Around the Diocese, churches are both demonstrating and enabling generosity in their communities.
Here are a few snapshots.
Gratitude Grows Generosity
When parishes live in a spirit of thankfulness, generosity spills out. Looking around our Diocese, we find that parishes in less prosperous areas are often places of deep generosity, giving money, time and gifts to enable creative and impactful mission. As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, those who sow generously, reap generously (2 Corinthians 9.6).
National figures show that more deprived areas match the generosity of richer areas – we see this lived out here in Southwark. Thamesmead Team Ministry is one of our more deprived parishes and gratefully benefits from the Parish Support Fund. Out of this gratitude flows generous mission – a free café serving soup and good company, foodbank, open doors to youth groups and messy church, and more. They’re also committed to growing in financial giving. William Temple, one of the Thamesmead team, is in the Diocesan top ten for average gifts through the Parish Giving Scheme!
St Edwards Mottingham brought a smile to our faces recently by sending a surprise voluntary contribution in addition to their pledge to the Parish Support Fund. They’re also a parish in a less financially resourced area where life is challenging. They are in the most deprived 10% of our Diocese, but share what they have, from a foodbank, access to IT, support and referrals for debt, housing, benefits and energy bills, shopping and medicine collection, community meals, exercise, toddlers, dance and more.
The Revd Dr Catherine Shelley says: “We are so grateful that our building project, to make the church more accessible for the local community, hasn’t bankrupted us that we thought it was time to give a bit extra in gratitude for all that God has given us. We are hoping to be in a position to increase our parish share in the coming year as well.”
Activating Generosity
We enjoy hearing about the ways in which parishes are activating the spirit of generosity in their congregations by providing opportunities and prompts to give.
At St John’s Old Malden an annual ‘red envelope’ scheme gives an opportunity for each church member to review their giving. One Sunday, led by the vicar in his sermon, they ask everyone to take a ‘red envelope’; each envelope contains an update about the church’s vision and finances, a leaflet about how to respond in giving, information about leaving legacies to the church, and a pledge form, so that people can respond. Over the next 3 weeks, people are asked to bring back their red envelopes, with completed pledge forms giving their response. The church can then celebrate the results together.
Their giving team told us: “This year we’ve been really encouraged to see the congregation respond generously when we shared our vision and presented an opportunity to increase giving. It means we can plan to sustain our presence and mission in the community, through our bereavement café, Tea and Chat, Sunday Lunch Club, our thriving toddler groups and Messy Church and we can develop our exciting plans for the future.”
Rev Sarah Simpson, at Immanuel and St Andrew, Streatham, tells us “we are a church community who look to foster a culture of gratitude, joy and sharing the love”. In gratitude for the “above and beyond” generosity of God, and the ways in which they’ve received from others, the church community expresses generosity with what they have. They’re not a wealthy church, but they can – and do! – offer their building within the partnerships that are an important part of their life.
Earlier this year that led to them hosting a multi-faith circus, with a tightrope across the church! Sarah notices that as people see the positive impacts of the mission that the building enables, so more generosity flows. This has been activated with new ways of giving, including the Parish Giving Scheme, and a contactless machine. The church has found the Parish Giving Scheme a real help, reducing their treasurer’s workload by claiming Gift Aid automatically, and enabling people to give regularly.
Sarah celebrates this as an “ordinary story” – a warm, genuine, friendly congregation, together choosing to notice, name, and give thanks for what is good, and responding by giving where they can, with what they have.
In St John’s Angell Town, Rev Robert Faulkner is quite clear about his approach: “I just keep on asking!” And in response, the generosity just keeps on flowing, with donations increasing!
Passing it On
Often one generous gift can inspire others.
We know that the opportunity to give through a contactless machine enables generous giving – the average cash gift is £3.61, the average gift with a contactless machine, just over £11. But before this happens, the church needs a machine! They’re not too expensive – the cheapest are under £300 – but for some, this is a barrier.
At All Saints Tooting, the barrier was hurdled when someone gifted the church a financial offering specifically to buy a contactless giving machine. From these initial gifts, further generosity can flow.
We would love to pass on your stories to encourage others too – do let us know what generosity looks like in your community.
