Pioneer Priest working in Hamworthy Parish and in Old Town.

Book Event

Early bird discount in person ticket course #2792 £55

This is a discounted early bird ticket offering the course for £55.00 rather than the normal £60.00. This offer expires 60 days prior to the event and cannot be used in conjunction with any other discount. This course will be held onsite at Sarum College. The course fee includes lunch and refreshments.

Available Tickets: 0

The Early bird discount in person ticket course #2792 ticket sales has ended!

In person Early Bird ticket # 2792 with B&B the night before £113

This is a discounted early bird ticket offering the course for £113.00 rather than the normal £118.00. This offer expires 60 days prior to the event and cannot be used in conjunction with any other discount. This course will be held onsite at Sarum College. The course fee includes lunch and refreshments. The extra B&B on 26th September 2023 includes accommodation in an en-suite room and breakfast the morning of the course. If the ticket you wish to purchase is showing as not available, please contact me on bclover@sarum.ac.uk, as we may be able to accommodate your request.

Available Tickets: 0

The In person Early Bird ticket # 2792 with B&B the night before ticket sales has ended!

In person ticket course #2792 £60

This course will be held onsite at Sarum College. The course fee includes lunch and refreshments.

Available Tickets: 3

The In person ticket course #2792 ticket is sold out. You can try another ticket or another date.

In person ticket with B&B the night before course #2792 £118

This course will be held onsite at Sarum College. The course fee includes lunch and refreshments. The extra B&B on 26th September 2023 includes accommodation in an en-suite room and breakfast the morning of the course. If the ticket you wish to purchase is showing as not available, please contact me on bclover@sarum.ac.uk, as we may be able to accommodate your request.

Available Tickets: 1

The In person ticket with B&B the night before course #2792 ticket is sold out. You can try another ticket or another date.

Salisbury CMD (in person) course #2792 £0

This course is part of the Salisbury Continuing Ministerial Development programme. Please use this ticket only If you are eligible for a free place and wish to participate in-person. If you need to check eligibility and / or terms & conditions for the booking, please contact parishsupport@salisbury.anglican.org

Available Tickets: 1

The Salisbury CMD (in person) course #2792 ticket is sold out. You can try another ticket or another date.

Details

Dates & Times

27 Sep 2023

10:00 am - 4:00 pm

Tutor(s)

The Revd Jo Neary

Course code

2792

Other Notes

This course will be held onsite at Sarum College. The course fee includes lunch and refreshments.

Places are set aside for those eligible for Salisbury Continuing Ministerial Development.

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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.

Read full article

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

Tutor(s)

The Revd Jo Neary

Tutor in Rural Ministry and Mission

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Rural Pioneering