New Church Mission & Fellowship Sub-committee

Part of the remit of this Sub-Committee is to investigate how the Church and Parish Centre can best provide a welcoming, practical, and safe environment suitable for the present and future needs of the parish and those groups which rely on the church buildings to carry out their important work in the community.

When the results of the Parish survey were analysed it became clear that there are many more groups using the present parish facilities than we had expected and each group has its own individual requirements and aspirations.

In particular the survey identified the need for a number of spaces and even our Architect, Columba Cook, expressed some surprise at the diversity of the requirements. These vary from a large hall we can use for Parish meetings and events, or could be hired out for suitable private events and provide a means of revenue, to smaller rooms capable of accommodating regular meetings of local associations and clubs, informal meetings or small social gatherings.

The needs are not just limited to the indoor facilities we have been asked for including a full-scale kitchen, coffee making facilities and a lounge area but also extend to the outdoors where we have requested to provide such things as a quiet garden area, to a play area for toddlers. Every group that responded to the survey seems to want masses of storage space.

The amount of overall available space is, of course, the major consideration and we have had a number of sessions for brainstorming ideas that would accommodate all of the requests within the parish survey and yet allow us to keep within a reasonable and affordable sized building which will become the New Church and Parish Centre.

We have been working in close consultation with Columba Cook. He has incorporated the results of our meetings and the Parish Survey into his plans, has prepared outline data sheets for each space and these have been submitted to the Main Committee. But our discussions have gone beyond just looking at existing requirements. The group recognises the importance of looking at the needs of the future generations. Suggestions made so far include a drop-in centre for the lonely, a soup kitchen, a mother and toddler group, formation days, Lenten courses, "house groups" and diocesan days.

We would welcome your thoughts and please do not hesitate to contact one of our committee members if you have any ideas you would like to be considered.

                                                                         Current members are:

Margaret Beauvoison, Mary Brown, Frances Halliday, Philip Hayllar, Teresa Hudson, Teresa Tierney.