A warm welcome just as you are, experiencing and sharing God s love Diocese of Liverpool: Kirkby Parish Parish Profile: Team Vicar of St. Andrew s Tower Hill and Mission Enabler for the Parish of Kirkby www.cofekirkby.co.uk www.liverpool.anglican.org
Section 1: Profile in summary We are one parish with 4 churches looking for someone who will minister in St. Andrew s Tower Hill, and work with us in enabling the mission of the church in Kirkby. This profile is part of the discernment process as we listen for who God is calling here. In order for lives to be transformed through the love of God, we see the need to be church outside the walls of our buildings, to build links with the community around us, and to discern Good Friday 2017 how God is calling us to respond. This is a role with two parts: At St. Andrew s, the person we are looking for will be comfortable working within the valued traditions of the existing church, but able to offer leadership in mapping our community with us, and identifying new ways of being church in and for our community. As a parish, we would like someone who will facilitate and support our thinking across the four churches as we seek to expand our mission in the town. We understand that this role may evolve over time, depending on the gifts and vocation of the person who takes it up. The fundamental question that we are asking in creating this post is, How do we as the existing congregations and plant meet the changing needs of the town? We are open to the challenge of whatever the outcome may be whether new congregations or projects, or development of our existing patterns of worship and ways of serving. In thinking about this post, we have structured the profile to describe the needs of our community first, followed by our own existing structures and capacity, and finally, what we hope you may be able to offer to help us meet those needs. Please feel free to ring Rev. Jeremy Fagan if you would like to have a Ecumenical Walk of Witness, 2016 conversation about any of this, on 07967 302127.
Table of Contents 1 Section 1: Profile in summary 2 Section 2: Our town 4 Section 3: Our churches 5 St. Andrew s Church: The people 6 St. Andrew s Church: The community 7 St. Andrew s Church: The building 7 Accommodation 8 St. Chad s Church 9 St. Mark s Church 9 St. Martin s Church 9 Kirkby Team 10 Children and Young People 11 Deanery 11 Ecumenical links 11 Current Staff 12 Section 4: About you 12 St. Andrew s: Children 13 St. Andrew s: Adults 13 PCC 14 Appendix 1: Current regular events and services 14 Sunday Service timetable: 15 Parish Sunday Evening Program: 15 Midweek pattern 15 Appendix 2: Finances/Accounts 15
Section 2: Our town Kirkby is an ancient village, mentioned in the Domesday Book, and remained a small village up until WW2, when a large munitions factory was built on the edge of Liverpool, well away from housing in case of explosions. After the war, the factory was converted to a large industrial estate, and the Corporation of Liverpool decided to expand the small village of Kirkby, which at the time had a population of around 1000, into one of the new towns. The first houses were completed around 1952, built on the first three estates: Southdene, Westvale and Northwood. Fairly soon, they decided to expand the town to the north, and so Tower Hill was built, slightly later than the other three estates. People moved out to Kirkby from the slum clearances in Liverpool, and the houses that they moved to were often the first places where married couples and families didn t have to share with their extended family. The new town was built with a sense of space but, the hope that moving to Kirkby seemed to offer, faded with factory closures and unemployment in the 1980s. As with many places, although Kirkby still has significant social problems and challenges, the levels of crime and antisocial behaviour have declined in recent years. More than 98% of the people of Kirkby are white British in origin, with a large proportion of Irish Catholic descent. The town has a slightly younger than average population. Most employment is found in the services industry, and many of the jobs on the local industrial estate are taken by people commuting from the wider area. Major local employers include QVC, Vertex (a call centre) and Matalan. Kirkby Festival
The ecclesiastical parish includes the entire town of Kirkby; the large industrial estate to the east of the town, and a considerable amount of agricultural land. It is part of the borough of Knowsley, which stretches from Kirkby to the south east around the outside of Liverpool, encompassing Prescot, Huyton and Halewood. Knowsley comes at or near the top of deprivation tables, and is the local authority most affected by central government cuts in funding over the past few years. Kirkby Town Centre has seen various plans for regeneration come and go, including a contentious plan for a 50,000 seat stadium for Everton and an out of town shopping centre, which was thrown out by the government after a planning inquiry and a local campaign partly led by the former Team Rector. The new town centre owners, St. Modwen, seem to be finally Christmas in Kirkby Town Centre interested in investing in the town, and there should be a major supermarket in Kirkby for the first time in 40 years in the near future, and even a cinema. This new development is hoping to bring new jobs to the town. The town centre has also seen investment in a new market, leisure centre, library and gallery, and some civic art which has provoked mixed feelings. Liverpool FC s Academy has been in Kirkby for a number of years, and there are currently plans to move all their first team training ground to the same site in Kirkby as well. There are significant areas of newer housing around Kirkby, but most of the private housing is built separately to the older social housing and, although the statistics show that deprivation is gradually reducing on average, people who live in the older areas still face the same challenges they always have. The district of the parish served by St. Andrew s consists of two large blocks of former council housing and several large blocks of newer, mostly privately owned, housing. There are several new developments currently being built, as a mixture of private and affordable housing. The congregation of St. Andrew s are very keen to build a positive relationship with the new communities forming in these developments. Liverpool City Centre There are two community primary schools, Ravenscroft and Eastcroft, with which St. Andrew s have had a good relationship, and a Catholic Primary School, St. Peter and St. Paul s, linked to the church of the same name. There is a small row of shops, a new NHS health centre and one or two other community buildings. There are bus links with the rest of the town and Liverpool, and regular train services from Kirkby station to both Liverpool and Manchester. The town is well connected for roads, being within easy reach of both the M57 and M58.
Section 3: Our churches Kirkby is one parish with four churches. When the new town was established, the parish took the decision not to split into four separate parishes, but to remain together, and when Team Ministries were introduced to the Church of England, Kirkby was one of the very first. St. Chad s is the Victorian Parish Church, on the site with a much more ancient church history, and St. Martin s, St. Mark s, and St. Andrew s were built to meet the needs of the new estates. The current staffing is Rev. Jeremy Fagan as Team Rector, and Rev. Philippa Lea as Team Vicar of St. Chad s and Children and Youth Minister. St. Andrew s Church: The people St Andrew s is a Eucharistic congregation of around 30 adults and 8 children, and values its traditions, but there is also a willingness to try new things. In practice this means that our main Sunday service at 11am is a Common Worship Order One Eucharist, done with a relaxed reverence, but with a willingness to learn new music from all the traditions of the church. During St. Andrew's Interior the Sunday service, our Cool School meets, led by a team of volunteers. Other services during the year can be very creative, and we have a history of embracing new expressions of worship - for example, a number of years ago we introduced a monthly, lay led Sunday evening reflective service which still continues. We have one or two funerals a year in church, no weddings, and around 15-20 baptisms, which take place at 12.45pm. During the last four years we have explored how we can live out our Mission Statement: A warm welcome just as you are, experiencing and sharing God s love Using a series of open discussions we deeply examined our own attitudes to inclusivity and diversity and how we could be a church which welcomes all. Following many interesting, candid and challenging conversations, we are now fully committed to inclusivity and are now officially registered as an Inclusive Church. At St Andrew s, there is consensus: We need to make St Andrew s visible as a place of God in this community We need to find ways to engage with our community to establish what their needs are and how we can make God relevant in their lives We must provide a loving welcome to all Lay leadership has not progressed and now needs to be developed and supported The building is a valuable asset which we need to maintain and promote
In 2013 and again in 2015 we leafleted the area, inviting people to the church but, sadly, to date, there has been no direct response. We want to continue the effort to reach out to our locality, as it sometimes feels as if we are detached from the community around us and have lost the ability to recognise the needs and desires of our neighbours. We are now in the centre of a new growing community as there are three separate housing developments in close proximity to the church consisting of both private and social housing. In response to the Faith in the City report in the mid-1980s, St. Andrew s built links with churches in St. Albans and Wareham, and although visits and exchanges have now finished, the friendships made have been important to us. St. Andrew s Church: The community In 2002 St Andrew s worked in partnership with SureStart to develop Children and Family services in the district of Tower Hill. This successful partnership resulted in the building of an extension to St Andrew s as a Children s Centre to include an admin base for Surestart and purpose built rooms to accommodate facilities for children and families. This partnership also enabled the church to redevelop the grounds which have matured into a very pleasant green space and includes a memorial garden for the burial of ashes. Local residents freely access the space as they walk to local shops or bus stops. We continue to work closely with SureStart with whom we share a mutual love of the building and its surroundings, sharing the costs for maintaining the grounds. Schools and Community Links We have links with our local community primary schools, Eastcroft Park and Ravenscroft. The children enjoy links with the church including: Educational class visits Assemblies led by the vicar Annual school carol concert hosted by the congregation and attended by school choir and parents In the past, we ran a monthly Kids Club on a Sunday afternoon, and an annual summer Holiday Club, both of which were attended by between 15-30 children. FoodBank is now well established at St Andrew s as a distribution centre for Tower Hill. To further develop this outreach to the community, we have been asked to participate in the Big Help and Get Connected projects. Both of these projects will provide support for local people who struggle with debt and unemployment. Currently, two members of the congregation are involved in Foodbank as volunteers.
St. Andrew s Church: The building St. Andrew s began by meeting in a house, then in a wooden hut on the current site (the foundations of which are still visible) before the current building was opened in 1976 (we celebrated our 40 th anniversary in 2016 with former clergy and past members). After a stray firework in 2001, the church was rebuilt to a fully modern standard in 2002 and is well maintained. St Andrew s has two dedicated worship areas: the main Chapel which has seating for 60 people, and a connecting small Chapel, currently used for children s worship, with crèche resources. In addition to the worship areas St Andrew s has an integral church hall. The hall has excellent facilities which are well maintained by congregation members and can be used for larger Parish and Deanery wide services. The space is attractive to hirers and is currently used by a number of groups with a focus on health and wellbeing and include: Slimming Club NHS Health projects Foodbank Cookery class Fitness Club Children s Yoga Local residents Group Children s Parties Public meetings The congregation are proactive in promoting the facilities locally. St Andrew s also use the hall for social and fundraising events. The highlights of our social calendar are a summer garden party and the congregation s Christmas meal (which for the past few years we have prepared ourselves). The money we receive in hall hire charges provides a vital income stream, reducing the financial burden on congregation members and ensuring that we meet our responsibility to contribute to the Parish Share. Accommodation Jubilee Lunch St. Andrew s has a purpose built four bedroom vicarage in excellent condition and decoration, with a garage, off street parking, and a reasonable sized garden. It is a short distance from the church, approximately five minutes walk away in an area of private housing, with good neighbours.
St. Chad s Church We are a congregation of around 40 adults and 10 children, who value the traditional in church worship, but have been open to new ways of working. We value good music, employing an organist on Sunday mornings. We like music in different styles, with a majority of the music being traditional. On All Age Worship Sundays, the music changes to include everyone. St. Chad s is a beautiful and historic building housing a welcoming church community. The building is iconic in the town, sitting at the heart of the town centre, and is currently fundraising for a major roof refurbishment project. Many local people comment that, when they see St. Chad s, they know they re home, regardless of religious affiliation. As a focal point for the town, the church welcomes various events, including the Duke of Duke of Lancaster's Band Concert Lancaster s Band s annual carol service, Remembrance Sunday, and others. We calculate that several thousand people come through St. Chad s every year for a baptism, wedding or funeral. As a whole parish, we have worked hard to develop this ministry into one that is as welcoming as possible. This has included providing a parishwide wedding choir on request, offering orders of service for weddings and funerals, and thinking hard about preparing for each event. St. Mark s Church St. Mark s Church is a congregation of 6 adults and 5 children, who took the decision to sell their building and move out when it became increasingly obvious that the building was unsustainable. We are currently worshipping in the Scout Hut, which is owned by the parish, as we work out how God is calling us to serve the estate of Northwood. The sale of the building is currently dependent on planning permission being granted if and when that finally happens, we hope this will enable us to invest in new ministries. We are happy to try new things, and place a high value on ministry among children and young people. Worship is relaxed and modern, making use of IT resources, including lay led, interactive family worship each month.
St. Martin s Church St. Martin s is a congregation of around 18 adults and 4 children. We value good quality liturgical worship, but we are willing to try new things, and the congregation enjoy being Stations of the Cross, Good Friday 2016 engaged in discussion in the service. 2 lay members of the church are involved in leading and preaching, and we have a monthly Family Service. We share a lunch each Tuesday, at which we welcome people from the other churches as well as our own, and a 50+ Social Club that is very active. We have a 1960s building, refurbished in 2010, and are currently trying to rent out our hall after we lost our previous, long-term tenant. The church is also used by the local Brownies and Guides, and Slimming World. Kirkby Team The parish is a Team Ministry with one PCC and a District Church Council at each of the four churches, although there are no strict district boundaries. The current Team Rector is responsible for the ministry at St. Martin s and St. Mark s, and there are also posts of Choir Concert 2016 incumbent status in St Andrew s and St Chad s. We have had a history of having curates, however, the funding commitment to take on a curate is currently beyond the parish. We also own the former parish hall and scout hut, which are leased out to Kirkby Christian Fellowship and a Scout Group respectively. The clergy meet together daily for prayer and weekly for planning. They freely offer cover to one another, and there is some deliberate rotation about each others churches. We get around 15-20 weddings and 100 funerals, and most of them happen at St Chad s, so these are reasonably equally shared between all the clergy. An attempt is made to encourage baptisms to happen in the district church nearest to the candidate s home. The PCC has committed itself to a strong pattern of team work, mutual respect, trust and commitment to one another. The churches are on a journey of appreciating the differing gifts, resources and styles that they each have and are coming to regard this diversity as a strength. The latest Development Plan is attached at Appendix 3, and a list of values the PCC are working towards at Appendix 4. We provide a monthly bereavement service, which is currently changing into more of a support group than a memorial service. This meets in St. Martin s, but is staffed by volunteers from across the parish. We also have a monthly Film Club, that watches and then discusses recent thought-provoking films.
Children and Young People Our provision for under 18s includes Cool School at St. Andrew s on Sunday morning. In the other three churches, there are toy areas for children, along with monthly All Age Worship. We admit children to Communion in Year 3, and confirm in Year 10 onwards. A parish Messy Church meets in the CofE school weekly, and we have good links with other schools around the parish. We have been involved in the Deanery Youth Pilgrimage, and several of our young people are travelling to our partner diocese in Virginia in the summer of 2017. The Team Ministry also includes a large youth centre employing 12 staff (Centre 63, an independent charity) and a Church of England Voluntary Aided primary school (235 children plus a nursery). Both Centre 63 and Kirkby CofE School are adjacent to St. Chad s. Deanery We are in Huyton Deanery, in the Knowsley and Sefton Archdeaconry. We have a good tradition of engagement in the deanery through the chapter and synod The Diocese of Liverpool makes money available each year to the deanery in the form of Mission and Growth Funds. These are available to fund initiatives in the parishes and in the deanery, and they have been used to part fund the pilgrimage and to help pay the costs of St. Mellitus ordinands based in the deanery. We have also applied for several small grants to support work in the parish, and are exploring the possibility of applying for a larger grant to fund a part time post to develop the work we do with our occasional offices through better marketing. We have been a significant part of the major piece of work that the deanery have done in the past few years a Youth Pilgrimage with our diocesan partners in Virginia, USA. This has involved welcoming a group of young people from in and around Richmond, Virginia, and then taking a group from the deanery over to the US in 2013, and again this summer, 2017. The link builds on the slave triangle, and we hope to expand the pilgrimage in the future to include our new link diocese in Ghana. The pilgrims themselves worked exceptionally hard to raise the funds, and we were grant funded for other costs. Youth Pilgrimage at Dream
Ecumenical links We have good links with the other churches in the town through Churches Together in Kirkby, which is based on long term friendships between ourselves, the four Catholic churches, and one of the free churches. It is fair to say that we have not yet managed to get Churches Together onto a strong footing, but the friendships behind it remain. We are also involved in a significant piece of work based in the community of Northwood, Church in the Centre & TANGO. This came out of two pieces of work, largely begun by the parish, but is now a separate ecumenical charity that runs a charity shop to serve those who are in need, and to provide church in the community. The volunteers who run it are partly from our churches, and partly from the community. Church in the Centre / TANGO shop Current Staff Rev. Jeremy Fagan, Team Rector Rev. Philippa Lea, Team Vicar of St. Chad s & Parish Children and Youth Minister
St. Andrew s: Children Section 4: About you A letter from a Cool School leader (Cool School is the name for Sunday School that the children chose themselves): St. Andrew s Cool School, 22 nd January 2017 I spoke to the children in Cool School this morning, and asked them for their feelings on the type of vicar they would like for St. Andrew s. Singing and songs featured strongly. They would like the vicar to be a good singer(!) and maybe start a choir or feature good singers in the service. They would like someone with a cheerful personality and used words such as funny, happy, joyful and full of energy. They also asked that the vicar be caring, helpful and kind, and that they would feel like a friend. They said they would like them to make a warm feeling in church and that they would fit in with us. They would like the vicar to include them and make them feel a part of the church. As part of the discussion, the children also suggested they would like children s film nights and church trips. They also came up with the idea that they would like the chairs in church to be arranged in a semicircle around the altar and although this is not exactly related to the type of vicar, they were very keen on this idea. St. Andrew s: Adults St. Andrew s spent a day in January thinking about who we are, and what we would ideally like to see in our new vicar. Here are some of the things that we came up with. Intellectually open, stimulating and rigorous Sympathetic to St. Andrew s traditions Committed to Inclusive Church Sense of humour and fun Deep faith Their own person Not frightened of going outside the door, and being a visible presence Reaching out to new people and new houses being built Enthusiasm and energy Team work both within St. Andrew s and within the parish Supportive of children s ministry Enabling existing gifts and developing new gifts Pastoral Ecumenically minded, and willing to work with other faiths Willing to work with schools and community groups
PCC The PCC were asked for their picture of who they would like to join us. They added: Someone who: Is interested in Kirkby its people, and community Can connect the church, the community and the place Has a clear vision for mission Is ready to develop existing ministries and launch new ones Isn t frightened of a challenge Has compassion and is pastorally minded, there in all situations Values the environment
Appendix 1: Current regular events and services Sunday Service timetable: St. Andrew s St. Chad s St. Mark s St. Martin s 11am Eucharist with Cool School 12.45pm Baptisms (2 nd & 4 th Sundays) 11am Eucharist (1 st Sunday All Age, 3 rd Sunday Baptisms) 12.45pm Baptisms (4 th Sunday) 9.30am Eucharist (except 1 st Sunday) 10am Family Service (1 st Sunday) 9.30am Eucharist (short on last Sunday) 10am Family Service (last Sunday) 12.45pm Baptisms (1 st & 3 rd Sunday) Parish Sunday Evening Program: 1 st Sunday: Taize Service, St. Martin s, 6.30pm 2 nd Sunday: Heart of Worship - Contemporary Music, St. Martin s or St. Andrew s, 6pm 3 rd Sunday: Lay-led Reflections Service, St. Andrew s, 6.30pm 4 th Sunday: BCP Evensong, St. Chad s, 6.30pm 5 th Sunday: Healing Service, 6.30pm Midweek pattern Monday 9am Morning Prayer @ St. Andrew s Tuesday 9am Morning Prayer @ St. Martin s 10am Eucharist @ St. Martin's 1pm St. Martin s Lunch 3.20pm Messy Church @ Kirkby CofE School 6.30pm Parish Wedding & Baptism bookings @ St. Andrew's 7.30pm Bible Study lay led 7.30pm Parish Choir @ St. Martin s (fortnightly) Wednesday 9am Morning Prayer @ St. Chad s 9.45am Eucharist @ St. Chad s 7pm Eucharist @ St. Andrew s Thursday 9am Morning Prayer 4.30pm St. Andrew s Ladies Group Friday 9am Morning Prayer 2pm St. Chad s Bible Study
Appendix 2: Finances/Accounts
Appendix 3: Parish Development Plan
Appendix 4: PCC Values How we want to be seen: Stuff done well through everything. 1. Accepting, open-minded, kind, welcoming, attractive, supportive, words of love, support net. 2. Work with community, relevant, patient, proactive. 3. Relationship with God, holiness, peace, involved 4. Crowded, part of the routine, social