OUR DIOCESE
Our Vision
Our vision is for Manchester Diocese to be a worshipping, growing, transforming Christian presence at the heart of every community.
Much of what we are doing in Manchester Diocese is already contributing to a culture of hope and an expectation of growth, working with our parishes, schools and chaplaincies. This includes many forms of inherited as well as fresh expressions of church. We serve in an area that has a rich history of culture and innovation, made up of diverse and vibrant communities, and a longstanding commitment to social justice. It is a wonderful place to engage in Gospel Ministry.
Our work together grows out of Jesus’s Great Commandment which is to ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind…and love your neighbour as yourself’. (Matthew 22: 36-40)…
… and out of his Great Commission, ‘to go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Spirit’ (Matthew 28:19-20).
Our strategy is based on positive, inspiring and relevant plans for the future. It is enabling us to bring together the key areas of opportunity and challenge, building on our learning and experience from the significant changes and investments that are already underway. Many of these changes have focused on new ways of working together which are becoming embedded in the life of our diocese.
Building on these successes, we are shifting to the next level in setting our priorities and working out what we want to achieve next. Given the excellent start that has been made, we now have the opportunity to be even more creative and ambitious with our plans for the future living out our values of faith, hope and love.
Based on four key themes – Parish Renewal, Growing Younger, Church Planting and Revitalisation, and Developing Missional Leaders – this strategy will guide our work over the coming years. We have recently been awarded significant additional funding from the national church as part of the Diocesan Investment Programme to support us with this mission and ministry.
Parish Renewal
At the heart of this support is our commitment to parish renewal, providing specialist, practical help to ensure the missional and financial sustainability of our parishes. This includes financial support for those wishing to establish New Worshipping Communities. Our aim is to ensure that every parish is equipped to thrive and serve its local community.
Growing Younger
We are deepening our commitment to growing younger, nurturing children and young people on their discipleship journey. Building on the success of the Places Project in Bolton and the Man Dio Growing Faith programme across the rest of our diocese, the Encounter Project will provide additional children’s and youth workers, while the Equip training initiative will support lay and ordained leaders so they grow in confidence and develop their skills in ministry with children and young people.
Church Planting and Revitalisation
Alongside this, we are focused on church planting and revitalisation through strengthened partnerships with our existing resource churches and the Antioch Network. Six new resource churches representing a range of traditions will also be established and supported in planting new churches over the next eight years.
Developing Missional Leaders
We are also building on the work that is already taking place to bring forward and develop the next generations of missional ordained and lay leaders at every stage of their vocation, including a new, diverse generation of leaders equipped to grow faith communities.
In all of this we are deeply committed to championing racial justice and ensuring that our clergy, lay leaders and congregations represent the rich diversity of our diocese.
We are working towards the 2030 net zero carbon goal set by General Synod, by supporting our churches and schools with measuring their energy use and taking simple, practical steps to reduce their carbon footprint.
We will continue to provide a safe environment for all by promoting effective safeguarding.
Across our diocese, people hold diverse views and express their faith through different traditions, united in a passion for Jesus Christ and his Church. Our bishops honour these differences by inviting church communities from across our diocese to learn together, support one another and listen to God.
These priorities align with the Church of England’s overall vision which is to create a church of missionary disciples, where mixed ecology is the norm, and whose membership is becoming younger and more diverse.
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