Support for parish mission

About the parish mission fund

Following the Church Commissioners’ agreement to make available an extra £10 million for distribution by the Archbishops’ Council over three years, from 2002 the Archbishops’ Council launched the Parish Mission Fund.  Its aim was to help to develop new Church ministry through investment in parish mission initiatives. 

Since then the funding has moved into a second triennium and to date, over £20 million has been put towards the support of a diverse range of projects across the Church.

Distribution

Funding is shared between the dioceses according to wealth (in terms of the amount of resources per person).  The formula used to calculate the level of distribution for each diocese allows the poorest diocese to receive four times as much per person as the most resourced diocese.  This can be used as extra help with meeting existing clergy stipend costs or for funding new mission opportunities.

Use of the Fund

Guidelines

Dioceses can credit their funding to their stipends account and/or invest in specific mission initiatives in the following areas:

• The mission development of a new Church ministry in an existing or new community.
• The mission development of a new ministry within an existing parish church (e.g. youth work, schools’ work or parent and children ministries).
• The mission development of network ministries (e.g. ministry among employment, leisure, recreation, or consumer networks which are not tied to a narrow geographical location).
• The support of other mission initiatives that are particularly focused on the development of Christian community among people who are not currently part of the life of a church.

These guidelines are intentionally wide, giving dioceses maximum freedom to choose how best to direct their grants.  However, dioceses are encouraged to support projects that could go on to become self-funding and whose energy and ideas could be shared between parishes and dioceses to help create lasting mission capital.

Dioceses are also encouraged to direct money towards the support of people, including clergy seeking to develop new Church ministry, ‘network ministers’ and lay workers.  The monies may be used for resources to help clergy or lay workers to undertake their ministry, as well as investment in church buildings, which are instrumental in the mission development of new ministry.

Monitoring the Fund’s Use

Across the dioceses, many new and innovative projects have come to fruition as a result of the Parish Mission Fund.  Dioceses are required annually to submit a report of how they have used their allocation.  This allows the Archbishops’ Council and Commissioners to monitor how the money is being used and helps them to gain and share mission ideas. 

Each year the Archbishops’ Council and Commissioners circulate a paper to Synod members showing how the Parish Mission Fund is being used.  Click here to see the most recent of these documents and here for the supporting schedule of projects and costs. An illustrated leaflet with case studies was published to accompany the Commissioners' annual report for 2005.

Researching good use of funding in the dioceses

As an example of the mission initiatives going forward in one diocese, here are a report and powerpoint presentation on projects and people supported by Lichfield diocese's Growth Fund.

A research seminar held in January 2007 gave the opportunity for representatives from a small number of dioceses to consider the strategic use of funds for mission. The results of the discussion are shown in two leaflets:

• Diocesan Strategies for Investing in New Mission Opportunities
• Reviewing Parishes’ Health and Viability

Feedback to commissioners.enquiry@c-of-e.org.uk would be welcome. In time we hope to develop a website to help share ideas about practical ways of supporting and enabling mission.