In the next phase of our Church on the Margins programme, we wish to build on the positive stories of hope that have been identified through participatory research –
creating space for people experiencing poverty and marginalisation to reclaim dignity, agency and power within their own congregations and communities, and at a wider level within institutional church. The programme will seek to enable transformational change to take place in multiple local communities across the UK, facilitated and funded by the URC, in which local people, communities and churches are enabled to reclaim dignity, agency and power together. This will contribute to wider thinking with the churches as to the role that institutional Christian bodies (nationally and locally) can play in investing a long-term social movement building, in which people and communities experiencing poverty and marginalisation are able to exercise leadership and agency.

The banking system underpins the global economy. Banks make loans and investments, and the way this money is used has consequences. Our current system doesn’t enable people and planet to flourish. 

JustMoney Movement’s Money Makes Change (MMC) programme educates and equips Christians and local churches to live out their faith and witness to shape a fairer, more sustainable economy, through how they bank, save, invest and spend money. With the support of MB Reckitt we will be able to develop the diversity of the programme, in particular to expand the reach and depth of our ethical finance education and action work with Black Majority Churches in the UK. This will enable more Christians from Black communities, many of whom are more financially marginalised than other ethnic groups, to know how their financial decisions can contribute to a fairer, more sustainable world, and to become aware of more inclusive, ethical actors in the finance sector such as credit unions. 

Working with and under the guidance of a group of Black Majority Church leaders, we will create tailored MMC resources in terms of language, cultural appropriateness, theological relevance, and practical specificity, and test these with local MMC ‘Champions’ who will be identified and supported to use such resources with their congregations and communities.
https://justmoney.org.uk/

Faith communities that provide inclusive and affirming spiritual homes for LGBTQ+ people are critical.  The Faithful Allies Programme will build the knowledge, skills, and confidence of diverse faith leaders to make positive change for LGBTQ+ inclusion in their communities through a series of educational dialogue and peer support sessions. This pilot programme will support one cohort of 12 leaders, and will include the production of a report outlining a replicable model for others to use to make change.
https://faithbeliefforum.org/

Peacebuilders Programme

While inter faith work in the UK is abundant and overwhelmingly positive, the issue of the Middle East and, in particular, Israel/Palestine can threaten to derail good relations and cause divisions between and within faith communities. As part of our ongoing work, the Peacebuilders project will train and equip Christians to lead and promote positive and informed dialogue among Jews, Christians and Muslims, and those of other faiths or none.

Working with our trained facilitators, course students will engage with the issues through online and in-person sessions, using a range of voices from communities here and in the Middle East. Not only will this enable participants to gain a fuller picture of the region, but it will also provide them with skills and opportunities to be peace-builders and to help mend broken relationships between and within communities here. http://www.fodip.org.uk/

For most people, pilgrimage is associated with remote, rural, ancient or ‘thin’ places like Iona or Lindisfarne. Whilst these very much have their place, they do not help with the task of discovering holiness, transformation or encountering God in more modern, urban, everyday environments. If we journey with forgotten, economically marginalised communities, can they become sites of pilgrimage, encounter, hope and transformation? 

To mark Church Action on Poverty’s 40^th anniversary in 2022, we are organising a series of Pilgrimage at the Margins events in different locations across the UK, each hosted by a local partner church or community organisation. We will listen to and amplify the truths revealed by people and communities on the margins of British society, sharing their vision of the kind of future they want to see for themselves and the neighbourhoods, and standing in solidarity with them in speaking truth to power about the wider changes that are needed to help bring this about.

Who Is Your Neighbour? (WIYN) holds conversations in which people are able to speak openly about issues like immigration, ethnicity, and people who are ‘not like us’. Most of these are in white communities where there isn’t a lot of day to day contact with people who are ‘not like us’ but where there might be worry about unsettling change.

In these conversations, people are taken seriously and their experience is valued which allows for openness, curiosity about others and questioning consensuses.

Our group of dialogue facilitators all have many years’ experience of working with conversations about hard things.  The facilitators share and pool their learning and experience and this develops and builds how we work.

WIYN was set up in 2010 in South Yorkshire, where most of our work has taken place.  We have developed our learning and experience during the last ten years and are keen to share it in ways that are useful.  To increase the impact of our work, we will begin working in partnership in 2022 with three national organisations, the Local Government Association, the Housing Diversity Network and Methodist Church Regional Learning Networks to embed our learning in their work and that of their member or partner organisations.

You can contact us on: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

In an average year, 5.5% of adults in the UK experience domestic abuse. Sadly, the figures are almost identical within the UK church, in every denomination. In church as in the general population, financial, psychological, and family factors may combine to trap people in abusive situations. However, when domestic abuse occurs in a church setting, there are additional complexities which can prevent resolution of the situation.  Some abusers use the Bible to manipulate their partners into complying or submitting. Churches sometimes unwittingly exacerbate the problem by giving unhelpful teaching about forgiveness, divorce and submission.

With generous financial assistance from the MR Reckitt Foundation we will be creating a set of six videos for use by church small groups, to help participants become allies in situations of domestic abuse. This is phase two of a three-phase project seeking to address the weaponization of the Bible in situations of domestic abuse. By using these studies, churches will become aware of and resistant to the weaponization of the Bible by abusers. The videos will be  based upon the successful book The Bible Doesn’t Tell Me So by Helen Paynter, and presented by the  author, and others. For more information please visit the centre's website.

(Up-date Dec 2022) The videos and course notes can be accessed at https://www.csbvbristol.org.uk/study-videos/ where a trailer can be seen.

Modern slavery ranks as the second most profitable worldwide criminal enterprise after the illegal arms trade. There are an estimated 40.3 million people kept in modern slavery in the world with 136,000 of those estimated to be in the United Kingdom (Global Slavery Index). With churches and faith groups increasingly encountering victims of modern slavery through their grassroots work with the homeless and other vulnerable people, there is the question of how we can respond? There is consequently a need to explore and develop theological and practical responses to the exploitation occurring on our doorstep.

The Together Free Foundation serves communities and faith groups in helping them partner towards slavery-free communities. This is done through training, developing resources and practical action. In partnership with the MB Reckitt Trust and their grant, The Together Free Foundation will develop an academic research paper exploring faith and grassroots responses to modern slavery. Two articles for wider readership will accompany the academic paper in order to encourage faith in action through responding to local forms of modern slavery and human trafficking. For further information about Together Free refer to www.togetherfree.org.uk

The research funded by the M B Reckitt Trust is completed and has been published in the journal Practical Theology. It is free for access on: https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/GRAFZB6BQ9PBAP5YTEFU/full Alternatively it can be accessed on the Together Free Website

Evidence from the Christian Muslim Forum’s work and from major surveys (Pew, 2018, reported that 45% of church-attending Christians think Islam is incompatible with British values) reveal ignorance about Muslims within church circles which can sometimes lead to fear, hostility and division. Commonly used sources of information about Islam can be misleading and existing material to fill this gap tends to have been produced years ago and designed for an already knowledgeable or motivated audience. Personal links are also an important factor in reducing hostility and engaging across religious differences on a realistic basis.

With the support of the MB Reckitt Trust, CMF will be creating attractive, easy-to-use, written resources, based on the recommendations of a reference group, and disseminating these through church structures across the country. This will be coupled with opportunities for churchgoers to get to know neighbouring Muslims and Islamic organisations through CMF’s national network. The result will be better informed, more confident Christians in their understanding of Islam, and in their understanding of their own faith, and who have taken up the opportunity to meet local Muslims.

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If there is truly to be (in Pope Francis’ words) a “Church of the poor” and not just a “Church for the poor,” then the poorest need to be speaking in theological discourse, and not merely spoken about. With the support of the MB Reckitt Trust, the Centre for Theology and Community is developing facilitated Bible Study sessions to bring the voice of grassroots leaders with whom we work more directly into the process of theological reflection. This will both deepen their own theological and spiritual engagement with the issues they identify as most salient, and will enable resources to be produced which bring their voice into the wider theological discourse of the Church – and which enable Christians in other parts of the UK to replicate the process.

For news and updates, please see our website.