Parish Development Working Group
Parish Development committee news, July 2009
Church21 Conference
11-13th September 2009, St Patrick’s College, Dublin
The second Parish Development programme is well underway, with 25 parishes across Ireland taking part. Each has been working with a Church21 facilitator over the past few months, looking at their parish life, with the aim of establishing goals and a vision for the future.
The parishes or groups will be sending a small team to the Church21 Conference in September where they will receive encouragement and practical help for the next steps in their development. It promises to be an exciting and stimulating weekend.
Ian Coffey (pictured) joins us again as the keynote speaker with the theme is "Vision: What It Is, How To Get It, Share It And Implement It." The following topics will be addressed:
- The life-cycle of every church – where are you?
- A church in transition
- Challenging the “survival” mentality?
- Managing change well
- Setting priorities
- Anticipating hurdles
- Inspiring others to catch the vision and see it through to completion
There will be opportunity to hear about initiatives that have been effective in helping ordinary parishes develop in ministry, and a video snapshot of some of the creative ways of involving local parishes in ministry appropriate to the 21st century.
There will also be a choice of exploratory seminars on key areas of development such as growing leaders, welcome ministry, shared pastoral ministry, developing worship and strategy for youth ministry.
A more detailed programme will soon be available on the website www.church21.org