R5 The Local Church in the Community

Welcome to the R5 Local Church in the Community Weekend web page. This page is designed to provide useful resources relating to topics covered in R5 with WEMTC. If you have found useful resources or have questions you would like ask, please do contribute. These weekends are linked to the Home Church Reflection module

What is this Weekend all about?

The third weekend particularly explores how your church relates to the community that surrounds it.

Click here for:

• Full module description for R5
• Sample R5 Programme
• Residential Timetable for dates of the weekend
• Booklists for the weekend
• Handouts for the weekend

Books

• Bowden A Ministry in the Countryside London, Mowbray 1994
• Chauvet, L-M. Symbol and Sacrament Liturgical Press, 1995
• Davie, G. Religion in Britain since 1945 Oxford, Blackwell, 1996
• Dulles, A. Models of the Church 2nd edition Doubleday 1988
• Greenwood, R. Practising Community: the Task of the Local Church London, SPCK 1996
• Macquarrie, J. A Guide to the Sacraments London, SCM, 1997
• Warren, R. Building Missionary Congregations CHP 1995
• Williams, R. Lost Icons: Reflections on Cultural Bereavement Edinburgh, T&T Clark, 2000

R5 The Local Church in the Community Web Resources

The Internet is not 100% reliable and documents move, disappear and change their names. If you find a link does not work, try again in an hour, a day, or a week. But do feel free to email us to report a link doesn't work. Don't forget to tell us the name of the link!

Resources Generally There are not many web sites specifically linked to this subject but you might find the following helpful

Your Local Community
Try typing in the name of your community into a search engine such as Google and experiment.
As well try starting from your local county council:

• Bristol City Council
• Gloucester City Council
• Herefordshire
• North Somerset
• Shropshire
• South Gloucestershire
• Worcestershire
• The Oultwood Site will connect you to other local givernment sites

Analysing your Community
I am still looking for web resources that might help with the assignment. Let me know of any you find useful.

Rural Church

Bangor Centre for Studies in Rural Ministry

About the Bangor University Centre for Studies in Rural Ministry.

The Arthur Rank Centre

the Arthur Rank Centre aims to serve the rural community and its churches.

The future of the Rural Church

A well acclaimed Report to the Methodist Conference in 2001 on the Rural Church.

fresh Expressions and the Rural Church

Fresh Expressions of Church and Cell Church for the rural church.

Why not tell us of some sites you have found useful? If the webmaster agrees we'll list them here.

Go ahead - be the first to submit something

A sample R5 Weekend Programme

Preparation

Programme

Saturday
8:00        Worship
8:30        Breakfast
9:15        Session 2
10:45      Coffee Break
11:15      Session 3
1:00        Lunch
2:00        Free
4:15        Session 4
6:00        Worship
6:30        Dinner
7:30        Session 5

Sunday
8:30        Breakfast
9:15        Session 6
10:30      WEMTC Forum
2:00        Coffee
2:30        Worship
1:00        Lunch

Preparatory Assignment

ASSIGNMENT 3 COMMUNITY AUDIT

You can download a copy of the R5 assignment in rtf format (22kb).

Collect together as much of the following information as you are able to locate before the next residential. Do not worry if you cannot answer all questions or some are irrelevant to your community.

Those who are in benefices should concentrate as much as possible on one church and its particular community.

Church Audit

Name of Church: 

1. On a separate sheet of paper attach a map or rough diagram of the parish boundaries, and mark the location of the church and any other churches.
2. How many people are currently on the electoral role/membership list? 
3. What percentage of the electoral role/membership live within the parish boundaries/ community boundaries 
4. How many adults and children attend services on an average Sunday (total all services) 
5. What is the age profile of those who attend services (total all Sunday services & list as percentage)
   0-10      10-20    20-35    35-50    50-70    over 70
6. What percentage of the Sunday attendees fall within these socio-economic categories
   Professional & Managerial        Skilled Workers 
   Semi-skilled       Non-skilled jobs 
   Homemakers         Unemployed
7. What is the ethnicity range for the church
8. List separately, church organised activities that exist primarily for church members
9. List separately, church organised activities that exist for the community churched or unchurched. If possible obtain attendance figures for non-churched and/or fringe church members.
10. List separately, commmunity organisations which have some affiliation or contact with the church and where possible attendance figures.
11. Give the figures for occassional offices for the last year and note what percentage have little church affiliation
    Baptisms:     Weddings:     Funerals:

Name of community/ies within the parish boundaries:

1. On the map of the parish boundaries, mark the main community centres e.g. shops, halls, recreation facilities etc. and the community boundaries e.g. govt wards etc.
2. What is the approx. total population of this area? 
3. How would you describe the community e.g. rural, market town, UPA, suburban 
4. What is the age profile of the community:
   0-10    10-20    20-35    35-50    50-70    over 70
5. What is the socio-economic profile in these categories:
   Professional & Managerial  Skilled Workers 
   Semi-skilled    Non-skilled jobs 
   Homemakers    Unemployed
6. What is the ethnicity range for the area:
7. What are the proportions of housing type in the area:
   Privately owned    Privately rented 
   Rented from council or similar    Detached or semi detached
   Terraced    Flats
   Average no of people per household    No of single person households 
   Percentage of households without a car    Percentage with 2 or more cars 
8. List on a separate page community groups and facilities that you are aware of.
9. Are there any tensions in the community, or any particular social problems
10. What are the current areas of concern locally

Resources:

Your Minister and Church Wardens should be able to help you with your church audit.

Your local library, council and any local papers should be able to help with the community audit.

Census figures for 2001 are also available online see:

Most councils have web sites and there are often community based web sites - try typing in the name of your community within a search engine such as Google

Resources Addition Form

Contribution to this Page

Code and title

Tutor

Brief description

Level and Credits

Status

Type

Prerequisites

Restrictions

Content summary

• Sharing experiences of the local church in a number of different contexts, such as liturgy, local community, pastoral care, ministerial practice.
• Exploration of models of the Church in relation to the local church
• Developing tools for collecting and understanding church data
• Use of the Pastoral Cycle
• Biblical models and stories of Church and their relationship to the local church
• Reflection on liturgy and the local church
• The Church's role in the community with reference to the local church
• Reflections on the Church and pastoral care in relation to the local church
• An exploration of Missiological themes in relation to the local church
• Worship and Sacraments including: Worship on the Course; Learning from Tradition; Worship and the Senses; Recent experiments in liturgy

Learning outcomes

a) Knowledge and Understanding

• Be familiar with some of the significant theological models for the Church
• Have an understanding of different worship traditions and ways of being the Church within an ecumenical perspective
• Understand a variety of traditions and perspectives on the relationship between Church and Community
• Have considered a number of models of pastoral care as exemplified in the communities represented by the group
• Deepened their understanding of the nature of worship Have considered different understandings of the role and nature of the sacraments

b) Skills

• Have gained skills in working and theologically reflecting with a small group.
• Have gained a respect for the strengths of traditions other than their own
• Demonstrate an understanding of the pastoral cycle
• Be able to theologically describe and reflect on their home church
• Be able to connect scriptural insights to their home church context
• Be able to apply theological insights in practical situations
• Be equipped to organise and lead worship within WEMTC and have developed the confidence to explore worship within the home church

Teaching and learning

Assessment

Indicative resources

• Bowden A Ministry in the Countryside London, Mowbray 1994
• Chauvet, L-M. Symbol and Sacrament Liturgical Press, 1995
• Davie, G. Religion in Britain since 1945 Oxford, Blackwell, 1996
• Dulles, A. Models of the Church 2nd edition Doubleday 1988
• Greenwood, R. Practising Community: the Task of the Local Church London, SPCK 1996
• Macquarrie, J. A Guide to the Sacraments London, SCM, 1997
• Warren, R. Building Missionary Congregations CHP 1995
• Williams, R. Lost Icons: Reflections on Cultural Bereavement Edinburgh, T&T Clark, 2000