St John's Parish Community Vision

Collaborative, Diverse, Open
Published by The Vicar • 19/09/2009 7:29:01 a.m.
Parish Ethos, Sept 09 – based on the parish website (Collaborative, Diverse, Open)
“St Johns chooses to build a loving, safe, welcoming faith community that is intellectually challenging, emotionally supportive and filled with the strength, integrity and social responsibility that spirituality inspires.”

In response to the input at the Diocesan Ministry Conference 2009, part of our professional ministry development, which asked, ‘how do we describe our church context (who are we?) and how do we lead within that context?’ Carole and Michael Hughes

Collaborative Teams Ministries – multiplicity of teams working in the parish.
- power is shared (not one person holding all roles/responsibilities)
- numerous people take up different roles/responsibilities – (not whole teams doing everything together all the time)
- encouraging/fostering a culture of initiative – where people feel safe to be proactive and try new ways and new ideas without one leader having to ‘do’ it all or control it.
- Promoting a culture of trust.
- Emphasis on relationships over programmes. Visiting/pastoral care a priority.
Building relationships with children just as important as what we teach them.
- young people lead young people
Diversity
- Parallel activities happening alongside each other – not necessarily all being on the same page.
- Different preachers/teachers offering different perspectives.
- Offering a range of different worship opportunities – Taize, Soul Café, 723 Service, Prayer and Praise, Wednesday Service, Home/Prayer Groups, Women’s Fellowship, Evensong, Beach Services, alongside the Sunday morning traditional Anglican services.
- Doing liturgy distinctive from that of neighbouring parishes – offering difference to the local community – i.e. Creative traditional Anglican worship based on NZPB with diverse music and liturgical styles according to season and themes.
- Creating an environment where people of different age groups, genders, cultures, family groups, feel welcome – including leadership opportunities.
- Equipping people to be followers of Jesus and minister in their own contexts – families/workplaces/community, etc.
Openness
- Open to new ways and new activities and new people, including both creating and holding traditions.
- Welcome comes before criteria/rules, e.g. baptism families/ weddings – always open and welcoming to everyone who approaches us.
- Holding pastoral alongside prophetic (open to be challenged as well as cared for).
- Fostering a theology of grace: emphasising love and welcome rather than sin and judgement.
- open to new ways of leading according to the context – complex and adaptive
- Open to people’s needs, struggles and celebrations!

To ensure the above vision/ethos evolves we encourage and support:
- processes of accountability
- regular communication with leaders and wider community
- gathering teams where appropriate, i.e. worship group, wardens group, etc
- discerning initiatives
- supporting/resourcing/encouraging leaders
- responding to issues of concern/conflict
- offering an overall perspective – the big picture
- sharing in doing the daily leadership roles of: preaching/teaching/administration/visiting/resourcing/meeting/communication etc