- Do you have a decent church website?
- Is it up to date?
- Is it responsive – ie does it work on mobile phones?
- Does your own online profile feature your ideas and hopes and dreams other than a desire for people to turn up to church?
- Do you know what you are doing with twitter and facebook?
- Who could you learn more about social media from?
- Do you have a compelling reason why people should come to your church other than where it is or what denomination it belongs to?
- Can everyone in the church tell you in one sentence what that compelling reason is?
- What is your beginners’ course like?
- What comes after the beginners’ course?
- Do people like the preaching?
- Do people enjoy the music?
- Have you dealt with conflicts from the past?
- Are the people friendly?
- Do you have any new groups starting soon?
- Do you talk about making the world a better place?
- How will people experience joy if they come to your congregation?
- If someone from your past turned up unexpectedly at worship how would it make you feel?
- How do you identify newcomers and what do you offer them?
- What problems will arise if you do grow and how will you deal with them?
- Do claims that you welcome everyone stop you working at welcoming those who traditionally find it hard to find a home in church?
- Do you use language that is inclusive of everyone?
- How do you know?
- Is there any identifiable group of people that you can’t explicitly say are welcome because of how an individual or group in the congregation will react?
- Do you want to grow or not?
6 responses to “Michael Perham and Gracious Restraint”
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I think the married bishops ought to be asked to repent of having married in the first place.
I think what the statement by +Gloucester fails to take on board is that it is not just about sex. It is the love and joy people have in each other. It is saying ‘have you met my husband?’ Until people get that, we will make no progress.
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I’d like to gear him call for a bit of gracious restraint in Uganda and Nigeris, where the Anglican church could perhaps do a little more to wind down the appalling homophobic violence taking place, due in no small part to their inflammatory conduct and support of really bad law…
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Yes, Jaye…
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Yes, it is always we who are called upon to stand in the “crucified place.”
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Well done! It should also be pointed out that the rhetorical form of this plea is sure to put people off, expressing the purblind self-hypnotic self-mediation of a closed mind. You wouldn’t buy a used car from this chap. I speak as an unchurched American deeply impressed by Kelvin’s intelligence as expressed on this blog, which I share with my son who is on the ordination path in a Bristol. He loves it too.
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Well said, as always.
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To the Tower
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Bishop David on the Big Questions
Fr Primus was on the Big Questions yesterday morning. For those who have not seen it, the Big Questions is a questiontimesque religious programme that goes out on a Sunday morning when lost of us are out at church. The questions this week were: Should an earthquake shake your faith? Is porn bad for society?…
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Lent Booklist
Someone over on facebook asked me to make a suggestion for something to read during Lent. I thought I’d done that before on the blog and was planing simply to link back to it but I can’t find it, so here’s a new Lent Book List. Worship-shaped Life (Canterbury Studies in Anglicanism) is well worth…
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Review – Orlando, Scottish Opera
Aha, my review of Orlando has now gone up at the Opera Britannia website. Rather late in the day, but I gather they have recruited someone new to get the reviews up much quicker in the future. Here is what I said: Rating: Scottish Opera – Theatre Royal, Glasgow, 14 February 2011 Scottish Opera’s Orlando…
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