St Michael le Belfrey, York. Annual Parochial Church Meeting 25 April 2016 Agenda

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2 St Michael le Belfrey, York Annual Parochial Church Meeting 25 April 2016 Agenda 6.30pm Pizza in church pm Welcome from Matthew and worship pm Review of the year video pm Approval of minutes of 2015 Annual Meeting pm (Annual Vestry Meeting) Election of Church Wardens pm (Annual Parochial Church Meeting) Presentation of the Electoral Roll, Terrier and Inventory Summary of Reports pm Election to the PCC pm Presentation of the Accounts Re-Appointment of Waltons Clark Whitehill as Auditor pm Questions on the Reports pm Prayer for the coming year i) Evangelism: Making Disciples ii) Discipleship: Nurturing Disciples iii) Leadership: Developing Leaders iv) Planting: Planting Churches pm Final Song & Close

3 I often find myself praying for eyes to see. I pray for eyes to see the Lord more clearly (Eph 1:18) and for vision to see his vision and plans for us as a church (Prov 29:18). I pray this for myself and for others. We need to see. To see his kingdom (John 3:3) and his goodness (Ps 34:8) and see what the Father is doing (John 5:19). Reports Attached to this Vicar s Report to the Annual Meeting are a number of short reports prepared by church staff who are responsible for various areas of church life. Separately there are also finance pages available, detailing the year accounts with a Treasurer s Report (with grateful thanks to Roger Holmes who has served us excellently during the past year) and a covering report to the accounts from me about the public benefit of the church. Please read all these so you can see a fuller picture of church life. As in previous years, this short Vicar s report introduces the others and highlights a few areas of church life where I see the Lord at work. May we all be encouraged, envisioned and equipped to play our part in serving God s transformation of the North in our day. Making Disciples Our big theme for 2015 was Coming Home and during the year we invited many people to find a home in Jesus Christ and in the family of his church. As such mission, ably overseen by Greg Downes, has continued to be at the heart of church life in both showing and telling the good news of Christ. I am grateful to the teams serving at Never Give Up (feeding the homeless and lonely) and Belfrey Doors (opening the church midweek to visitors) who ve worked tremendously hard in giving their time and love in pointing people to Christ. We have encouraged Belfrey Groups in 2015 to have a missional focus and for each believer to be a witness in their workplace. We have more intentionally offered people an opportunity at all our congregations to give their lives to Jesus Christ. We have sent out a weekly Street Evangelism team and had a number of evangelistic cafes and guest services. As a result we have seen many people make professions of faith in Christ in 2015 and for that we rejoice! Some of those professing faith have been tourists who we won t see again but we give thanks for the 38 baptisms in 2015 and are praying and expecting to exceed that in already having had 23 at the start of 2016! Through our Youth and Children s work, based in The Storehouse, a good number of new young people have been drawn into the life of the church, with growing numbers attending the Youth residential in February each year and some choosing to be baptised. Congratulations went to Lee Kirkby at the end of 2015 as he was awarded Premier s Youth Worker of the Year! Our Student and 18-30s work has continued to strengthen under the leadership of Ben Doolan with new leaders being trained and Belfrey Groups forming. We have also seen people drawn into our fellowship through our worship. Worship is primarily for God and his glory but, as David Watson used to say, a praising community preaches to answer questions raised by its praise. Quite a number of those making professions of faith recently have said how the worship of our church played a key part in the journey to Christian commitment, and so grateful thanks go to Tom Holmes, Rachel Gray and all on

4 the worship team for their leading of us in congregational worship in Tom and the Belfrey Music team achieved two international No 1s in the itunes Christian & Gospel charts at the end of 2015, which was a sign of the growing impact of our music and worship ministry and the renewed life the Holy Spirit has been bringing our worship in Nurturing Disciples During the first part of 2015 we invited Belfrey Groups to come together for some special Coming Home Together events, encouraging groups and their leaders to help nurture disciples through outreach, worship and fellowship. Groups have always been the primary place of growth as disciples and where w e d e v e l o p d e e p, a c c o u n t a b l e friendships and encourage each other as followers of Jesus. I would like to thank all our group leaders for their care, support and leadership of the groups in 2015 as they are crucial to our life as a church. I would also like to thank all who have worked and prayed in St Cuthbert s House of Prayer (HOP) during the year, crying out to God for our church, our city and our region. Some excellent prayer and discipleship training has taken place in the HOP in the last year. The HOP is very important to us because nothing of lasting significance happens without prayer. Disciples have also been nurtured in 2015 through our congregations and in our preaching and teaching. In 2015 we looked at the themes of: Coming Home (January); I am sayings of Jesus (February); Jonah (March); Colossians (April); Kingdom Culture (May-June); Ezra & Nehemiah (July); Sign Posts Healings in John (August); Building Blocks of Testimony, Prayer, Worship (September); Titus (October); Ruth (November) and Advent (December). During Advent we began to look at the early verses of Luke s gospel which has continued as we ve gone into All these series were carefully considered and planned with a view to helping us grow as disciples, flow with the rhythm of the church year and also to be a means of declaring the good news of Christ to all. During 2015 some of our faithful disciples died and went to be with the Lord, which was sad for us but good for them. So we said a fond farewell to Warwick Stephenson, Nancy Rowland and Connie Holmes, and recently have also lost Pam Kennedy, Kay Taylor and Jenny Dixon - all of whom are remembered with love and affection.

5 Developing Leaders Leadership is influence. As disciples we are all called to life of influence in every sphere of life, wherever the Lord places us. In 2015 we have sought to help and encourage the whole of The Belfrey to make a difference in York and the North and we will continue to do this. In particular we have continued to invest time and resources into the Forge intern scheme (led by Greg Downes) with 10 Forgees beginning in September As well as serving in various areas of church life the Forgees are mentored and trained on a Monday and we love having them as part of our staff! We have also continued to send out ordinands to be trained to serve God s transformation of the North, and in the summer we sent off Ben Gunter, Simon Biddlestone, Mike Perkins and Jack Shepherd. We heard before Christmas that over the last 7 years we are No4 in the table of UK Anglican churches producing ordinands (clergy in training). As a church we are a founding partner church of the St Barnabas Training Centre in Sheffield and continue to invest time and resources to see contextual missional training pioneered in our region so that ordinands can be best prepared for future ministry. At The Belfrey I am grateful for the many leaders who have served the vision and mission of the church in various capacities. The staff have worked hard in 2015 with much of the Parish Centre having a make-over and special thanks go to Debs Stephens who served as our temporary Administration Manager for much of the year, Liv Davis as our Children and Families Worker and Cathryn Fergie who administered Belfrey Doors until the end of the year. During 2015 we welcomed into the staff team Ian McElligott (Senior Administrator), Jo Briggs (Administrative Assistant), Al Elmes (Creative Media Manager) and Liz Hunt (Children and Families Worker). Thanks too go to Wanda Patterson and Derek Spicer for giving much time and energy on the Leadership Team up to the summer and to all on Church Council (PCC) who have helped maintain good governance of the church. Thanks in particular to our 4 church wardens (Julie Caddell, Daniel Brookes, Barrie Stephenson and Tash Fletcher) for their wisdom, prayers and dedicated service. Planting Churches It s been exciting to see some great examples of church planting happening across the UK in 2015, spurred on by the appointment of Ric Thorpe as Bishop of Islington (for Church Planting). Both Ric and the Archbishop of York have been encouraging us during the year to plant more intentionally into the future and we have been making plans for that in 2017.

6 G2, our satellite church have also been encouraging more pioneering initiatives and it s encouraging to see a new plant about to begin from G2 in Whilst it s right that some churches in our Diocese and region close we have been in conversation with the Diocese about how we might work together to see new communities of faith develop in the future and how we might play our part in that. We very much value being part of the Diocese of York and we have good representation on Deanery Synod, Diocesan Synod and myself and Daniel Brookes serve on Archbishop s Council. Peter Collier continues to serve the Diocese faithfully as Chancellor and we have good relations with the Diocese s senior staff. The Archdeacon came in December to undertake a full church visit and came away greatly encouraged. Behind all this is our desire to see growth rather than decline in the North and to see God s kingdom come in greater measure in our city and region. This should be our expectation as it is part of the DNA that was brought to us 50 years ago by David Watson, and it was wonderful to celebrate a Jubilee Party in November 2015, remembering 50 years since David and Anne arrived in York, to look back and see again some of the things the Lord has been doing, and to also celebrate what we see the Lord doing today. In the light of this a few have rightly questioned why our congregational numbers in 2015 were below 2014 figures and why a greater than usual number of people left us in resulting in a decrease in regular monthly income. Some of this is undoubtedly due to uncertainty that arose after the PCC operational review of staff in 2014 and the closure of the Grace congregation in Whilst there were strategic and missional reasons behind those decisions some found them difficult and as a result chose to leave us. At the same time a good number joined Al Rycroft as he began at St Thomas, supported by us, and some chose only to worship once rather than twice with us on a Sunday. All this makes numerical analysis complex but it nevertheless has caused me and other leaders to take stock and to ask again for eyes to see in order to be sure that we are heading in the right direction. So what do I see? I see a church full of stories of God at work. I see a church returning to its roots. I see a church becoming clearer and more confident about priorities. A church that humbly but unashamedly has a big vision. A church learning to pray and fast. A church emphasising even more intentionally the ministry of the Word and Spirit, aiming to communicate clearly the Scriptures and Christ s good news to our generation and highly valuing the presence of God and expecting signs and wonders as we pray and follow Christ. A church desiring to be contemporary, speaking the language and using the communication tools of the culture. And a church seeking to be pioneering, with the PCC in 2015 agreeing the 4 strategic

7 emphases highlighted above as we look to the future: making disciples; nurturing disciples; developing leaders; planting churches. Many will want to be part of a church like this, and new people have been and are joining us and committing to being part of us, but others will not. Some want a church that prioritises the small; or that is more liberal in theology or less charismatic; or that is more traditional in worship and liturgy or where maintenance is more important than mission. Our city and region has many churches like that but that is not the vision the Lord has given us and not the church the Lord has called me, the staff or the PCC to lead. Nevertheless we can and do still value the micro and local, which is why we have Belfrey Groups, and why we lead the York New Wine Network, encouraging leaders of smaller churches in their ministry. We are grateful for every member of all ages and will not neglect those who have been with us for many years. We are pleased to be part of a denomination and a city with churches of differing emphases and styles, which we honour and are gladly part of through the Diocese and OneVoice. And we take seriously our pastoral care and look forward to appointing a new Senior Pastoral Leader in Reflecting on some of these things with the Church Council (PCC) recently, I said: I believe that the church and our culture is generally in a healthy place, our vision and values are clear, that we have a good balance between prayer and mission in 2016, that we have staff who can help facilitate growth, there is good morale in the church and excitement about the year ahead has indeed begun well, with a call to awakening and many testimonies already of God s Spirit at work, a great response to JJohn s visit and with a positive renewal of financial giving (with pledged giving increasing by 8% as we were praying for). All this bodes well for the future. As you read these reports I trust you feel similarly positive about the future as you see what the Lord is doing amongst us. Together let s keep praying and working to play our part in serving God s transformation of the North, beginning right here in York amongst our families, friends and work-places and then extending beyond into our region. My prayer for us all at this time of annual review is the prayer of Elisha which he prayed for his friend in 2 Kings 6:17 Open his eyes Lord, so he may see. It s the prayer we often sing in worship: God I look to you. I won t be overwhelmed. Give me vision to see things like you do. Matthew Porter Easter 2016

8 Training Greg Downes Forge We had ten Forgees in who contributed to various areas of church life while training in leadership. In September 2015 we welcomed ten young people onto Forge for the year, five of whom are continuing members from the previous year and five new Forgees who joined this year. Each member of the Forge Training Programme is placed in a department within the life of the church, be it Youth or Children, Students, Pastoral, IT etc. The Forgees have recently attended the New Wine Leadership Conference in Harrogate and are looking forward to the end of year weekend away before the programme finishes. Extra opportunities included going to a LEAD day at Life Church in Bradford and going off with Greg on mission trips such as the Leeds University Carol Service. St Barnabas Theological Centre Since September 2015 Greg Downes has served on the faculty of St Barnabas Theological Centre (SBTC) the Church of England s newest theological institution, of which we are a founding church, along with St Thomas Crookes Sheffield and St George s Church in Leeds. Matthew Porter continues to serve as a Director of SBTC. As the lecturer in Mission and Apologetics in Contemporary Culture, Greg has taught a third year (level 6) course during the first semester (September February) to students mainly training for church leadership (mainly Anglican ordinands). This has included the Belfrey s Eve Ridgeway and Sam Tyndall, who along with other ordinands are due to graduate and be ordained this summer (the first cohort to do so since St Barnabas Theological College started nearly three years ago). Outreach- Greg Downes Never Give Up Liz Ransford With grateful thanks to the generosity of the people of The Belfrey, Never Give Up has continued to be able to open the doors of the Belfrey Hall every Thursday afternoon to all who want to come in. There are around 30 guests each week, many of whom are homeless, who come and receive a warm welcome, a good hot meal, and a Gospel message. We praise God as we see what He is doing in our midst. We do not know who are the most blessed, the volunteers or the guests! As a volunteer team we love to see how God is building us up, strengthening relationships, binding us together in a love that crosses cultural and age boundaries. We have joy as we serve and listen and pray. The guests honour the family atmosphere that is there and we believe they feel valued through what is offered. Above all we are encouraged to see steps in faith that are taken, hearts that begin to be opened to the Lord, and lives that are turned round to walk with God. We know what an immense privilege it is to participate in what the Lord is doing.

9 Belfrey Doors Belfrey Doors finished an excellent season in the winter and Cathryn Fergie s skilful leadership over the past 2 years was recognised with a presentation. We are currently in an interregnum in terms of a leader for this particular ministry, but the church recognises its strategic importance in reaching the many thousands of tourists who pass through the church doors each year. Belfrey Chaplaincy Belfrey Retail Chaplaincy continues to meet every three weeks to pray and then go out to minister to the retail industry within our parish. The contacts are primarily pastoral and yet it seeks to have an evangelistic edge looking for appropriate places to witness. Agnostics Anonymous An Agnostics Anonymous Course took place in the summer term. This is a six weeks pub apologetics course that was held in the Guy Fawkes Inn. Each week featured a short talk, an opportunity for Q&A and discussion. A one off Agnostics Anonymous was held during the Plus One Mission Week in February 2016, which was packed out with people who were Atheists, Agnostics, and Theists. We will be launching this as a monthly event under the guise of The Guy Fawkes Society later in Alpha Alpha has continued to run throughout In February we had a course in Starbuck s Coffee shop followed later in the year by an Alpha@Home course in Greg s vicarage. We have also seen Student Alpha and Youth Alpha courses run by The Belfrey. In the autumn Alpha@Home course nearly all people journeyed to making a commitment to Christ and some have subsequently been baptised and are now members of the church fellowship. Easter and Christmas Cafés The tradition of doing the Easter and Christmas Outreach Cafés continued as usual this year with a café generously resourced by members of the church, live music and short talks on the half hour to seek to explain something of the gospel. In addition, a café was run for the York Marathon Sunday, a proven and effective way of connecting with local residents and transitory tourists alike, raising the profile of the church and giving us an opportunity to share the Good News. Carol Service Our annual Minster Carol Service took place on December 13 th. The speaker this year was Dr. Krish Kandiah, President of the London School of Theology, who preached effectively and tied in his message wonderfully with the drama from the Riding Lights Theatre Company. The theme was No Room at the Inn #RefugeesWelcome and this proved to be an inspired theme that raised a vital issue of Christian concern as well as being a context in which to share the Christian Good News of the inclusive love of God.

10 External ministry As part of the Theologian & Missioner s brief to spend up to 20% of his time engaged in external ministry Greg has continued to be involved speaking at conferences, church weekends away and missions; of particular note he has been the main speaker for a number of northern University missions this year including at Newcastle University, Sheffield Hallam University and Leeds University. Plus One Mission Week In February 2016 we had a Week of Intense Mission Activity. This featured street evangelism led by Paul Myers on the Monday and Agnostics Anonymous in the Guy Fawkes Pub on the Tuesday, Faith in the City Service on Wednesday having an evangelistic edge (Jim Roberts preached), and Greg speaking at the debating society at All Saints School York on the Thursday and a number of Belfrey Group initiatives. The week culminated with the evangelist J John preaching across the day on Sunday Feb 7 th. Many guests came across the day, especially to The 6 which was full to capacity including the balcony. A significant number of people responded to reaffirm or re-consecrate their life to Christ including a number of first time commitments. World Mission - Wendy Taylor 2015 was another encouraging year for world mission at The Belfrey. The World Mission Steering Group met monthly through the year, debriefing partners during their home assignments, and meeting people considering serving in mission. They also prepared and distributed news for prayer and organised monthly prayer meetings. John and Kate Marsden, now based in Scotland but travelling overseas, a couple in SE Asia, Bill and Irene Manley in Mongolia, Judy Homer in South Wales and Andy and Rose Roberts and family in Brazil were supported financially and several others connected with The Belfrey were supported in prayer. Mission news was regularly shared in Sunday Congregations. Chris and Suzy Wilson (with Abigail and Matthew) were accepted as CMS Link Mission Partners and will be supported financially from August 2016, when they move to Ethiopia to serve in Theological Training for South Sudanese refugee church leaders. Luke and Alison Blacker (with Banya) returned from Thailand, where they worked with a Christian charity and are getting involved in The Belfrey, while applying to OMF and preparing to study at All Nations. Rob and Roz Barnett went to Brazil as short term volunteers, working with Andy Roberts in the ReVive Project and plans are underway for a small team under the leadership of Greg Downes to go there in the summer 2016.

11 Groups & Congregations - Matthew Porter We have a simple structure for gathering at The Belfrey - of groups and congregations. For many years we have gathered midweek in groups. Groups meet to enable us to reach out in mission and grow as disciples. They are the best place to make friends in church. In larger churches in particular, groups are central to church life. If people join us but fail to settle in a group they often feel like they don t belong and then they don t stay. Since 2011 Groups have been free to set their own programme, whilst encouraged to have a good balance between worship, discipleship and outreach. Questions based on Sunday sermons have been produced for every series, and many groups use these as the basis of their gathering. To help facilitate the theme of Coming Home in 2015, groups met together in church for a number of weeks to be inspired, encouraged and challenged to do the basics well. At the end of 2015 there were around 45 groups (excluding student and G2 groups). I am particularly grateful to group leaders for their dedicated giving of time, love, prayer and support of the groups in 2015 and we will continue to invest in them as they lead this important part of our work. During 2015 our congregations have been: Sundays at 9am (Morning Worship); 11am (XI); 3.45pm (G2 in Burnholme Community College); 6pm (The6). Our Wednesday Lunchtime congregation (Faith in the City) has met at 12.30pm through the year. In 2015 the 9am Congregation has been led by Matthew Porter with much assistance from Rachel Gray; XI by Lee Kirkby; G2 by Christian Selvaratnam; The6 by Ben Doolan and Faith in the City by Derek Wooldridge until September, when leadership was passed to Chris Dobson. Grateful thanks were given to Derek as he passed on the leadership. The themes of the Sunday congregations meeting in St Michael le Belfrey Church in 2015 have been listed in my Vicar s Report. Much prayer, planning and work goes into our sermons and themes. They are normally recorded and posted online. Many from outside (as well as inside) the church listen online and we sometimes receive stories from people far away from York who have been helped by the online sermons. The music at our congregations continues to be ably led by Tom Holmes and an excellent set of musicians and special thanks go to them for their dedicated and loving work (see separate report below by Tom Holmes). There has been a notable increase in joy and passion in our worship at all our congregations in 2015 which I trust is a sign of the Spirit at work, meeting with us and renewing our worship and inspiring us for mission and service. As in previous years I would again like to thank our service leaders, preachers, music teams, and many others involved in supporting our congregations through excellent welcome, refreshments, prayer ministry, verging and much more. We are a church mainly of volunteers for whom we are grateful!

12 G2 - Christian Selvaratnam This has been an exciting year for G2 with a particular focus on growth and church planting. More than 200 people are regularly involved with G2 on Sunday and mid-week. We have over 60 students actively involved in student clusters that run their own mission projects such as night church a clubmission project based at Spurriergate. Many of the students at G2 are active in international mission and social justice. Our 20s & 30s Cluster has hosted a number of teaching evening through the year and now meet in 4 cells. In April 2016 a new (Fresh Expression of) church will be planted out from the 20s cluster. Over 30 children are part of G2 kids who meet on Sunday and mid-week in children s cell. Once a term we run Mosaic an allage children s event on Sunday. Two members of G2 youth were baptised this year and we're seeing maturity and spiritual growth throughout the youth group. Sunday football is a free kick about for detached youth in Tang Hall, running at the same venue as our Sunday meeting. We've had up to 30 youth, averaging around 12 a week, and it's currently growing. For more information about G2 go to g2york.org.

13 Worship and Creativity Tom Holmes Over the last year there have been many new and exciting things happening in the life of the worship department. It s exciting personally to have moved into a new role as Head of Worship and Creativity. There are so many amazing evangelistic opportunities in media that we as a team are really fuelled by and as this ministry grows, I think we will see more people come onto the team with this attitude and heart. The worship life of the church, led so well by our fantastic team of worship leaders, continues to develop and grow. The heart of the team to give hours upon hours of time to rehearse and serve is so amazing and should not be taken for granted. A special thanks to Rachel Gray for her wonderful servant-hearted leading of the 9am music team, which continues to flourish. This was the year when we released new music as Belfrey Music and it is wonderful to hear that Foundation and A Light Has Dawned is being listened to and used across the country. Giving everyone who came to the Minster Carol Service a free copy of these tracks was a real sign of how we want to use this as a resource. We were also delighted to see both go to number 1 in the itunes Christian and Gospel chart, a testament to both songs craft. Do join me in praying for more of this over the next few years home grown songs have so much significance in stories of revival and this, alongside our digital resources as a creative team, is really about Serving God s transformation of the North. Over the next year I would like to see more young people leading in our worship and creativity departments; I am expectant that we will see a great move of the Holy Spirit in our church through our worship and we will continue to see development in our whole church s creativity, all to give God the glory in what we do. Please do pray with me in this, including for the wonderful staff team we have working in these areas - Al Elmes, Cathryn Fergie, Tim Johnston and Jack Chipperfield - and finally please keep praying with expectancy for what God will do as we use worship and creativity to fix our eyes on Jesus and press closer into his heart. The joy of the Lord is our strength, so in 2016 please join us in praying for many breakouts of joy, festivity and celebration in worship. We are called to live 24/7 worship lifestyles and I hope as we come together as a gathered church and in our groups, we can make 2016 a year of Joy.

14 Students Ben Dolan Over the past twelve months we have seen continued growth in the student ministry, particularly in our Belfrey Groups (missional communities). We now have around 40 young leaders leading Belfrey Groups, small groups and the wider ministry. These leaders are also training and raising up their peers to take over their roles when they move on at the end of their degree. This helps greatly with the sustainability of the ministry. Ellie and I are incredibly grateful to them all for all their hard work week in and week out. They do a great job leading our student communities and the ministry simply would not work without them. Groups are so vital! Students from The Belfrey continue to go out onto the streets of York regularly on Wednesday nights as they pioneer club mission in the city. This has led on to a student Alpha course being run on Thursday evenings over the last term. If you have attended any of the baptism services at The6 over the past twelve months then you will have seen that we are seeing large numbers of students being baptised or reaffirming their baptismal faith. This has been a real joy to see as we are seeing students regularly make professions of faith on Sundays and throughout the week. It is also wonderful to see many students take on high profile roles in leading services, worship and prayer meetings. Increasing numbers of students are getting involved in dynamic prayer and our evangelism teams as well as other areas of life right across The Belfrey.

15 Youth & Children s - Lee Kirkby It has been quite a significant year for our youth and children s ministry. We are seeing signs of kingdom breakthrough with children praying and ministering for adults in church, young people encouraging parents and even bringing them to faith, healings, and young people eager to live in the power of the Holy Spirit. Over ten young people have been baptised this year and we ve seen an encouraging number make first time commitments. Our residentials are key times of encounter and growth, and our small groups build a strong sense of family, being places of welcome and discipleship. We are committed to our call of Equipping Young People and Children to be Lifelong Disciples of Jesus Christ and I believe the best is yet to come! Having a permanent youth and children s work centre has enabled us to increase our regular provision and improve the quality of facilities we offer young people and families. Having been flooded at Christmas I am thankful to everyone who made it possible to be back using the building within three months of the floods. During the year we introduced a new group for parents and toddlers on Tuesday mornings called Song Stars. This is a play group that incorporates musical nursery rhymes and Bible storytelling, ending with a community picnic. We have introduced a monthly Dad s & Little uns event on Saturday mornings, which is an opportunity particularly to reach Dads, but also other men who look after children such as Godparents, Uncles & Grandads. Just this month there were twenty Dads, many having no regular contact with church, and we were able to bless them each with a Why Easter? booklet and an Easter Egg. We have also hosted regular family open days, inviting the local community to come and engage with our work and ministry. In the summer we held Belfrey Youth Fest - a small scale festival of teaching, worship and community action with many young people making first time commitments and reaffirmations. We plan to run this again in This month we start a new after school club for children called ALF (About Life and Faith) and the Storehouse will, for the first time, be open daily throughout the week as a drop in cafe for young people. This will serve as a place for teachers within the church to help young people revise for exams. We are planning to host Parenting Courses & Marriage Courses soon. There is a genuine void left by the local authority cuts to children, youth & families work - something I believe we can help fill - helping us to increase our contact with many more young people and families in York!

16 We have a fantastic team of staff and volunteers. In September we were honoured that Liz Hunt joined us as our new Children and Families Worker, willing to take a cut in her teaching hours. She is fantastic and is working really hard to build community among parents, develop the volunteer teams and bring a quality of children s work to our church that is inspiring. Adam, our Youth Worker, has settled into his role very well, particularly developing and growing the work with our House Huddle small groups for young people. Rosie Brabbs is in the middle of her youth and community work degree and we continue to be her placement church where she brings so much creativity and life to our team. Our brilliant Forgees Alicia, Jenni and Sam continue to pour themselves into ministry and you will probably see them continue as part of our team for some time yet because they re excellent. We re delighted Annie Norton is joining our team soon as volunteer administrator, so you ll probably be hearing more from her. We owe a debt of thanks to our committed teams of volunteers, without whom we wouldn t be able to do what we do. We recently spent a rewarding 48 hours away as a team at Wydale Hall, seeking God and his vision for youth and children s work at The Belfrey. We came away so excited for what He has in store for us and have a strategic plan for the next five years. This summer our team will be serving at the New Wine Inspire event, helping to organise and run the youth venue. We feel a particular call to help resource others and are finding ourselves being invited to lead other church weekends away and teaching days. Please do continue to pray for us as we seek to serve God s Transformation of the North.

17 Prophecy- Kerstin Wandel Looking back on 2015, I would say it can be summarised as changes, challenges and a continuation of the already established. With Lisa Cuellar leaving in the summer, I took over leadership of the Prophecy Team in July and have since coordinated this branch of ministry with the help of other leaders from the Belfrey, G2, St Thomas and CPC. As accountability is thought to be of essential significance, we met monthly as a team to grow in the prophetic together by receiving teaching, having fellowship and praying for one another and as new people joined, a mentoring system was encouraged. A group of people were meeting twice a month for Prophetic Intercession in St Cuthbert s House of Prayer - once a month to pray for and prophesy over The Belfrey and once a month to do the same for York as a whole. We continued to offer Training Sessions and ran an eight-week Day Time Course, an eight-week Evening Course, and a Training Day which was attended by members of 12 different churches throughout York and the wider area, and launched a five-week Prophecy Course in September. During 2015 the leadership of the Gathering went over to the House of Prayer team and it now looks at wider topics than just the Prophetic but we still had two sessions on Prophetic Art and Standing our Ground in Spiritual Battle. The heart of Prophetic Ministry is to reach out and bless people, so we sent a team to a worship event in Leeds and offered Prophetic Appointments, which means that people can book a 15-minute slot, in which two of our team prophesy over them. The team provided prophetic words for every delegate of the Women of Worth Teaching Days both in 2015 and at the beginning of 2016, the participants of the five-week Prophecy Course and on other occasions; We have been seeing how people s hearts have been touched by God, who loves them so personally and knows them so intimately. In July the Prophetic Art outreach project 100 pictures for the Groves - organised by Jo Bloss - took place. It was a great day in the style of a community party in St Thomas, where people could come, enjoy fellowship and food, listen to music, wander through the open air exhibition and do arts and crafts themselves. The vision behind this is that people can look at a picture and have God speak to them through it and we are planning on doing more in the area of Prophetic Art. There are currently 40 people who have committed to being part of Prophetic Ministry, so this month we are moving out of my living room into St Cuthbert s for our monthly accountability meetings. I felt very strongly for this year that God wants us to go wider, bigger and deeper as well as establish structures, which enable a coalescing of young and old and provide a safe place for young leaders to be challenged and grow. Please pray that we would know the heart of God in all of this.

18 Prayer - James Fletcher The past year we have continued to develop the foundations of the House of Prayer. We are continually reminded that it is The Lord who builds the House, and not ourselves. However it was also a year of increase: of new ministries emerging, the growth of established areas and most significantly an increase in wisdom and revelation. We opened the House of Prayer in February 2014, and now, two years later, I am more convinced than ever of the great need for prayer, more convicted of our prayerlessness and ever more conscious of the divine beauty and glory of God. Growth has come in a number of areas. At Pentecost we led and facilitated 100 Hours of Prayer and Worship which saw us partner not just with churches across the city, but also with teams from Switzerland and Colchester. The Gathering, our monthly night of teaching and ministry, has expanded in numbers, but also deepened and matured in impact. The Evangelism Team have seen many make commitments to follow Jesus and had the opportunity to minister and pray with many on the streets. During the year a number of people began to receive training in preparation for the prayer ministry of SOZO to begin, and we are excited by the potential of many more being released into fresh freedom and healing. Above all else, the call is to prayer. Aside from our regular rhythm, for much of the year we held a weekly night of prayer and worship, and have been privileged to witness God moving in power amongst us. As the vision and awareness of the House of Prayer has spread, many more individuals and groups have engaged with us in taking retreats, receiving prayer and generally using the space to encounter God. Organisations and churches have continued to use the House of Prayer for prayer meetings and away days (eg New Wine network church leaders from the North) or in partnership with the team for training and equipping. In our own church, we have also been seen a significant increase in the number of Belfrey Groups using the House of Prayer. In initiatives beyond York, the team led a session at the New Wine Regional Leaders Conference in Harrogate in March 2015, and in May we took a team to the New Wine Worship Conference in Leeds. Towards the end of the year discussions began around implementing a shift in my job role, which came into place in January Whilst I will continue to remain very much rooted in the House of Prayer, this new position of Head of Prayer reflects an increased responsibility to lead and develop both St Cuthbert s and prayer across The Belfrey.

19 Facilities - Rob Hill 2015 was another productive year around our buildings. Early on, we re-surfaced the floor at the Belfrey Hall bringing new life to it and further improved our kitchen facilities. We took advice to monitor the problem area of the Hall by waiting for a longer period of time before we planned work. This was done and has now been confirmed as historic movement and plans are now under way to repair that area of the Hall when budgets allow. The Belfrey Hall also became the regular meeting place for exciting new initiatives with the North Yorkshire Probation Services, Scripture Union North East and North Yorkshire Police. The Parish Centre saw a lot of change in the summer of 2015 with the beginning of a programme of re-decoration throughout and office moves to suit new roles. Fixed Electrical Condition Reports (a 5 yearly test which checks wiring and lighting) were also carried out which revealed only minor work required to most buildings. All this work was carried out promptly so we are now covered and safe for another 5 years. Urgent Quinquennial work at St Michael le Belfrey church was carried out in 2014 leaving only larger scale works classed as ideal remaining, all of which are being incorporated into the Impact Project. In January 2015 the Listed Places of Worship fund offered listed buildings nationwide the chance of being given a grant toward necessary roof works that may be required on St Michael le Belfrey Church. We applied for this and in the summer of 2015 we found that we had been unsuccessful. This, however, has now been opened up again and our second application was submitted at the end of February We will know the outcome in June was of course a very exciting year with the opening of The Storehouse at Mansfield Street. We had a tremendous time designing and crafting the building to our needs and our Youth and Children s team did a phenomenal job there all year with the youth of York and our own church family. Disaster stuck though on Boxing Day with major flooding and meant we have had to start again. We are well underway with the task, along with some great tradesmen, and will be back in the building by the time you read this.

20 Safeguarding- Viv Blacker I took on the role of Parish Child Protection Representative in May 2015 for a trial period. Within St Michael le Belfrey the role also covers Adult Safeguarding because of the nature of the care we give to a number of adults. Now that I have been in the post for eight months I am sorry that I realise I am unable to meet the requirements of the role because of other demands and commitments. Between May 2015 and July 2015 I reviewed the Church Safeguarding Policies. The Child Safeguarding Policy was slightly amended to bring it in line with the latest Diocese (March 2014) guidance, and their 'Making Policy Work' (February 2015). I also clarified the procedures for reporting incidents of suspected abuse and added as an appendix the form for logging concerns. The Adult Safeguarding policy required considerable revision. In April 2015, the Care Act 2014 came in to force, which superseded the 'No Secrets' guidance of 2000 upon which all previous Adult Safeguarding policies had been based. The new policy reflects this, including the addition of a number of new types of adult abuse. The term 'vulnerable adult' was removed where possible to reflect the Care Act, and reference was made to the Mental Capacity Act 2015, because of its relevance to adult safeguarding. In July I carried out the annual Review of Safeguarding Procedures, with the help of Lee Kirkby for the main church and Paul Henderson for G2. During my time in post I have met with Matthew and Lee to discuss adult and child safeguarding matters, met with the PCC to report on the Reviews and on the changes to the policies, and visited the 'Never Give Up' group'. I was unable to attend Diocese training, due to lack of places when I was available. When I took up the post most previous incidents had been logged by . These s were transferred to me by the previous Representative and I transferred these to a new church safeguarding address, Safeguarding@belfrey.org. This is available for all safeguarding issues and will facilitate any future hand-over between Representatives. During my time in post there have been no serious safeguarding issues, although a number of minor concerns were raised which were dealt with by Church staff. During this time there has been no Diocesan Safeguarding Officer to provide support. However, Dave Finan has now been appointed to the post and this will be much more supportive for whoever takes over the role of Parish Child Protection Representative. I am very sorry to have to pass the role on. It has been a great privilege to work with the wonderful people in the church who care for and nurture both adults in need and our children and young people, and to see the amazing work that the Lord is doing through them.

21 Church Council (PCC) - Julie Caddell The Parochial Church Council is the legal governing body of St Michael le Belfrey Church and, together with the Vicar, is responsible for the management and running of the church. The PCC met on the following dates over the last year since the last APCM: 27 April 2015, 18 May 2015, 22 June 2015, 20 July 2015, 21 September 2015, 12 October 2015, 23 November 2015, 14 December 2015, 11 January 2016, 8 February 2016, 21 March 2016, 18 April There are 6 elected members of the PCC in addition to 6 Deanery Synod Representatives, 4 Churchwardens and 6 Clergy. The minutes secretary (Deb Stephens) is a non-elected and non-voting member of the PCC. The 6 elected members, the Churchwardens, the Vicar, Associate Minister, Training Curate (Ben Doolan) and the secretary of the council attend all meetings. The other members attend on a rotation basis but are in receipt of all papers for comment. Some of the many areas that have been discussed by the PCC over the past year include: Church Finances the PCC receives a report each month. This year we are extremely thankful for the receipt of a large gift; considerable time was spent discussing how this might be best used. HR proposals of new paid posts Good governance and communication Risk Management Relationship with the Spurriergate Centre Development of The House of Prayer Development of Belfrey Groups Emphasis on creativity Generally speaking, decisions are made at the PCC through a process, which includes raising an issue for general consideration at one meeting with the following meeting considering and making a decision on a detailed proposal. The aim is to have consensus of opinion within the PCC as often as possible to avoid the need for having a formal vote although these do happen from time to time. Once a PCC decision has been made the implementation and management of the process is handed from PCC to the staff or volunteer team concerned. The lay chair of the PCC is currently Julie Caddell. All minutes of the PCC are added to Belfrey Connect (formerly Church Box) once they have been approved. The PCC has agreed that after each meeting, a précis of the meeting will be made available in the Church Newsletter. PCC Members 2015 to 2016 Katrina Bakker, Daniel Brookes, Julie Caddell, Dudley Clark, Ben Doolan, Greg Downes, Tash Fletcher, Beth Goodwin, Roger Holmes (co-opted, treasurer), Brogan Hume, Helen Lawrence, Richard Lawrence, Geoff Pickles, Matthew Porter, Liz Ransford, Jim Roberts, Christian Selvaratnam, Tony Scott, Peter Simpson, Barrie Stephenson, Keith Steven.

22 Deanery Synod - Tony Scott The Deanery Synod has met three times during the period, under the chairmanship of the Revd Terence McDonough, Rural Dean, and the Lay Chair, Dr Brian Ormston. The location of Synod has continued to move around the Deanery, meeting in St Chad 's (June); St Paul's Heslington (October); and Manor CE Academy, as guests of the school (February). Regular updates were given at each meeting by Terina Hurley on how the Common Fund (which replaced Parish Share) was progressing. Each meeting normally also included reports from Diocesan Synod. General Synod Reports were received regularly from Canon Linda Ali and the Revd Christian Selvaratnam, including most recently on the ongoing agenda of Reform and Renewal, the migrant crisis, and global warming. At the June meeting John Ransford, Chair of Spurriergate Trading Company, reported on 25 years of mission and service through the Spurriergate Centre. He referred to Bishop Graham Cray, who had had been there at the very beginning of this venture of faith, in the mid-eighties, as the then Vicar of St Michael le Belfrey, and that the Lord was continuing to move in and through its ministry. Bishop Graham Cray, now Diocesan Advocate for Pioneer Ministry and Fresh Expressions of Church described some of the work the Lord is doing across the Diocese and beyond, urging us to see what God is doing and join in. Other meetings have included discussion about Heslington parish, the green agenda, developing the denaeries, the life and work of Manor CE Academy, recent staff changes at Diocesan House, and the likely future appointments at the Diocesan office, and the impending office move to a larger and more suitable building, still at Clifton Moor.

23 Finance Report - Roger Holmes The church s financial performance last year and financial position at the end of 2015 are set out in detail in the Accounts. For ease of reference, a summary of the key points is given below:- The church was blessed to receive a very generous gift of 270,000 which, with Gift Aid, provides a total of 337,500. The Vicar and PCC have agreed on a plan to spend the gift on the longer-term development of our mission over the next 3-4 years. One-tenth of the gift ( 33,700) was donated to the Diocese in 2015, and the bulk of the remainder has been designated for use in 5 specified areas as shown in note 19 on page 20 of the Accounts. In accounting terms, the gift generated a large surplus for the church in 2015, but the church is almost certain to report losses in each of the next 3-4 years as the gift is spent. Our underlying financial position excluding the gift was more or less unchanged in We made a loss of 1,077, which in relation to unrestricted expenditure of over 600,000 is effectively in line with our budget of break-even. Similarly our available unrestricted reserves, excluding the gift, are almost the same as at the end of 2014 standing at 47,599. Most of our other unrestricted reserves are tied up in property, as indicated in note 11 on page 19 of the Accounts. The most significant changes in our financial performance in 2015 were a fall in regular giving, offset by a fall in staff costs. There are encouraging signs of income growth so far in 2016, while staff costs will also rise to some extent reflecting the filling of posts in the second half of The restricted fund for the Storehouse was fully used in 2015 for equipping and operating the building. An insurance payment of over 9,000 has been received in 2016 to cover the damage caused by the floods. G2, whose finances are also run through a restricted fund, made a surplus in 2015, with its income reflecting the growth in its membership. Gift Day in November achieved just above its 35,000 target, which has enabled grants to be made to several local mission organisations as well as improvements and repairs to some of our properties and the purchase of a new drum kit for the church. I will propose at the APCM the re-appointment of our auditors, Waltons Clark Whitehill, for a second year. The possibility of not having a full audit, which was mooted at last year s APCM, is no longer available, as the major gift has pushed our annual turnover above the 1m threshold where audits for charities become compulsory.

24 Spurriergate (St Michael York Trust) - Keith Steven The vision of the Spurriergate Centre is to be a sign of the Kingdom of God a shop window on the high street of God s character and concerns in the world today. The aim is to share the good news of God s love in Jesus Christ with the people of York and its visitors through: Providing caring service and refreshment; Offering a listening ear; and Upholding justice issues in our community and worldwide. Such has been the aim and objectives of the St Michael York Trust, given practical expression through the ministry of the Spurriergate Centre over a period of 25 years, and celebrated in the autumn of 2014 in recognition of the silver jubilee of Spurriergate. During 2015 Spurriergate has provided a resource for evangelistic events and other social activities, including: the i-connect Café, run weekly during term time for international students from the universities and colleges; an outstanding evening with Canon Garth Hewitt focusing on Israel/Palestine and the work of the Amos Trust; supporting City of Sanctuary, though the provision of cost effective office space and a central location for their activities as a movement aiming to build a culture of hospitality for people seeking sanctuary in the UK. Having regard to the significant use of Spurriergate by young mothers and their toddlers a new soft play area was installed which has been welcomed and proved a valuable addition to the resources of the Centre. The Spurriergate Counselling Service provided by the Trust continued to provide an invaluable, but to many free of charge, service. Its Coordinator, Lesley Nicholls, provides vital Counsellor management and service delivery. The bulk of the costs of this service are met by the St Michael York Trust. The lease of the building of St Michael s Church Spurriergate with the Diocese of York was renewed for a further period, in this case for 50 years. Negotiations began regarding the lease with the Feoffees of St Michael Spurriergate regarding Spurriergate s continuing occupancy of St Michael s Chambers of which they are the landlords the new lease was agreed in March A change of constitution has been under initial consideration, given that the trustees consider that moving to the legal structure of a Charitable Incorporated Organisation could well offer a more appropriate model for the operation of both Trust and Company. This will require fresh agreements with both the Diocese of York and the PCC of St Michael le Belfrey. Substantive discussions took place with representatives of St Michael le Belfrey PCC with a view to clarifying the nature of the relationship of Spurriergate with life of the Belfrey and strengthening that relationship.