Parish Support Fund 2025 Q & A sessions
Our Archdeacons are hosting information, question and answer sessions – mostly online, to which all incumbents, treasurers and all PCC members are cordially invited. They will be one hour long. Please book via the links below. Please do share the dates with your PCCs – you are welcome to attend whichever date is the most convenient for you:
| Wednesday 26 June | Evening zoom (6pm) | Reigate |
| Monday 8 July | Afternoon in person 3.30pm, Trinity House | Woolwich |
| Wednesday 10 July | Lunchtime zoom (12.30pm) | Kingston |
| Monday 15 July | Lunchtime zoom (12.30pm) | Woolwich |
| Tuesday 16 July | Evening zoom (7.30pm) | Kingston |
| Thursday 18 July | Lunchtime zoom (12.30pm) | Croydon |
The 2025 PSF materials were sent on 24 June and you are requested to submit your 2025 pledge by 15 September, please.
Each month as I read the finance reports, I give thanks and rejoice in your faithful commitment to the Parish Support Fund. May we give joyfully, committed to resourcing our
Bishop Christopher
apostolic mission and ministry and blessing each Diocesan community.
One of the great things about the Church of England is that we work together. We have a shared mission to share the love of God in Christ Jesus with all around us. Rather than each church paying for its own vicar and all the other costs of ministry, we pool our resources with richer parishes supporting poorer ones. This means we can put clergy in the places where they are needed most. So, a more affluent parish with fewer people in it may have a half-time priest, while a less affluent inner-city parish may need a full-time priest.
What is the PSF?
Working together since 2016
The PSF was introduced in January 2016 in Southwark. Parishes have responded positively and generously to this new scheme over the past eight years – thank you. We are all God’s people, and the Diocese of Southwark is like a large family which needs to support each other. That is why the PSF is so important as it helps the parishes to work together and support one another generously.
Our PCCs right across our Diocese are responsible and accountable to each other for how much they give, and we ask each parish to aspire to being self-financing (that is, to cover their indicative costs of ministry).
Principles of the PSF
The PSF is a generosity-based pledge scheme which brings together the principles of:
- proportionality
- informed generosity
- an aspiration to, and encouragement towards becoming self-financing.
These three principles are underpinned by a commitment to transparency and mutual accountability.
Parish Support Fund 2024 and 2025
Bishop Christopher writes “My fellow Bishops and I wish to thank you for your generosity. Parish ministry is made possible by your commitment to the Parish Support Fund (PSF), which is a partnership that resources mission and ministry in every parish across this beautifully diverse Diocese. “
We have sent out the 2025 Parish Support Fund materials digitally at the end of June. We hope you will share the letters, stories and videos with your PCC and congregation, as well as a newly added introductory video from Bishop Christopher and colleagues, and a PowerPoint for your PCC to help explain what your pledge pays towards. Please enjoy the six videos from parishes, one from each area, which celebrate the impact of your generosity and God’s blessing. We’ll be releasing these once a week, starting from 1 July.
Please could I ask you to include the discussion of your 2025 pledge as an agenda item in your PCCS in the months of July, August or September and submit your pledge by 15 September. This deadline is to help us prepare the Diocesan budget to be presented and discussed by the governance committees ahead of Diocesan Synod. We will be asking you to submit your pledges online, as last year.
If you have any questions please contact Gabby Parikh, our Director of Giving, or your Archdeacon.
Thank you again for enabling us to continue to resource our Diocese’s mission and ministry through your Parish Support fund pledge donations.
Watch good news stories funded by the PSF (updated fortnightly)
This year we visited six parishes across our Diocese to celebrate their inspiring Christ Centred, Outward Focused approach to mission and ministry. You can read about each of these parish stories in this year's PSF Booklet, and watch the films which follow more closely the impact these churches are having in their local areas.
