city centre Archives - FX ARCHIVE...

Deeper Network Church

Andy Poultney is minister-in-charge of Deeper Network Church, based in what was a restaurant on Romford High Street.

Deeper Network Church originated as 'Deeper' six years ago at St James', Collier Row, with St John's, Havering-Atte-Bower. Deeper, a fresh expression of church, came together as I began serving as curate with a bunch of young adults; my plan was simply to see what God was doing and join in with it.

Following much discussion and prayer, we decided that we wanted to focus on other young adults in the pub and club culture of central Romford. Night-time economy is important here; about 10,000 to 12,000 people descend on the local pubs and clubs every weekend.

We had great support from the community of St James' and St John's and the result was that we launched The Deeper Lounge as a safe space, in Romford's market place, on Friday nights. It started in December 2009 and it has continued to run most weeks; we have served many hundreds of cups of tea and coffee since then and – more importantly – met some great people and had some great chats.

Working alongside Street Pastors, we set up under one of the market stalls and operated from there. After a while, the local authority recognised that we were providing a valuable service and wanted to help us a little more so they bought us a large, pop-up gazebo. It was about a year ago that we moved to a prime spot and now we regularly see about 100 people a night.

I'm part of The Order of Mission and, using missional community 'language', I was – by this stage – beginning to think about what was to happen next because the end of my curacy was on the horizon. The Friday nights were going well and there was also a youth project called DIY (Deeply Impacting Youth) which was engaging with about 60-70 young people.

There was a very strong sense that if we moved away, the work was not yet strong enough to be led by anybody else, and in 2012 we felt God was calling us to become a permanent presence in central Romford rather than just dipping in and out.

In April 2013, ten of us were released from St James' and St John's in order to establish a new worshipping community known as Deeper Network Church. Our office base, and home to lots of what we do now, is called The Deeper Lounge and it's on the high street in Romford.

It's owned by the London Borough of Havering and we rent it from them. It used to be an Afro-Caribbean restaurant but the building has been gutted at a cost of £50,000. It's always incredible to see what God can do, time and time again I've been in the building while work has been going on and as people walk past, one in five will stop and ask what is going on. It offers a natural opportunity to get into conversations with all sorts of people. We applied to the Mission Opportunities Fund to cover our salary costs but money is tight and we are living by faith beyond 2014.

The Diocese of Chelmsford granted us a Bishop's Mission Order and this has been important in how we, and others, view the work. When talking about The Deeper Lounge I like to say, 'this is not a youth centre, it's not a community centre, I want to start calling it home – to us that home is a church'. It's a venue and the idea is that we will continue to do a lot of outward focused work and to engage with mission with different community groups.

We have got a reception area, a coffee shop-sized space, a small kitchen, an office and a prayer room. The plan after Easter is to do a bit of everything in this space, including activities for young people, homeless people and parents. Deeper Network Church will develop for all these different people groups.

Part of my previous role was to act as youth adviser to the bishop but I am now stopping that work as my wife and I will be moving into a community house because I'm becoming Young Vocations Champion for the diocese. This will involve mentoring interns and four guys will live with us and take on placements.

Basically, everything that we do begins with service. When we're out under the gazebo speaking to young people late at night at Friday, we'll say, 'would you like a free tea or coffee?' Generally the third or fourth question people ask is, 'why are you doing this?' You tell them and we get varying responses: from complete disbelief to 'oh, that's cute' or similar.

Everything we do is to move on conversations and relationships from 'Oh cute' to our vision of deepening life together as disciples of Jesus Christ. That can be a real challenge but there's nothing else I'd rather do.

Left Bank Leeds

Youth worker and Baptist minister Simon Hall is involved with the Revive community and Left Bank Leeds. He explains why it's very difficult to know where one ends and the other begins.

Revive has been a bit of everything in the past. It was a youth congregation 20 years ago but, obviously, the people have got older and Revive eventually became a church plant rather than a congregation within a larger church.

We moved into Hyde Park, the 'boho', bedsit land area of Leeds because we knew the people we wanted to reach and where they lived. Revive has had its ups and downs, with many mistakes being made along the way, but in many ways we can now see Left Bank as a perfect fulfilment of Revive's original vision.

Revive saw young, single, people with alternative lifestyles and felt that these people weren't going to connect with traditional churches at all. We wanted to put church in their way and make God more accessible. Well, we haven't seen revival since then but we have seen a few people become Christians and others explore faith more deeply.

In more recent times, members of Revive helped to found a project called Left Bank Leeds, an arts and events venue based in the amazing surroundings of the former St Margaret of Antioch church in Hyde Park.

The building hadn't been in weekly use for some years, although occasional services had taken place there. From the outside, it's not the most attractive of places but inside it's huge; a mock gothic cathedral with a real 'wow' factor. We had funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund and other funders for major repair work which began in July 2008 and finished in February 2011.

The idea was that it would be a centre for arts and culture, for new thought and new ideas, friendly and full of life – which is why we called it Left Bank, after the artistic district of Paris known as the Rive Gauche.

Half of the people who got behind it were from Revive and the other half from another local church. Left Bank is kind of undergirded by these people, most of whom are still either staff or trustees. There is also a wider community of Christians who ensure that the explicitly Christian part of the vision is maintained – known as the Left Bank God Group, they are involved in the day-to-day God 'stuff' and bits of programming that have a clear faith emphasis. There are about 20 people in the Left Bank God Group and most of them are part of Revive.

The other side of it is that we have got a wider group of people who have been drawn into the community through volunteering, about 200 of them. That's where conversations about faith occur naturally rather than us trying to manufacture opportunities. In the old days, I guess you'd call it an attractional model but it's the building and project which are bringing people together, rather than a service. We don't have to work hard at building community, it's all around us.

A great example of Left Bank programming would be Amazing Graze, our street food and culture festival. We worked in partnership with street food traders and buskers to create a unique weekend event – the vision came in part from the bad experiences of a member of Revive who is a professional busker; we wanted to celebrate the diversity of life on the street and celebrate 'the commons'. In the autumn we'll be working together on a massive Narnia community project – as pioneered by Liverpool's In Another Place. It will involve about 300-400 people, including professional sound engineers, lighting designers and producers wanting to lend a hand. Isn't this what church is supposed to be like with so many people using their gifts – a lot of them Christians, a lot of them not?

For the next six months, we will all be getting involved in the Narnia project but it's difficult to know where the boundaries are. Revive doesn't meet in Left Bank, it's too big! I live with my family in two terraced houses which we knocked into one and I think we have had about 50 people meeting in there at times. We've also got one or two other places that we go to and we have met in church buildings in the past but that just didn't work for us.

Revive was definitely a young people's and then young adults' church. We have been really blessed in that quite a few of those people are still involved but it's quite hard keeping a church of that type going. Every now and then we'd say, 'Shall we just give it up?' and have a meeting to talk about it – but we kept on going because it's definitely like a family; I can only think of one or two people who have really left.

We are still only about 40 adults and 20 kids even when we are all together but we also have a much bigger group of people from all over the world who, in some way, feel they are part of it.

We still do the thing that churches do and meet on a Sunday but we also have a strong focus on vocation and small groups meeting around a common purpose. We have:

book Group which is involved in organising open debates and lectures;

'blokes' Group. Someone in the church bought some woodland and is trying to set up a programme to take kids from the city to learn bushcraft skills (this is sort of shared with another church);

women's Group, a prayer group exclusively for women in the church;

group for people who are musicians or really into music;

group for those who want to get involved in Forest Church;

the Left Bank God Group;

a very informal leadership group made up of anyone who wants to discuss what we should do next.

The small groups work as a sort of free market. They start and, if they gather people, they carry on. There is no central idea or strategy along the lines of, 'Oh we must have a small group based on…'

When Revive started we had some priming money. Over three years, we were given money from the Baptist Union and individuals were able to make up the rest.

I have never worked more than half time for Revive and, technically, I only work a day a week for them. We also have an organised, admin-type, person who does half a day a week. I would have thought our annual budget is in the region of about £10,000 a year. Thankfully, we have a few people involved who earn good money and they also support it financially.

Left Bank Leeds is a quintessential social enterprise. There is a charity that owns the building, with responsibility for the faith and heritage side of it. On top of that, we set up a Community Interest Company – which is the new legal vehicle for social enterprises – and that deals with the community and the arts ventures. We also have a commercial arm, renting the space out for gigs, parties, conferences and – in the summer – lots of weddings!

In terms of the future at LeftBankLeeds, there is a long list of needs to improve its facilities. Long term plans at the moment include:

development of a café bar at the front of the building. People are certainly attracted to the space but, at the moment, it's too big for them to feel able to stop. We want to ensure that there is community there every day;

continuing to curate a gathered space for all the creatives in the city; we want to be the catalyst to make things happen

For God Group, we are working on two things that people could pray for:

permanent exhibits that draw people towards God. There are already plans in the pipeline to have the Chartres labyrinth as part of our new floor;

commissioning other arts that would just give people pause – not as invasions of space but that the space would allow them to consider what life is all about.

We have reached an amazing new stage with Revive. While we have always wanted to reach out the truth is we have always been like a hospital for people with heart conditions – people who have been hurt by church, people who have asked too many questions of their churches and come unstuck – but now they are finding 'real' church again. This has always been the main way that the community has grown and sustained itself.

At the moment we feel less like a hospice and more like a hospital, where people are actually getting well! We have been quite well known in the past for writing quite melancholy songs, but at the moment we are having to write songs of faith, hope and love because as a community we are finding out feet and want to be more positive.

Left Bank has a chequered history. It is a long time since it was full, if it ever was. Changing demographics in the area – first Irish Catholics, then Pakistani Muslims – mean that there was never a large congregation. And it means that the building doesn't have a place in the heart of the community, even though it is the largest building by some way. Most people who visit Left Bank have never been in it when it was a church, which has turned out to be a great help to us as people don't immediately associate it with religion. This new phase in the life of the building is fulfilling the vision of the original church in new ways, as well as the vision of Revive.

Kahaila

Baptist minister Paul Unsworth established a commercial coffee shop, which is also home to a church community, in London's Brick Lane. Kahaila opened in June 2012 and there are now plans for another.

When I began the initiative to set up a coffee shop, with the intention of planting a congregation among the many young adults in the area of Brick Lane, I had no idea how things would develop.

I'd always had a heart for those in their 20s and 30s. I was youth pastor at a church in Hackney for eight years and Youth Coordinator for New Wine (London South-East), but it really came home to me that I wanted to do something more when I came down to Brick Lane one Sunday morning and saw thousands of people visiting the market. I saw tarot card reading, I saw people of other faiths trying to reach out to the crowds but the Christians were all in church. I knew we had to do to be right at the heart of these crowds.

I could never have imagined what has happened since then and I am in awe of all that God has been doing since the café got off the ground. We have had a very good response from local people and businesses and we are generating four times as much business than we originally anticipated! That is particularly good because we are a charity, so any profit that is made goes into supporting local community projects and other causes.

In order to set up a café in Brick Lane, we needed to raise a lot of money which I knew would require a great deal more of my time. As a result, I left the church I was working in and approached the Baptist Union's Home Mission for financial help in setting up Kahaila. They knew it was a high risk project requiring a lot of investment, they also knew there was a lot of uncertainty as to whether it would succeed or not.

In the build-up to all of that, we just prayed that if it was what God wanted, then He would provide for us. Within the first six weeks of me first trying to find the money for this project, we managed to raise £60,000. We also had a significant loan but were able to pay that back within 18 months. The start-up costs were very high, in the end we raised over £100,000 but this was because the property required a lot of renovation and because it is Brick Lane – incredibly close to the city and a very popular area.

Home Mission awarded us a grant in 2011 and others believed in it too, with friends in the Anglican church and many individuals giving cash backing. Kahaila opened its doors to the public in June last year and things have gone so well that the trustees of the project agreed they would not need any Home Mission Support after the end of 2012.

Our goals were:

To build a community that brings life in all its fullness through enabling people to know Jesus Christ.

To reach out to young adults in their 20s and 30s, the declining generation in church.

To reach out to the estimated 20,000 people who visit the area every Sunday.

To run a successful business where profits are reinvested for the purpose of mission.

Our biggest challenge after the fundraising was trying to get a property on Brick Lane. It took about a year and a half and we secured the lease in April last year. Again, we had to invest a lot of money into it; gutting the place, rebuilding the back section of the roof and removing over 20cms of concrete from the floor – but God provided the key people with the key skills so there was a real sense of God's provision throughout.

It took a huge amount of faith on many people's part to get this off the ground – to get the money and to get the building. Then, once it had been transformed into a café, the challenge was, 'How can we make sure it makes money? It's a business and, if the business fails, the mission fails'. So we needed to really invest in the business to begin with.

Since then, people have been blogging about us and complimenting us on how they love Kahaila for its coffee, food, customer service and general atmosphere. We have also had the additional comment, 'O, and these guys are Christians'. I like that because we're being seen as people who are looking to serve rather than control. Other businesses have taken note of what we've been doing as well; we're now seeing many more shops putting cakes in their windows! One of our aims from the beginning was to become one of the best coffee shops in London. I am not saying we have achieved that as yet but we are making good progress. It's all the more special because the very first Baptist church in the UK was planted in Spitalfields in 1612 and exactly 400 years later we planted Kahaila in exactly the same area.

Why the name? We wanted something that created a bit of curiosity and the two words we kept coming back to were 'Life' and 'Community'. In order to come up with a more unique name we looked for these words in different languages, Hebrew being one of them. The Hebrew word 'Kahila' means community and the Hebrew word 'Chaim' – sometimes spelt 'hai' – means living and is associated to the word 'life'; so we took 'hai ' and placed it in the middle of 'Kahila'. This gave us the word 'Kahaila' pronounced Ka-hi-la.This really represents what we believe we are called to do, to bring life to the very centre of the community.

At this stage in the life of Kahaila, we are constantly experimenting as to how we build community and relationship through intellectual, creative and social events. A monthly 'bring and share' supper club involves us inviting regular customers to come and have a meal together. The regular programme of activities includes things like origami, a book club and live music and poetry. Much of it develops because someone enjoys doing a particular art or craft, for example, and they ask if they could do it in the café. We just say, 'Do it and see what happens'.

We have church every Wednesday night where we try different styles of worship and allow time for discussion after the teaching. Diversity in the worship is important because we don't want to be labelled as an evangelical church, a post-evangelical church, a charismatic church – or however people see us. We now have around 40 regular attenders, some of those that come regularly have either never gone to church before or have not been to church for a long time.

We are very much learning as we go along so some things have worked well; other things haven't worked at all. At one point we put out cards with discussion starter-type questions on them but when we got to our discussion time, everyone upped and walked out! We used to close the café on Wednesday nights and then open the place up again for church a short while later but that didn't feel right at all; now we stay open but tell everyone in the coffee shop, 'You are welcome to stay but, just to let you know that church will be happening here at 7.30'.

Kahaila is a 'crossing place' between Christians and non-Christians and, as a model, it demonstrates that the faith community (church) is at the centre of the café and all its activities. As a result, I feel like I have more significant conversations with people in one week than I had in one year working in a church building. What encourages me is that these conversations just happen by being available in the café. There have been so many examples of this, including a Muslim man from a neighbouring shop who came in and asked us to pray for him. So, in the middle of the café, we prayed God's blessing on him in the name of Jesus.

I always say that what we are doing here is exploring how we model a church that engages people; those people who see church as being a bit like a red telephone box – an amazing building that's part of our heritage. They'd never want it removed and they love to see it in the high street but they don't ever use it.

They look at church in the same way. They love the architecture, they love the fact that it's part of our British culture but it's not for them.

Another fantastic thing that we see happening is the effect on those working with us at Kahaila. We have a core team of about 20 and I believe that all of us are called to leadership in one form or another. Encouragement of young leaders is particularly important to me and we have seen many of them go much deeper in their discipleship; in their early 20s they are developing ministries to prostitutes in the area, to ex-offenders, to those in desperate need. My role involves looking at how I can release people into the calling that God has placed on them. They then go on to inspire others to do the same.

If I really empower and release them, I have to get out of the way – otherwise I cause a bottleneck in what God is doing in their lives. It's not that I, as a leader, don't get to live out my calling because the fullness of my calling involves creating a way forward for others.

Availability of Christians also plays a really important part in this. There is so much activity in churches which means that Christians, in many instances, are not available to meet non-Christians at all. On one Sunday a month we say to people, just go and be with your family and friends; be intentional about it. The café stays open but we give an opportunity for many of those involved to go elsewhere and they love that.

I don't see us as being 'radical' in any way I think we're just doing what Christians have always been called to do – which is to go. When the Spirit comes in power it sends us out. So we probably just need to get out of our churches a bit more and start meeting the people where they're at – rather than expecting them to come in to where we are.

As time goes on, the challenge will be that it's easy to try lots of different things when you're relatively small in number but when you get bigger, I think that becomes harder to hold. In a year's time we could be a church of 60-80 people so we'd then need a bigger space but if it means we move out of the café for church, then the danger is that we become a 'normal' church service somewhere.

The temptation is to pull back to what you know. Mission flows out of our Wednesday night gatherings; the aim is not to bring people to a service to be transformed but that significant discipleship can take place through relationship and community.

I do want to see big things for Kahaila but I think that would involve more of what we're doing already in different ways; we're looking at setting up a bakery so we'd then look at how we might do church in a bakery and at Kahaila. We want to plant out again because we believe Kahaila is having an effect; we have baptised people in the café and helped others on the road to faith.

Originally our aim was to reach those in their 20s and 30s but now many families come. How do we do Kahaila for adults and children? At the moment we are looking at the franchise model but remind ourselves that the vision is about reaching people for Christ; it's not about business.

Hot Chocolate

Charis Robertson is the Acting Director of Hot Chocolate Trust in Dundee. She tells how the city centre youth work organisation is seeing the signs of a developing church community.

Hot Chocolate started in 2001 in the heart of Dundee. There is a shopping mall built around The Steeple Church in the city centre and, in front of the church, is a grassy area which became a meeting place for young people from the 'alternative' culture (ie. those dressed in black with piercings and tattoos and skateboards and thrash metal music etc).

At that time, there was a young woman on placement as a part-time youth worker with The Steeple who was looking outside the church, saying,

There is a community inside the walls of the church and there is a community outside the walls.

She went out with a small group of volunteers and they had no agenda other than to go and meet young people on that grassy area. Within a few months, there were quite a few significant relationships developing. We are called Hot Chocolate simply because that's what the volunteers took out with them and the young people themselves started calling the encounters, Hot Chocolate. The name just stuck.

Then we started to ask the young people, 'If you had a bit of space in the church building, what would you do with it?' The answer was that they wanted some rehearsal space, a place they could just crash out and be themselves, and so we ended up with some thrash metal bands come to rehearse in the sanctuary of the church!

Since the outset, it has been the young people who have made the decisions about how, when and what happens. These roots remain totally foundational to who we are and the way we operate today.

It all grew very organically and was very relationally-based. We became an independent charity in 2004 and we now have six paid staff (two of whom are full time) and around 35 youth work volunteers each year. We work with about 300 young people in the course of a year and do lots of things, including group work and one-to-one sessions but we don't preach at them or do anything that would be seen as typically 'churchy' in any way. Instead we get alongside to support them and are always asking the question, 'What do you want to do?' We've got good facilities, including a sports room, kitchen and chill-out room so we have the space to accommodate lots of different types of activities.

Many of the young people are from difficult family contexts and some have been in and out of young offender institutes. The young people we encounter hear from so many sources that they are bad, stupid, worthless, and will amount to nothing. Giving as much of the responsibility and ownership of Hot Chocolate to the young people as possible has resulted in a deep commitment and respect for both the place and the relationships around it. Creating a space that is truly owned by the young people has been vital to this. They most commonly describe it as their 'home', where they can make their own cup of tea, hang their art on the wall, and find a place of belonging. Hot Chocolate is not here to do things for young people or to provide a service for young people, but instead to grow a community with young people. That actually makes all the difference.

We've found too that language can also play a huge part in unhelpful power dynamics, and Hot Chocolate works hard to be thoughtful about this. For example: we are not a service. We do not have clients, customers or service users. We are a community, and the young people are young people. We do not have staff and volunteers, we have team. We do not try to fix the young people but walk alongside them, open to learning as much from them as they might from us.

Our approach is not that of a typical church based youth work organisation. We don't do God slots, but we share our lives, and those of the team who have faith share our faith when the time is right. A lot of the young folk are interested in spirituality and it is not difficult to get spiritual conversations at all.

As time has gone on, some of the young folk have found faith. That has often coincided with them coming onto team and experiencing a more explicitly Christian part of the community. As the former young people find that sense of belonging amongst the team, it opens up all sorts of questions. One young person started coming when he was 13 or 14, became a Christian along the way and is now one of our key volunteers. Not all of the team are Christians, but all are open to exploring and all feel that the Christian ethos is very important. We also often attract team members who are disillusioned with mainstream church – especially artists and social activists especially who feel they haven't found their place.

What they tend to describe as their 'church' time is when we're sitting around the dinner table together, three times a week. Before opening for any youth work session, the team has a meal together and shares some sort of devotion – and that's where they find belonging and faith. We want to develop specifically around that time, and help grow an indigenous Christian leadership. We feel uneasy about importing worship resources that are not appropriate to our context so we have started writing worship and prayers of our own. In a way, everything that has happened so far in the way of church community is completely accidental, and so tends to be quite different to intentional church planting models and approaches. (This is not a bad thing, it is just different).

Hot Chocolate has never been about getting the young people into church on a Sunday morning and it wasn't even about starting a youth project. It was simply about building relationships and seeing what might emerge, motivated by the love of God. It seems that every couple of months we stop and say, 'What are you up to now God? It's changing again!' We know we are very strong on belonging, on community and activism; we are not necessarily great at discipleship but we are learning.

Hot Chocolate experiments: not recklessly, but without anxiety of failure. There is a strong culture of reflection, vulnerability and learning together, even when we have made mistakes.

We've learned a lot about the God of mission. It's God's mission to transform the lives of the young people and not ours. God is already at work doing this, and so our job is to get alongside him, not the other way around. This has been a liberating, challenging realisation.

In terms of challenges, when you work for a charity, finance is always going to be a challenge but we do have support from various agencies, including the Church of Scotland's Go For It Fund which aims to encourage creative ways of working which develop the life and mission of the local church and are transformative for both communities and congregations. We have had some major staffing changes in the team in the past couple of years too, but we have just appointed a new director to start in January so we are looking forward to starting the new year with a leader who is very missional-minded, someone to help us grow this amazing community together.

JustChurch

A new church for young adults has been growing in Bradford since the appointment of a city centre Mission Priest, Chris Howson, in October 2005.

The church takes inspiration from Micah 6.8, which exhorts concern for justice, and by liberation theology, expressed by Chris as

get involved in your context.

Liberation theology teaches people to act first, reflect later,

he explains.

Our job was to hit the ground running, to see what worked and ditch what didn't.

One of the first ways Chris sought to grow church was through JustChurch, a weeknight meeting that focuses its worship on the writing of letters on behalf of lobby groups like Amnesty International. Around 15 to 25 young adults attend, most of them new to church practice.

The old Anglican chaplaincy centre near Bradford University where JustChurch meets is also host to a fair trade café. On the first Friday of every month up to 80 young adults – most new to church – meet there for an evening of live music and poetry called Soul Jam.

It's about being alongside people and having fun, so people discover that this is a church that lets them be themselves,

says Chris. But he is also concerned to connect people with the wider church and holds a weekly Eucharist on Sundays at noon. Soul Space is a relaxed, informal Anglican service where the Bible is told as a story rather than read and discussion replaces a sermon.

We emphasise listening and making discoveries for ourselves,

explains Chris. The service, attracting around 25 young adults, lasts about 50 minutes, then moves to the café for refreshments. Sundays also see an afternoon discussion group on faith issues and an evening service of Christian meditation.

Young adults are introduced to any of these events through friends, and through actions such as peace vigils in the city centre, work with campaign groups, and a bike repair service run by church members jointly with a local squatters' collective.

Our aim is to encourage real discipleship, to show that the kingdom of God is about showing love, and that we can make a difference in the world,

says Chris.

Night Church Hastings

A town centre church in Hastings hosts a monthly Night Church to provide a safe space on Saturday evenings – a place where people have the opportunity to encounter God. Revd Annette Hawkins explains more.

Several people from different places had a vision to open a Night Church in Hastings. Some of them had been inspired by Church for the Night in Bournemouth (featured on expressions: making a difference and this website) as something that would work alongside and complement the ministry of Street Pastors in the area.

As we met together a team emerged and we found that the vision we shared was to create a safe space where people felt welcome and accepted. We would offer hospitality and be sensitive to people's needs; talking and praying for them if that is what they wanted but also giving them space and being careful not to get in the way of what the Holy Spirit was doing.

Towards the end of 2011 a team from various churches in Hastings transformed the interior of Holy Trinity Church in the town centre. We covered an 8ft cross with Christmas lights and decorations and set it in the chancel, organised a comfortable area where people could pray, light a candle and pin prayers to a prayer wall. We also set up a large café area with sofas, chairs and tables, good tea, coffee and cakes. The church was decorated with tealights and Christmas lights and different areas were created by using fencing panels covered in material!

There were poetry, art and multi-media displays and music and light projected out into the street to attract passers-by. Sixty people of different ages came in, some for a few minutes, others for a couple of hours. Some lit a candle and prayed silently, some chattered noisily and asked lots of questions, some poured their hearts out and shared deeply painful and moving experiences.

Most were amazed that they were allowed in at all – especially if they had been drinking, many of them expressed their appreciation and their intent to come back and bring their friends.

Encouraged, we opened the doors again on New Year's Eve and similar numbers of people came, several who had been to the first event but many new people as well. Our next event will be around Valentine's Day and we plan to open monthly from then on. Up to now we have advertised Night Church as running from 10pm to 2am but in reality we have kept it open as long as people needed us. We're thinking that we may now have a cut-off point of 3am though on New Year's Eve people were still walking through the doors at 4.30am. One person who had been contemplating suicide that night said the fact that they could come into Night Church had saved them from doing that.

Holy Trinity is an Anglo-Catholic church and a very beautiful building; the local council pay for the chancel to be lit and the light can be seen through the stained glass windows. It's one of those 'wow' sort of interiors and when people walk in for the first time their first reaction is one of amazement! The church is in an interregnum at the moment but the predominantly older congregation have been so helpful and are really thrilled that their church is being used in this way. They have also been generous in giving us storage space there. One of the most exciting aspects of this ministry is that at the last count there were people from 10 different churches and seven different denominations working together with no agenda other than to serve the community and show God's love.

Night Church is missional in that we seek to help people to encounter the living God, particularly the unchurched and dechurched. We actively discourage Christians from coming unless they are on the team. At the moment we are not in a position to disciple people although the hope is that, as we build relationships through regular contact, we will be able to encourage people in their faith journey. We are at a very early stage and are quite open to the leading of the Spirit as to what the next stage may be.

York Community Chaplaincy

York Community Chaplaincy (YCC) operates in the York Diocese as a Bishop's Mission Order. Leader Chris Cullwick details how its work has grown.

Building on the development of chaplaincy in various sectors across the city and the success of recent projects such as Street Angels, the Community Chaplaincy seeks new opportunities for chaplaincy service and trains and supports volunteers into a variety of chaplaincy roles.

YCC officially started in June 2010 as a three year project though I have been personally involved in chaplaincy here under the title of York Workplace Chaplaincy for several years before that. A previous Bishop of Selby, Humphrey Taylor, had originally set up workplace chaplaincy as an independent and ecumenical charity, representing all the denominations in the city and its range of chaplaincy services.

Among the many organisations and businesses using these services were the Chamber of Commerce and York City Football Club. That model worked pretty well until about five years ago because the partners benefiting from the chaplaincy were contributing to the charity so there wasn't too much of a worry about fundraising. Those partners included City of York Council, Nestle (which contributed £34,000 pa), Terrys and Norwich Union which provided us with an office space. However, over the course of time and with changes in management, funding support diminished.

Two of us had been employed full-time but then my colleague was made redundant. It was time to think again because the workplace chaplaincy provision under the old arrangements ended in January last year. The Diocese was keen to address the need and opportunity and, on considering various options, saw a Bishop's Mission Order as the best way to move things on. The BMO, from June 2010 for three years, was a new initiative to not only support existing chaplaincies in the city but also to develop new opportunities with new resources, in particular by identifying suitable volunteers.

I now help to recruit, train and support a growing number of those volunteers into chaplaincy positions. Under the umbrella of York Community Chaplaincy we now have a team of about 10 volunteers doing a variety of things. I'm also employed part-time by York St John. I have worked alongside the University's Theology and Ministry Department and very much hope to develop the chaplaincy strand as training for general use.

Looking at general trends, we can see that more and more vacancies for chaplaincy welcome applications not only from ordained ministers but also from suitably qualified lay people. We are providing opportunity for those who have not come through the route of ordination.

It's easy with pioneer ministry and fresh expressions to overlook what the church has been doing for hundreds of years in the form of chaplaincy. The fact is that chaplaincy has become a very, very flexible term. As far as I'm concerned, it's all about being where people are with a focus on service and I think that's why many are getting excited about it.

I have organised a number of days to help people explore chaplaincy, one chap who came is now heading up the retail chaplaincy in York which regularly visits over 100 city centre businesses.

The BMO is very helpful because it gives YCC a sense of support and respectability from the diocese in taking this kind of initiative across parish boundaries and drawing in volunteers from different kinds of churches. We hope it will enable YCC to continue its life beyond my present appointment and direct involvement.

Others recognise the BMO as a cross city initiative which doesn't have to tiptoe around parish boundaries. We are now at a pretty critical stage and quite a lot needs to happen because chaplaincy is a huge opportunity and a tremendous way to harness a lot of volunteer engagement with our churches and community; going out to meet people where they are.

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!

Moot

The Moot monastic community (featured on expressions: the dvd – 2) offers hospitality and welcome in the heart of the City of London to 'questers' or 'spiritual seekers'. Vanessa Elston, one of the community's core team responsible for developing mission and evangelism, describes its work.

As a monastic community we are seeking to deepen the ways we encounter God, ourselves and others in community, spiritual formation and mission.

Our worship draws deeply on the sacramental and contemplative traditions, bringing together the ancient-future dimensions of the faith. We aspire to a common rhythm of life that expresses our commitment to living sustainably, holistically and justly. We also explore spiritual practices, postures and virtues as means to the transformation and inner liberation required to live out our Christian vocation.

Hospitality and welcome are part of our rhythm of life; they represent a significant strand in the monastic tradition and have a long biblical and Christian tradition of practice that best describes how we are called to engage with the 'other', our 'neighbour', the 'stranger' – particularly those who may lack resources to support themselves.

Through our presence in the City, we regularly meet those who are increasingly dissatisfied with the assumptions and lifestyle offered by secular modernity. Many are looking for resources to support their quest for meaning, spiritual experience and practice but are not turning to the traditional church to do this. Our society is increasingly post secular and open to exploring the spiritual dimension of life but the Church has been slow to effectively engage with this shift in the culture. As a result we have been experimenting with two forms of welcome and hospitality on offer to those who are looking for more to their lives, but are resistant to traditional forms of church and evangelism.

On Wednesday evenings at St Mary Woolnoth's Church, opposite Bank Tube station and the Bank of England, you will see banners on the railing offering 'Free Meditation' to those who are 'stressed in the city'. Inside the church a group of 15-20 people meets every week to be led through a series of relaxation exercises into a 20 minute silent meditation, following the sacred word approach of the Benedictine Monk John Main. We are encouraged not to worry if our minds seem to leap about like monkeys at first, but to keep drawing ourselves back to our 'anchor word' or 'image'.

This method is to help us still our minds, so that we can begin to get beyond the surface clutter and distraction that prevents us from encountering ourselves at a deeper level and going beyond ourselves to encounter the divine. After the meditation we reflect on how our stress levels have, or have not, been lowered and there is an opportunity to share thoughts, reflections and questions on the process. In this way, those who are spiritual questers experience stillness and transformation. As a result some become regular visitors who are now in a process of opening up to Christian spirituality.

Twice a month on a Wednesday evening, in a large pub near St Mary’s, city workers share a drink or meal while a group of people meet in a back room for what we call a ‘Serum discussion’ based on one of the bigger questions around life, God and spirituality. The group starts with an icebreaker in which everyone introduces themselves and then there is a short 3 to 5 minute thought-provoking discussion starter which ends with a question.

We then split up into smaller groups where the conversation is facilitated so that everyone participates on the same level, feels listened to and respected. The ground rules of Serum are explained so that the goal is not 'to win the argument', or 'get the right answer to the question' but is about mutual learning. If you listened in to one of these groups you would become aware how this approach can take the discussion beyond an intellectual debate about ideas into something far more personal involving heartfelt searching and consideration. It is amazing how honest and open people can be with others they have never met before.

You would also notice how this approach works best when the Christian presence and voice is in the minority and how people find it much easier to listen when they no longer feel threatened by an atmosphere of dominance or control. A trainee ordinand described Serum as ‘unique in his experience’ in that the church was hosting an event where it was not asking people to move towards it but providing a genuine space of mutual encounter and dialogue.

In these ways Moot is seeking to engage with those who may be a long way from traditional forms of church but are searching for ultimate reality through spiritual experience and finding safe spaces where beliefs and perceptions can be explored and discussed in a non-threatening and non-argumentative environment. The meditation group has been meeting for over a year while the Serum discussion groups are a newer venture – both are attended by a majority of non-Mooters.

One of the challenges of living in a big city is sustaining and growing community and Moot is no different in this respect. We have big ambitions for a small community and are looking for new participants to help us develop our programme of spiritual and missional events in the heart of the City of London.

River in the City

The vision for River in the City is to create new ways of 'being church' for people who work, relax and live in Liverpool City Centre. Pioneer minister Keith Hitchman envisages a growing network of small communities in workplaces, cafes, and many other areas.

Liverpool ONE is one of the biggest shopping centres in the country. Its 42 acres includes 160 shops, more than 20 bars and restaurants, a 14-screen cinema and a park. It is the largest city centre regeneration project in Europe.

River in the City will seek to serve those who visit, work and live in this development but it will also be there for anyone in and around the Liverpool city centre. The slogan for Liverpool ONE is 'Love the City'; the aim of River in the City is to follow Jesus' lead and to love the city in his name, demonstrating that love in useful and practical ways.

The Diocese of Liverpool is looking at a model of church that doesn't involve a large number of people coming together in one place but sees groups being established around a common interest – whatever that interest may be. In a world of choice and change, people form groups with others who share the same interests and views on life. It is through these groups that they discuss and ask the big questions and I want to help people to do that.

This is about taking church out of the church building and into the workplace environment. It's about growing faith where life happens and life happens in the workplace and places like the city centre.

It's interesting how people see my work. Someone recently described me as 'the travelling vicar.' In a sense I suppose that's what I am! Other things are also important here. I have already been asked the key question of what football team I support. My son has chosen Liverpool because I don't think we'll survive without supporting a team from the city but I'm going to stick with my own favourites, West Ham. That means I don't have to be a 'Blue' (Everton) or a 'Red' (Liverpool). Anyway if you add the blue and the red together you'd probably get the claret colour of The Hammers!

Culture is changing so rapidly that, for me, fresh expressions is not an add-on. It is vital. We're mapping out the way the Church will look over the next 200 years and that's exciting, but it’s also disturbing for people I think. The line that comes to me is from the book of Acts, 'these people are disturbing our city'.

Supportive bishops, deacons and those in leadership in the Diocese mean there is a growing understanding of what it means to do church in new ways and be church in new ways for a new time. I love the fact that there is a strategy for pioneer ministry here and the imagery of Lake and River – with the river of fresh expressions flowing into the lake of the inherited models of church. There's something very holistic about that.