COMMUNITY

The quick and dirty definition of a community is a group of people with something in common. It can be the place they live, an interest in common, a faith in common - in fact almost anything where a group of people share a bond and work as a collective. The church is concerned with the WHOLE community - not just the worshipping one. We should be at the heart of community matters, on a local level and at a regional decision making level. There are programmes and initiatives to regenerate the local countryside and to reduce the barriers to social inclusion and we as a church can help undertake this task as part of our mission. The rural nature of our Diocese means that people can be isolated and find it difficult to access what many of us take for granted, such as transport, health services, support groups, youth activities, shops .....the list is endless. Part of our response to this could be exploring ways of using our buildings in rural, isolated communities. There are lots of ways we can serve our community, we just have to ask local people how we can do it. It's called consultation.