church of england Archives - Page 8 of 11

Kairos, Harrogate

Kairos – previously St Mary's Low Harrogate – was launched when the Rt Revd John Packer, Bishop of Ripon and Leeds, gave his blessing to the latest Bishop's Mission Order church. What does it mean to be a BMO? Pioneer Minister Mark Carey outlines the story so far.

We launched our radical form of network church in October 2010 so obviously everything is still very new. It's a fledgeling community but we are very excited about the opportunities opening up.

In saying that, we are very much in a transition stage with elements of inherited church in the midst of all the other stuff going on – it’s a classic mixed economy encapsulated into one setting!

Formerly Priest in Charge at St Mary's, I have been here for three years with the first being taken up by testing and seeing. Two years further down the line and there have been some really encouraging things along the way, not least the development of Kairos, but now we need to try and embed a new vision and work out how it looks to be in a way that's centralised – yet decentralised. We're in new territory here so things take time – but that's fine.

Some things look familiar, such as our using a hall in Harrogate for Sunday worship once a fortnight and a weekly 9am Communion service but other things are very different. Kairos, while one church, is also a group of smaller network churches, small to mid-size groups of up to 30 people known, officially, as mid-sized/mission-shaped communities (MSCs). Each of these communities is treated as a church in its own right, meeting not in a church building but in all sorts of places like homes, cafes or pubs.

Kairos Church is about becoming a new kind of church which focuses on releasing communities of followers to live out the mission of Jesus. This is being worked out through people who are good news in our workplaces, families and friendships.

In saying that we very much value our place in the Church of England as a fresh expression of church within the Anglican tradition. We are:

influenced by rule of life of the Order of Mission;

involved in the New Wine movement;

focused on prioritising partnership in mission with other churches.

But the history of St Mary's and how things have changed in this area can find echoes in CofE parishes up and down the country. This parish was originally established to serve an area of Harrogate from the centre near the Pump Rooms right up to Harlow Hill at the edge of the town. Two worship centres were built, St Mary's as the main parish church and All Saints – a chapel at the top of Harlow Hill for the surrounding area.

St Mary's was closed in January 2007 due to severe problems with the building. At almost the same time All Saints had to close its doors, again because of concerns about the building, and it was formally shut down in 2009. The church continued to pray and work towards effective discipleship and mission and St Mary's moved into Harrogate Grammar School for Sunday services until Summer 2008.

By then it had started a significant transition from parish church to a fresh expression of church serving the whole deanery of Harrogate. Fully part of the Deanery and the Diocese of Ripon and Leeds, St Mary's became Kairos Church because Kairos is a Greek word of great significance for Christians as it speaks of the appointed time in the purpose of God.

We continue to meet together twice a month in a hall that houses the Kairos Church office and various activities. It is also used by a number of local community organisations.

Our vision is to release communities of followers to live the mission of Jesus, encourage many communities of followers of Jesus released to do what they think Jesus would do – and is doing – see all ages engaged in the joy of being the church on the move people and learning together how to be disciples as they go.

We have got a great bunch of people here with some joining us because they fully support our vision while others have taken the journey from the old St Mary's into the new Kairos. There are those who just take it on board instinctively and others like being part of it but who are struggling to understand it or only understand elements of it. Most get the fact that if we don't function in a number of different ways we are unlikely to be able to engage with the large percentage of people who won't be attracted through the doors traditionally.

There is no hostility but there is a real mixture of uptake on the vision and very different interpretations within the mission shaped congregations themselves. People do have very, very, different understandings of what we're doing and why but I'd expect that at this stage!

Some of our MSCs are developing well. Wanderers are led by an early retired couple with experience and real passion for the Gospel. They also have a deep understanding about what they are doing in that they are going out on the streets and are very purposeful. People coming to that tend to be from mid-30s to early 50s.

They have been developing this community long before Kairos became a BMO but the group is developing with regular attendance up to 18 and another 10 people who consider themselves to be in relationship with them.

We also have Eucharist in a pub by using a family room in Wetherspoons for Curry and Communion. Our MSCs do all sorts of things because they are in the sort of environment where they feel free to fail. Some of our MSC leaders, from a traditional church background, are happy to no longer be drawn into any of the 'performance' that can accompany what it means to be church.

One of my hopes for 2011 is that we will get our first multiplications of MSCs this year. I also pray for fruitfulness from all the sowing of relationships across this area. We are going to start a new MSC at the start of the year which will take us to six and I would like to see another couple of MSCs. Some of them are very small but they have a very real sense of purpose.

Ecumenical relations are very important to us and we welcomed quite a lot of church leaders from the area to our launch in October. Among the denominations there is a great deal of understanding and we get a lot of support as a deanery initiative.

One of the key concepts we have worked with since the earliest days of the transition to a fresh expression of church is that of being a tent community with a tent mentality. We have found ourselves without church buildings, enabling us to develop a mentality that is at heart simple and flexible. Only time will tell how that mentality will translate into the life and work of Kairos.

Messy Church at Parkstone URC

Alison Dalton, Church Related Community Worker, looks at the growth of Messy Church at Parkstone United Reformed Church, Poole.

We began our Messy Church journey four years ago with our ecumenical partners – the Parish of Parkstone St Peter's and St Osmund's with Branksea St Mary's.

They already had really strong links with our local schools and were involved in holiday activity days. Those developing these events had been inspired by Messy Church founder Lucy Moore and wanted to explore the idea of Messy Church further. As a result we talked together and developed our team throughout 2006.

After discussions with the schools, parents and carers and wider community it was decided that the Messy Church model would be piloted over six months. However, through my experience as a Church Related Community Worker, I realised that six months was not long enough to get something off the ground and so it was extended to one year. Our Messy Church journey began in January 2007 but it was in the eleventh month that our numbers increased. Our lowest numbers in the early days were around 10 children and their carers whilst our highest numbers were over 60 children plus parents/carers.

We were in no doubt that this was a different experience to our earlier activity days, this was Messy Church! The upshot is that we have found ourselves developing a community, asking questions of ourselves about Church, baptism and who we really are. For me personally that has been a key part of the whole thing, being able to look at such questions as, 'Is this an activity or is it church?' 'If it is church, how can we make it more sustainable?' 'How can we be open to people's questioning without imposing our belief system on them?'

I feel the whole thing is about relationship. If I was in the position of forming a new traditional church and it was developing as a community, I wouldn't expect that to happen after a month or so – it would take years. Why should Messy Church be any different? I have just got to be ready to be where people are, not expect things to happen quickly but be prepared when it does.

It's all about timing and unreal expectations.

Lucy Moore has facilitated two training sessions for us and continues to support us through the Messy Church Network. Nearly four years on – and with a cluster of a dozen Messy Churches in Poole – we realise that this development is really important for us as individuals, as a team and as a wider ecumenical partnership. Parkstone and St Peter's have been a Local Ecumenical Partnership for about nine years but Messy Church, among other initiatives, has helped that partnership to deepen even further because we have got a shared goal, a shared vision and shared experience. When we work together we grow together and that's of great benefit to everyone.

Those Messy Churches which are part of our local network have worked together to ensure that they are not in competition with each other and their Messy Church times do not clash. This means that mums or dads and their children can go to all the various Messy Churches if they want to and we have already found that some parents are doing just that.

There are many personal good news stories about God's work through these churches. People who have gone forward for baptism in other churches have said it was because of their involvement in Messy Church; our Messy Church coordinator has been accepted for ministerial training; members of St Peter's youth group, and other young people, have become actively involved as volunteers while students at a local college cook – and sometimes serve – food for Messy Church sessions as part of their studies in life skills.

Visions and Transcendence

Sue Wallace reports on the development of Transcendence, an Ancient-Future mass in York Minster.

Going to Transcendence has been compared to stepping into a medieval painting, bathed in light and moving images. It's a place where you can sit on a cushion and watch the incense smoke curling through the projector beams, lighting up the futuristic technology, and journey around an ancient building by night, kneeling at a creative prayer installation.

Transcendence is a collaboration between York Minster and Visions, who have been doing alternative worship in St Cuthberts in York since 1991. In 2005 Sue Wallace did some MA research into the cultural and spiritual journeys of some residents of central York and all the respondents cited York Minster as a sacred space to them, even confessed athiests. They also felt that classical and ambient music was the most spiritual for them. Later, in 2006 Visions hosted some services in York Minster crypt while roof repairs were carried out at St Cuthberts.

Out of these elements an idea was born. What if Visions teamed up with the Minster once a month and created a new fresh expression? One that combined the best of what Visions and the Minster had to offer: beautiful singing; creative prayer; colourful visuals; liturgy with depth and passion combined with futuristic technology and a transcendent atmosphere of powerful approachable-otherness. An Ancient-Future Mass.

So after some time of talking, waiting and prayer a plan was hatched to try two of these services in November and December 2007. It was hard in a sense to imagine what this new service might be like, unless we actually tried it. Sometimes you just need to learn how to do something by doing it! The response has been completely wonderful!

A continuing element of Transcendence has been mixing up the old and the new. Using some quite ancient chants (some of which are older than most of the minster) and new elements such as live video mixing, beats and DJs. We named the service Transcendence is because we wanted that awesome atmosphere. We wanted to be able to go into a space where someone would want to fall on their knees and say 'Wow! God is amazing.'

You could compare our video stuff to stained glass its just that it moves, and its the same with the music. You could compare the DJs to the organ. They're doing basically the same job but in a different way. Yet the music and the images are the ones we listen to every day. There is a link there between our everyday lives and God, and yet when we offer it in worship it is transformed. Every time we plan a service it feels like a completely new thing, a blank sheet of paper, and yet there's always a sense of familiarity. The journey is recognisable to those who want that sense of continuity.

We have had visitors from far and near and a huge age spread too. Old friends making a tentative return through the church doors and tourists from far-flung places who saw the publicity. God has been deeply touching people during the worship, especially during the creative prayer.

Each Transcendence we have tried has been different, and we are very much learning as we go along. It is exciting and scary and new territory for us all. The first time we had four wonderful minster choristers come and sing a stunningly-beautiful mass setting for us in the candlelit atmosphere. The second service included a world class cellist and a group of singers with Taize chants.

At others we have had specially written new settings of ancient hymns and a chance to explore the space and interact with prayer installations. With gold, incense and myrrh for example, praying for world leaders, those far from God, and the broken-hearted.

Yet each time the climax, as ever, has been in bread and wine, connecting us to Christ and each other, but also across history to the hoards of Christians who have worshipped in that place across the centuries up to one and a half millenia and more. It makes me realise what an amazing privilege we have, and yet what a huge responsibility, singing the next verse of the Great Story and Song to those who have not yet heard the tune, with a certain freedom to improvise, but in such a way that the Word is still heard. Exciting stuff!

Grafted

Refresh, a fresh expression of church in the Scottish Borders, has grown out of the Church Army's Grafted project. Established in 2003 by Church Army officer Paul Little, Refresh continues to develop new ministries in the region.

I came to the area in 2001 straight out of Church Army college and my first post was as an evangelist in the outdoor centre here which belongs to Barnabas Trust, now known as Rock UK. We are 25 miles north east from Carlisle and 20 miles south of Hawick in the Scottish Borders, the very furthest tip of Edinburgh diocese. There's somewhere around 800 in the traditionally agricultural community though there is a lot of tourism in the summer.

I was placed with another officer and my brief was to be an evangelist on the site to the 9,000 people who visited very year but it soon became clear to me that the future job would be very different. God had called me here but it was to be for another reason and this started to take shape after I ran a 10-week course for six people recognised as most serious offenders in the youth justice system. During that time one did reoffend but otherwise everybody had a clean sheet and the police would ring up asking where they were! Basically it worked because the young people had something to do on a Friday which appealed to their sense of adventure and helped them develop skills at the same time.

They ranged from 12/13 year-olds up to 16 and were basically pre-prison status. It was an experimental last ditch programme and things have developed a lot more since then. Many of the young people I have met along the way are now in their early 20s and those relationships bring lots of opportunities.

Those first few years saw me heavily involved in networking with youth work, social justice projects and drug agencies so that when it came to running the stuff we are now running, there were already strong relationships in place and they were prepared to trust us. It may have appeared to be quite unfruitful at the time but those early links have become vital. Many of the people I first came across are now key decision makers and budget holders in the area but it all takes time and you have to allow that time if things are going to be effective. These days we get a lot of referrals from social workers – even though they know we’re Christian and we're trying to tell the Gospel. The local council also funds us to run the youth work in the village.

Grafted (Giving Hope to those Without Hope) is known locally for its work with people struggling with drug and alcohol dependency. Using outdoor activities such as canoeing, mountain biking and mountaineering, Grafted's Window of Time project helps to develop leadership and self esteem in those with poor basic and social skills, or those with learning disabilities or emotional and behavioural difficulties.

The project runs 5 days a week, including a drop-in on Tuesdays at Hawick Youth Centre. This provides a safe and supportive environment with opportunities to talk to others who have been able to overcome their own addictions and hear their stories. There is also a discussion group for those wanting to talk about issues of faith and the bigger questions of life.

Each Wednesday we encourage people from the drop-in to join us for adventurous outdoor activities which help promote an active lifestyle. These include hill walking, canoeing, kayaking, archery and mountain biking. Throughout the rest of the week, we support people in a variety of ways by attending appointments, accompanying them to court and showing kindness and support where needed.

We have an open access policy and anyone over 18 is welcome to attend.

Referrals and recommendations also come through social workers, health professionals and the Criminal Justice system.

The other strand to all of this is the fact that my wife and I joined the Presbyterian Church when we moved here. In fact I was actually preaching in a Presbyterian Church when I felt a strong calling from God to leave and begin another one. What sprang to mind was, 'Leave the 99 sheep and look for the lost one' from Matthew 18 and Luke 15. It sounds simple but I went through a year without going to church as an 'event' and instead learned about 'being' the church rather than 'doing' it.

Refresh Community Church in Newcastleton was the result of that period. About three quarters of the people who have come over all are non-Christians and we have grown to about 20 in number with some 60 people from the community involved in one way or another. There are also groups that meet under the banner of Refresh, all of which are missional because the people who make up the leadership are locals who have been through Alpha.

It's normal for them to do things that are missional but that is something else that has taken time as well. We had to be strong at one particular point because we found there were a lot of people who were already Christians attracted to Refresh and they wanted things to become more settled and comfortable. It meant we had to be quite firm in saying that we were called to be a mission group in the village. We work well alongside the Presbyterian Church but have always had this vision of Refresh as a lifeboat and we do our best never to become a cruise ship. That doesn't suit everybody but some people just want to cruise and enjoy all the benefits that brings.

When we meet for Refresh, there is usually discussion and some sung worship. We don't have anybody at all who is ordained – we never have had on the leadership team. Children's work didn't really take place in the community when we started Refresh but it is flourishing now.

Stepping Stones is church for two to four-year-olds and their parents and carers. This takes place each Monday and has become an integral part of the week for many.

Other children's activities include Boulder Gang on Thursdays and Rock Solid Crew. The groups are run in six week blocks and there are social events in between, things like games nights, activity sessions, movie nights and adventure walks. Each week we follow a theme based on a Bible story and a memory verse and we include games, worship, and prayer. We have an average of 25 primary school children coming along each week, with 16 of those not attending any other form of church.

In June we took a group of 32 of these young people to a Christian residential weekend called 'Spree'. They all had a great time and are already looking forward to going back next year.

More recently, and as part of Refresh, Deeper was developed for 14 to 19-year-olds in the village. Deeper is a home group for teenagers, which meets each Sunday in a Church Army house we have here. The aim of the group is to disciple the young people who come along and encourage them to grow deeper in their relationship with God. The evening consists of games, a talk and discussion with food. On average 12 young people attend regularly. We see youth work as a priority so we are looking at new ways of developing youth work for 2011.

At the other end of the age range, another group came about when Mary – a member of Refresh – felt called by God to invite the elderly people we visit each week to come to a regular tea party. Mary serves a home-cooked meal with plenty of cakes and scones for afters. Our guests chat to their peers and lifelong friends who they haven’t seen for years and this is sometimes followed by a short time of worship and a speaker talking about some aspect of their Christian faith.

Some of those at Refresh are still involved with their local church and we did come close to meeting on a Sunday because we wanted to reach families but we decided that wasn't the right way forward. We have explored, and continue to explore, a lot of options but the important thing is that we see ourselves as part of the one Church with Jesus at the head of it.

Holy Commotion

The parish church of Truro, St Paul's, closed in November 2007 but the parish of St Paul continues to exist and worship is now based at Archbishop Benson CofE School. Parish priest, Father Christopher, describes how it is also home to… Holy Commotion!

On alternate Wednesdays during term time, we get together in the school hall – a licensed place of worship – for a short, informal act of worship with songs, a prayer, a reading and lots of fun. Everyone is welcome and we always tells people that if they don't fancy formal Sunday church but want to explore the Christian faith in a familiar and 'safe' environment, Holy Commotion! could be just the thing.

Emphasis is on informality and the involvement of children. As a result we have a regular kids club with activities designed specifically for them. For those wanting to explore their own spirituality or beliefs, or specific aspects of the Christian faith, we run an Emmaus course.

Sometimes we have theme evenings at Holy Commotion when we get involved in other activities as part of our act of worship. Truro Methodist Church's Speaking in Drums group has visited us a couple of times.

As well as our regular Wednesday evening gatherings we also have social events for adults and/or children. It has come a long way since it first got off the ground a few years ago. I arrived here in 2003 and noticed that Christingle services always brought in so many people who would never otherwise come to one of our services. In 2006 the church was absolutely heaving with people; it was so packed we were putting visitors in the choir stalls and there was still standing room only at the back.

Afterwards I thought, 'This is incredible, where do all these people come from and where do they all go? Why are they happy to come to Christmas services but not at any other time?'

The answer, of course, was because they knew nothing 'strange' was going to happen. Even allowing for the fact that St Paul's is fairly strong Anglo Catholic – and people may not be familiar with that tradition – there was obviously a very different 'feel' about those Christingle services. People felt comfortable in coming to them.

In digging a little deeper about the whys and wherefores of it all we came to some serious conclusions about things we tend to take for granted in church circles:

The day: Sundays are not good days to get to a service for many people;

The place: Church buildings can be quite intimidating;

The time: 10am is useless if you're taking your children to play football or some other sport; or arranging to transport them from one place to another if they're going to see a parent who no longer lives in the same home as they do;

The formality of it all: Radical reassessment was needed because this thing called 'church' does not attract people in the same way these days. I have found that people of all ages, and whatever family or age bracket they happen to be in, are not averse to religion and spirituality but they don't like the way it is contextualised in institutional church.

So we decided to launch Holy Commotion! in the school hall. We now have a very committed bunch of people and the way we break it down generally is that I do the 'bits' that requires someone with a dog collar and they do the 'commotion'. It's very informal and, to my mind, combines the best of both worlds to establish some kind of early church model.

There was quite a milestone recently when we had our first ever baptism which means that people are now seeing that school hall as a holy, sacred place. They may not necessarily see themselves as Christians but they are interested in finding out about that thing called religion.

We worship, we pray, we sing, I talk to the children but the 'shape' of it is never quite the same! We also have a Eucharist from time to time. Holy Commotion! is all delivered on PowerPoint so people don't get mounds of books given to them; there is nothing scary about it. I find that if we take the scariness away, people really do open up.

We have children up to the age of 14 but don't seem to attract the older teenagers. In saying that, it has been successful beyond my wildest dreams in drawing people into the Christian family.

One of its wider effects can be seen in the number of baptisms having increased phenomenally across the benefice – most of whom are people who have come through Holy Commotion! and then fed back into other churches. It has also had an impact on my other congregations, we have introduced a fourth Sunday family service because the 9am Mass attracted one kind of clientele but it wasn't right for people with families. Now, after the Mass, the 9am crowd sit down for breakfast with the congregation arriving for the 10.30am service.

There have been some rumbles of 'It's all very nice but when are they going to come to proper church?' Well, Holy Commotion! is church and the fact is that these people simply will not come to what many think of as a church service. If they didn't go to Holy Commotion! they wouldn't go to church anywhere else – Wednesday has become the new Sunday for us.

I'm a high churchman and I was very much stepping out of my comfort zone when we first started – now I find it all hugely encouraging. The wonderful thing is that the people who come are here because they want to be here, not because they feel they should be here for whatever reason. Perhaps more importantly they tend not to come with any baggage, politics or prejudices associated with church life.

Holy Commotion! is quite intensive in terms of energy and resources – and of course I have the life of the wider parish to look after as well but thankfully, because this is 21st century, I can communicate with the Holy Commotion! people extensively via email, text or Facebook.

There's no doubt that we really need to be doing this, we need to be doing both fresh expression of church and traditional church. It's the only way forward. When we started I was quite keen that whatever was to be presented had to have some kind of liturgical structure. That wasn't so much based on a deep theological reasoning, more that it was a complete experiment so I just stuck to what I knew and put together a service that was sort of familiar in structure. This included a welcome, gathering prayer, hymn or song and a reading from Scripture – I wanted it to be recognisable as church rather than just a social gathering.

People didn't find it off-putting. Instead they took to it all immediately because we forget how unusual it all is – they have not heard the Bible read so it's great to see their reaction to something like the Parable of the Good Samaritan. Also to have teaching is unusual because they don't know about Jesus. To me, that's what it's all about, a fulfilling life with a spiritual dimension. On the whole they are truly intrigued by it all because they see it as something incredibly relevant to today.

It could have such a different story on the first evening… we got to about 6.25pm and there were only three of us there. I was just about to say, 'Oh well it was worth a try but that's that' and then suddenly everyone came in through the door and there were about 36 people in the room. Our age range is from newborn to a lady in her 80s, the number fluctuates – for our harvest social there were more than 70 but I would say we have a core of 50.

Perhaps a testing time next year will be when I take a six-week sabbatical in March. I've tried to do my very best to get the message across that Holy Commotion! isn't me, it's them. My own personal resources are limited and one of the struggles is to try and think of new things to do, coming up with the ideas is tricky.

We need to resource it with people from either Holy Commotion! itself or other local churches. There are sufficient numbers of them to do that and the shape and form of it can continue in my absence because they now have a template to work from but they can develop it in different ways.

Footsteps

Mary Styles, an ordinand with the CofE Diocese in Europe, is a Reader at All Saints Church, Rome. For the past nine years she has led Footsteps, a fresh expression of church meeting in two areas of the city.

Rome is the base for three United Nations agency headquarters and many international companies so there is a large English-speaking community here. Hospitality, friendship and fellowship are the basis of our ministry and, as a cosmopolitan group, understanding and celebrating other ways and cultures are hugely important.

When I first arrived in Italy I really noticed the difference in people's openness to talk about things other than the weather! In England it had been very difficult to talk about spiritual matters and no-one really wanted to engage with that. However, when people are away from their home 'territory' they are far more willing to discuss all sorts of matters.

Footsteps started because I was aware of the gap between these sort of discussions and the opportunity or space to follow them up. Since that time, some of those who have been part of Footsteps are churchgoers who have lapsed, others have been involved in church life for quite a while and there are also those who are not interested at all in attending a traditional church.

Whilst there is a good choice of established churches in the city centre, it became clear that there was no opportunity for worship in English in the suburbs and beyond (from where it can take one to two hours to reach the heart of Rome). It was also notable that many who expressed an interest in learning more about the Christian faith or coming together to worship were either not interested in – or disillusioned with – inherited church.

Footsteps now meets in both a northern and a southern suburb, Casal Palocco and La Storta, for informal worship in English and runs weekly Bible study groups and occasional Alpha courses open to all. We meet in people's homes, as families and individuals, to serve and reach out to our neighbours. Our mission is 'knowing and growing in Jesus, following in His footsteps and putting His love into action.'

We are all English speakers but that doesn't mean we are all British. Instead we have got people from every continent and denomination and as a result we have been very enriched by our Orthodox and Catholic members.

Dealing with ex-pats means there are large fluctuations in numbers because our community is particularly mobile; quite a lot are highly skilled professionals and they may be with us for anything from six months to two years before they fly off again. We generally tend to attract families with children; there aren't too many people of grandparent age.

We have what would broadly be recognised as a Liturgy of the Word where we sing songs, read the Bible and talk about what relevance the Bible has for us. We may also have a forum or discussion with different people leading it. People have come along through word of mouth 'advertising', in the past there have been very good mother evangelists at the school gate but we don't have many of those people at the moment so we are having to rethink how we get the message out. There is no big strategic plan; we do what we do depending on who is around at the time.

We try to keep the actual worship to an hour but there is always a time of fellowship afterwards with coffee and pastries. I have had lots of support from the local Baptist pastor and Methodist minister and my parish priest at All Saints has been very supportive too – though there has been the inevitable tension from some people in the community who say that we should bringing regulars from Footsteps into All Saints. On the positive side of things, we have got vicars and ministers who want to help us lead interdenominational worship because we are not linked to any one tradition. The only link is through me – who happens to be an Anglican Reader.

If I could go back and start it all over again I'd say it would have been better if we had put a proper authority structure in place; otherwise there's a danger of Footsteps becoming 'Mary Styles Incorporated' and I'd never want that.

I have been trying to prepare people for a handover in leadership but, due to the transient nature of the congregation, everybody I have trained as possible new leaders has left. As a result I am now trying to forge links with churches with a good organisational structure in order to help make the big decisions about the way we are going.

I have a leadership team and every now and we do gather as a group to try to discern prayerfully what we should be doing. The big challenge is for me eventually to leave Footsteps as something that is sustainable, something that continues with a life and energy and purpose.

Legacy XS

Legacy XS offers, among other things, indoor and outdoor skate parks, a recording studio, arts suite… and a youth congregation. Leader Pete Hillman gives the lowdown on its work in Essex.

It's never boring being involved in fresh expressions! When we first appeared on expressions: the dvd – 1 there was a lot going on but things have developed much further. The skatepark is still very much a going concern but we have also developed the building itself and now have outside ramps as well. There is a multi-use games area at the back for basketball and 5-a-side football and we fitted a recording studio and an arts suite with a dance floor so we can offer dance lessons. There's a café downstairs, Café Legacy, and a video editing suite that boasts £20,000 worth of equipment which we got with a grant from various sources.

There have been some difficult times along the way. The local council decided they wanted to begin charging rent on the land on which Legacy XS is built (an interesting move in the context of the 'big society!') and, as a result, we had to make the centre manager redundant. However, the council's decision made us take a fresh look at what we wanted to achieve with the skate park as a whole.

We decided to reduce the hours we were open to the public and instead of running our midweek sessions on a commercial basis we instead now operate them as cell groups organised by our team of youth workers. That has been running quite successfully on Tuesday evenings for young people from Year 4/5 up to Year 7.

Wednesday evenings are now given over to skateboarders, we started with very small numbers but this has grown steadily. Thursday night is a BMX cell and, again, numbers are very encouraging. On Fridays we have just started running a gym as a bit of a pilot project.

On Saturday and Sunday we can get 60 young people through the doors. It's interesting the response we get sometimes. For instance, a local Catholic Church gave us a large figure of Jesus made out of wicker which we put at the end of the skatepark on the wall – it is supposed to be a crucifix but looks more like ascension. A couple of years ago when one of the BMX lads was leaving, I was joking with him about me doing all the work around here. He said, 'What do you mean you run this place? I thought it was that bloke hanging on the wall over the ramp.'

The Legacy XS youth congregation itself has been much quieter and has shrunk down to a maximum of 20 people. How many of them are moving on in faith? Not many that we know of to be honest. It's better to tell the truth and say it is really, really hard to develop the youth congregation. The fact is that the measure of success and failure in God's economy is quite different. That may make it sound as if we are trying to cover ourselves but that's what we believe. All we say is that it's our job to put Jesus at the centre of what we do, for some young people that will be enough for now because maybe the time isn't yet right for them.

About three years ago we also launched Legacy Rayleigh which operates in the neighbouring town. It has its own full-time worker as part of the parish team there and has developed its own distinctive ethos. They too have mid-week outreach activities for different age groups as well as a cell group and Sunday evening gatherings for worship, prayer and teaching. It's another runner of the plant springing up somewhere new.

In other areas Legacy XS, now open for six years, continues to develop very well. Two years ago, the local county and borough councils and the Canvey Island Town Council asked us to be the lead partner in a drop-in centre on the Island. They came up with all the money. I reminded them that we are Christians and they said they had no problem with that at all. In fact I have never encountered a problem because of our Christian roots – quite the opposite. We have got another year or so of funding so we can now offer sessions on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, after-school Saturday and most of Sunday.

The team does a lot of teaching work on Canvey Island and we also managed to get some money to buy a 33ft Winnebago-style vehicle to use as a mobile recording studio to go out into different areas. It's like a youth club on wheels.

Sustainability is always a big challenge. My curacy comes to an end in June 2011 and at the moment I have no idea what will happen then – hopefully something to help me continue with Legacy XS. It's always a struggle because youth congregations in particular are never, ever going to break even. The only way they will be self-sustaining is if they are delivering work on the ground that is recognised by secular funders. That's why we have to be clear about what we are doing and why we are doing it.

You really have to be an entrepreneur if you are going to be doing radical stuff; that can be seen in things like taking risks and being a bit creative about the way you describe what's happening and what you can offer. It's about being as wise as serpents and a bit shrewd about things.

People then begin to recognise what you are doing. The local secondary school is a Business Enterprise College and they now study Legacy XS as an example of social entrepreneurship. The fact is that I run a reasonably sized organisation and have learned to be creative – not just in the work itself but how I am able to develop ideas within the existing structures. Through my work as a school governor, I not only take lessons in Religious Studies but also in Business Enterprise. This is a time of great opportunity and we hope and pray that we can continue to make the most of them in all of our activities.

FREEdom Café

There's no such thing as a free lunch. Well, not unless you're visiting the FREEdom Café in St Gregory's Church hall, Seaton. Its leader, Mary Casey, gives the lowdown on the church with a difference.

The monthly café itself has been running for just over 12 months but the story goes back a lot further, about six years, when I became very conscious of those people who found coming to traditional church very difficult.

At that time I worked for a charity promoting social inclusion for people with learning disabilities and I was concerned that when they went into residential care, it often meant the end of any opportunities for them to explore or celebrate faith. I persuaded our vicar at that time to hold a special service for those involved in care in the community, whether they were carers or those being cared for.

We still have those ecumenical services six times a year and they have been a great blessing. Simple worship followed by fellowship, afternoon tea and a sing along. As a result some of the carers at those services started to show an interest in knowing more but they weren't ready for the full-blown church 'thing' or anything like the Alpha course, so I wondered how we could do something about that and also include others in our community who might have preconceived ideas about 'church'. Then the answer came to me, food. I love it!

My faith is very simple in that Jesus was always talking about community, serving one another, friends and feeding people. As a church I felt we needed to be very much part of our community so about two years ago I went to our PCC and asked if I could have the use of the hall for three months because I wanted to open a café where people would not be charged for the food they'd be given.

I didn't know how we were going to fund it but felt it was time to put my faith where my mouth was. As a Christian I often shy away from publicly acknowledging my faith, but I felt Jesus was encouraging and challenging me to do something about this. We talk about a God who will give freely if we trust, let go and ask. I wrote a piece for the church magazine about the cafe and asked people to pray about it and pledge whatever they could, time, money or ingredients to the project. Such a lot of talent and produce was offered that I was able to create a rota for volunteers and a menu for the cafe, and we opened our doors in September 2009.

It was a huge learning curve for the church to trust that the money would be supplied. On that very first Saturday we had overspent by £39.42, when we looked in the baskets we had put out for prayer requests – not donations – we had enough to cover our deficit and over £100 more to fund the next café session.

I believed from the start that if God wanted to fund this, the money would be there. We have a rummage and book stall too but again, there is no charge for anything. The only baskets we leave out are those for prayers though our 'customers' have been so generous that we've been able to buy ourselves some basic kitchen equipment – at the beginning we brought in our own – and we've also given away over £500 in donations to local charities and community projects. To mark our first anniversary we held a special birthday café, with many from the community helping out and also gave a £100 to Seaton Primary School to help a project there for the young children.

We meet on the third Saturday of every month and we now have a core team of about ten and many, many volunteers – more than I can actually use for any one café session. That means I can give people time off for a month or two, they are very grateful and it does away with any sense of it being a chore to be completed rather than an act of joyful service! It gives everyone the freedom to move in and out of the volunteering rota, the message being that God doesn't 'trap' you into serving him.

Earlier this year I completed a Pioneer Discipleship course run by Exeter diocese [mission shaped ministry] and it was very helpful indeed. One of the things I had to come to accept through the course was that, for many, a transition from something like FREEdom café to a traditional Sunday model of church is almost impossible in today's culture. The course also helped me to get some input for myself and just check again if this project was more about self ambition than anything to do with the Lord working. Very quickly I had confirmation that if you gave God a space he would walk in it.

I constantly check on the project's motivation and make-up, if it starts to become a struggle because the Lord is no longer moving in it, then the volunteers know I will knock it on the head. But until then it will go on, not necessarily with me leading it, but that's fine – God has already raised up so many people to be part of this, I'm sure he'll have his eye on the next person in line.

The joy is that we've now got people meeting in the FREEdom café community who don’t go to traditional church but who are active in volunteering their time and talents. We open up at 10.30am and at 1.30pm when the café officially 'closes', I give a clear announcement that the team is going to join café visitors for lunch and at 1.45pm will have 3.2.1 for Jesus.

This is 15-minutes of worship time and people are very welcome to stay or leave as they wish at any time. At first I thought people would run for the door at that point but instead I've noticed that some now come later in the morning for lunch and then hang on for 3.2.1. It averages about 30-35, about 60% of which don't attend traditional church.

We light candles and hand around a simple service sheet with a few words and a clear outline of what to expect. There are then:

Three minutes of music for reflection;

Two short readings (one Scripture and something current today which fits in with the scripture);

One further song with lyrics that fit the theme and a short time of prayer based on the simple Celtic theme of 'circling'.

People are invited to join in aloud or quietly in their hearts if they wish. I quickly learned to include the words of The Lord's Prayer when I realised it's not known by everyone any more.

We talk of a God who speaks of freely giving us what we need, it's all about putting our faith on the line and seeing that God will feed us freely – that has certainly been our experience at FREEdom Café. When I first presented the idea to the PCC, I said the only way that everyone can be treated as equal in this café is for everything to be free.

Some of the initial reactions were that it was a ridiculous idea, that it would be 'awkward' if you weren't paying, that there was no such thing as a free lunch. People from the community were looking for the catch, saying we don't want to come here if you'll then say we need to come to church on Sunday, or have our children baptised, or be confirmed. The only way I could explain it was by saying, 'Nearly 2,000 years ago a friend of mine fed a crowd of people he cared for lunch. The loaves and fishes went down a treat. He's doing the same today only its called FREEdom café.' Those words are now on a poster on our wall. Christian visitors to our café have written these words down and taken them away to Wales, North Devon, Chester and even New Zealand!

Thankfully I could go back to the PCC after that initial three months pilot to say that FREEdom café was going well, and so it rolls on. One of the key things is excellence in all things and doing our best for God because, from the start, I wanted this café to look like it would fit into any high street, and operate like a restaurant. There is waitress service; and beautiful white contemporary crockery donated by the Churchwomen's Guild. The colour theme is black and white with a touch of colour and this reflects in the table linen and waitress aprons. The kitchen staff has to make do with green and white aprons, but we're working on it! Everything is branded with our logo. There are just no prices on the menu…

The other huge benefit with the development of the café has been the growing relationship between the churchgoers who lend a helping hand. Many people didn't know each other, even though they all go to the same church, because they attend different services. If they go to the 8am, 10.30am or Evensong regularly they may never have met each other. My question was 'How can we bring people to Christ if we don't even know the people in our own church family?'

There are now at least eight regulars at 3.2.1 who do not set foot inside traditional church, FREEdom Café has become their church and I pray that many more will come to know the God who loves them and gives so freely as we move into our second year.

What would I like to see for the future? I would like to see the ethos of FREEdom Café in every parish in the diocese, and in 10 years every parish in the land. One of the biggest challenges in that? Christians have to learn not to question, or even interrogate, the people they are there to serve. Don't quiz them, don't mention church, keep it on their terms and be ready to speak of your faith if asked – but not before. Just love them, serve them and watch what happens with God's help.

Scarborough Deanery

Revd Sam Foster is fresh expressions pioneer missioner for the Scarborough Deanery. Numerous projects are now underway, among them a fresh expression of church in Hub Groups. Sam tells us more:

I am a fresh expressions missioner for the whole Deanery instead of a single parish and that has made a huge difference. Although I work for the Church of England, I work ecumenically – mainly through Churches Together – helping churches to step out in faith in building community and supporting Parochial Church Councils and ministers along the way.

I now have an Anglican team of about ten people, including Church Army officer Shena Woolridge. Church Army gave us full funding for five years and Shena works full time on spirituality and the arts. The entire Deanery is represented in the make up of the team, we have got 27 Anglican churches here for instance but five of those churches may be in one benefice so one person will represent that group.

The team overlap a lot; and the beauty of it is that everyone has responsibility for a project or particular area of work. The groups of people helping us to run these projects are ecumenical, everything from Anglo-Catholics to Pentecostal Baptists. If we want things to be sustainable we must equip and encourage lay people to do all sorts of things; I am against the model of a vicar as a Jack of all Trades. I have been ordained for seven years and I don't want to have a breakdown because I’m running around trying to do everything.

We also have a mix of lay and ordained as well as some people who have recently come to faith. Whatever their Christian story so far I look for people who don't speak church 'language' all the time – it's very easy to slip in to that but it ends up meaning nothing to the people you're trying to reach. It's interesting that people who don't know anything about church tend to respond to friendship and support but the de-churched people we meet along the way look for some form of accountability so they know if we are 'safe' or not.

To work across the Deanery means that I can go anywhere and open things up, not only to our own CofE churches but also ecumenically. Part of that work is getting as many churches as possible to support and fund the initiative. Twelve churches of different denominations have done just that though this comes with its own challenges; namely that we have to make sure that everybody is singing from the same hymn sheet by using the same national material from Fresh Expressions. It sounds a bit heavy but in order for this to work it has to be that way.

Our team also meet regularly to share in the vision. That really helps when facing criticism from the various denominations – whether it is not preaching the Gospel enough or preaching it too much!

Healing on the beach for example is a bit controversial among the churches but most people on the streets – faced with things like regular Mind Body Spirit Fairs – are saying, 'It's about time Christians were doing something like this'. The media around here call me 'the vicar without a church' and I'm fine with that. I don't face too much opposition as such – mainly because I'm ordained and the vicars see me as being in the same boat and also that I came into this job because I truly felt that God was telling me to do it; to be a church without walls.

The Hub Groups are part of our fresh expressions faith community, discovering together what it means to be disciples of Christ in the 21st Century. There are three groups now with the first one coming out of an Alpha course we did in a Travelodge. It was New Year and they let us advertise on the railings outside because they were promoting New Year's breaks and we were looking at Resolutions in one way or another. We had a real mix of people there and by the time we got to the end of the course they wanted something more.

Another of the Hub Groups is made up of people not really involved in their own churches but who still want to be disciples and deepen their faith journey. They are our potential leaders.

There's also a 20s/30s group and that's more flexible. That started with a young married couple who said they had no friends. I asked them to stay on for six months, start something, and see if they could build it up. It is now a very social group meeting twice a month in all sorts of places. The others meet weekly in people's homes. We also bring the three Hub Groups together for different occasions.

Our next step is to think about something on a monthly basis; we currently do creative prayer days around the town and it would be good to expand on that possibly. One thing is for sure, we are not at all interested in just starting another church. We share people and share resources but that would possibly change if we were in one distinct building.

This is a real mix of an area; it's a seaside town with a middle class suburbia that attracts visitors all year round but two locations in Scarborough are also nationally recognised areas of deprivation. We also cover many rural villages too and this rural focus makes up quite a lot of the Deanery.

Part of our role is to try to encourage churches to shape a team and take over building community when they feel equipped to do so. At Christmas last year, St Mary's, Cloughton, staged a live nativity on Town Farm in the village. It was the first time the church had ever been involved in anything like that. It has since moved the local post office inside the church to ensure that the community doesn't lose that vital service. They also have a fresh expression café church called Café Refresh which meets in the village hall.

St Thomas', Gristhorpe – part of the Filey group of parishes – is an iron clad shack that came in a flat pack from Harrods 150 yrs ago. In April 2009 the fresh expressions team set up a Community Cinema in the church.

St. Mark's Newby, Wreyfield Drive Methodist, St. Luke's and St. Joseph's RC Churches and some members of the Barrowcliff Residents Association are in the process of looking at how we can best serve and be part of the community of Barrowcliff. We are also following the stages of the fresh expressions mission audit 'Listening to the Community' which involves asking local residents, youth workers, councillors, to tell us what they are already doing. What they share is forming our prayers.

Sacred Space on the beach is very popular with people lighting a candle to give thanks or commemorate something or remember someone. In the pilot project last year 150 candles were lit on South Bay, Scarborough. We are not there to Bible bash or collect money. As a result people stopped and said, 'We don't go to church but can we join in?'

The Deanery actually pay for my post, the Diocese provide the house and pay my expenses. Initially it was for 5 years – now they have said they want to continue with it. At the moment we don't give anything to the parish share.

As a team we meet together monthly and pray together and we dream dreams but I'm also very much a member of the Clergy Chapter and Churches Together. I like to see us as one church.

Needing a Bishop's Mission Order (BMO) to go places and do things clearly works in other places but in this area it would be such a poor witness, this attitude of blessing from God is to work all together for the needs of the people.

The only way we can get through to people is by God's good grace and through relationships. Two years ago I had a blank canvas, now God is filling in that bigger picture.

X-Site

Church Army New Zealand runs a successful bus ministry called Canterbury Kids Coach. Captain Louise Weller tells how a new Christian community, X-Site, has developed to work alongside the mobile ministry to reach families in Rowley, a needy suburb of Christchurch.

We began three years ago, running a children's after school programme on board our Canterbury Kids Coach.

Every six months we move to three more locations. Two years ago, we were given the use of a community house so that we could encourage children who had been on our programme to be involved in something more permanent, and provide support and ongoing discipleship. We call this 'X-Site'.

Parents started coming along to 'X-Site' as well and this has now grown to an average attendance of about 30 children and 9 adults each week. We have not 'arrived' yet but we are well on the way.

The X-Site weekly sessions are from 3pm-5pm every Friday and follow a similar pattern each week. Leaders and other adults from the community arrive from 2.15pm and we stop to pray at 2.45pm. The children arrive from the nearby local school and are given a drink and games to play and we sit around and chat.

At 3.30pm we start our session proper with singing, prayer and a Bible reading. The children themselves lead the prayer and Bible reading while parents are all encouraged to be involved. We then have one of our puppets introduce the theme for the day and then the mums with children of preschool age leave for their own special programme while the others have their separate teaching time. We use lots of different creative ways to encourage the development of faith, including mime, drama, crafts, games with purpose, teaching of puppetry and even learning how to play the ukulele! We usually follow a theme that lasts for 10 weeks.

Refreshments are provided and meals arranged at the end of each term. We carry out visits and follow-up work to help meet material needs and address neglect, truancy and abuse. This is much more than just a bus; it is bringing Church to the people.

Our organisation aims to keep the following values at the heart of all our work:

fully rely on God;

encourage the development of Christian values: sharing, honesty, responsibility, honouring of relationships, serving others, making wise choices and respect;

break down the barriers of isolation and racial disharmony;

see where the Holy Spirit is working and join in;

remain outward focused – seeing the needs in the community and continually looking to 'take new ground'

following the example of Jesus, we seek to love and serve each other, and encourage others to do the same.

Three team leaders are members of the local Anglican Church and two are from the nearest Baptist Church; teenagers help as junior leaders. Although we are a Church Army initiative, we also have the support and encouragement of our local parish and some families have now started attending services on Sunday.

Our goal is however, to encourage the local people to find faith in Christ and grow to become leaders of their own community. This is beginning. For those that come, this is Church.

We are a registered charity funded from trusts and donations from individuals. To spread the vision about what we’re doing we undertake speaking engagements, networking and sharing stories of good practice through the media and our own publications. We understand the value of working together with other organisations, agencies and community groups and work at discovering what is happening in order to encourage one another. It is important to enable people to network together, learn from one another and exercise responsible oversight.

We want to see lives transformed and communities grow. I didn't have an opportunity as a child to hear about Jesus, so I had to struggle alone during my tough teenage years. Consequently I desperately want others to have opportunities to hear about, experience and grow in the love of Jesus, and be equipped to reach their full potential.

It is our hope that parents will take ownership of this and begin to disciple others. With a group of 10 mums, we recently started to organise midweek morning sessions for parents. We hope that these sessions will be a time to focus on being there for these mums and helping them to grow in faith. We are taking things a step at a time, learning as we go, and listening to the needs of the community and to what God is saying. Watch this space!