Fresh Expressions
To maximise the potential for our churches to grow across Greater Manchester, the diocese is keen to encourage creative thinking about Fresh Expressions of church.
Fresh Expressions is an exciting initiative of the Anglican Church, Methodist Church and United Reformed Church. It encourages the planting of new Christian churches and congregations. However, these are different in ethos and style from the church which planted them; because they are designed to reach a different group of people than those already attending the original church.
There is no single model to copy but a wide variety of approaches for a wide variety of contexts and constituencies. The emphasis is on planting something which is appropriate to its context, rather than cloning something which works elsewhere.
Fresh Expressions of church work alongside the parish church. They are not in competition with it, but complementary. The Archbishop of Canterbury has called this as a ‘mixed economy’ of church as it speaks about the diversity of different models of church.
In Greater Manchester we have a number of examples of Fresh Expressions of Church, such as Sanctus1, Bolton Network Church and Sports Village Church. Each is an example of a church that has been established to reach a different people group.
See also www.freshexpressions.org.uk
