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WELCOME TO ALL SAINTS DEDWORTH!

All Saint’s Church, Dedworth is a Christ centred, life-giving, inclusive church, committed to serving God, who is empowering us to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ to the community and beyond.

A living church

We are an evangelical church that believes our love for Jesus Christ should be reflected in the many ways we serve and work within the community.

An involved congregation

We have over 250+ regular worshippers of all ages, many of whom are actively involved in the everyday life of the church. Worship ranges from the more traditional to the energetic family service.

Engaged with the community

We are at the centre of the community : we provide regular school assemblies, services in the local care homes, our community cafe, the events we run and support at the church and in the community and rooms for the use of non-church groups

1.Where do we think God is leading us? To create a kingdom without walls; bringing more people to Jesus through evangelism; going

out into the community with the power of God to share the message of Jesus; Being open to the gifts of the Holy Spirit; To greater mission, so the church is more mobile and less comfortable, coupled with a

continued focus on compassionate pastoral care; To strengthen and develop our work with young people and schools; To have inspiring leadership with a team of passionately led ministry groups; To engage more people fully with God; and To become a beacon of Christ’s light within our community alongside the other Christian

churches.

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2.Where are we now?

Strengths Challenges

Increasingly open to the gifts of the Spirit Faith Not always confident to seek and

take opportunities to bring people into the family of God

A stable congregation of all ages with loyal and lively members with a wide range of talents

Congregation We have varying ages in the congregation, and we need to learn to reap the harvest that has been sown among all ages

An engaged congregation guided by the Holy Spirit and led in a team structure which is open to change and willing to reach out in pastoral care

Life A congregation where there are some differing opinions that need to be helped through change

A wide range of worship for different needs, particularly families. We are at the heart of the community with a developed mission in schools and to the elderly and sick

Community Providing a future plan for outreach to a proposed change in population, in view of planned new builds within the parish

We have a good, multi-purpose building, extended to meet the diverse needs of the church and community

Practicalities Finances are well managed and giving is stable but only growing slowly

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3. MINISTRY - FAITH AND LEADERSHIP3.1 MINISTRY – MISSION AND OUTREACH

TABLE 3.1 What God enables us to do for community and congregation

MISSION WHAT WE DO EXAMPLESBOLD COMMUNITY OUTREACH Leading/supporting

community events, Working with local officials

and institutions Hosting secular and spiritual

events at our church put on by third parties

Working with local media

Take the message of Christ’s birth and resurrection around the community in a double-decker bus to many hundreds in the community

Preaching at racecourse Hustings, Windsor Fringe

events, close liaison with local radio

Helping with local homeless projects

OUTREACH TO THE ELDERLY AND PASTORAL CARE

members of the congregation take God to the elderly of our community, inside and outside the congregation with visits and services.

Those in hospital and lonely visited by informal team

Work closely with Cross Roads, a secular care organisation with office at All Saints

Services regularly held at several old people’s homes

Lunches for the elderly at church on Fridays

FUNERALS Funeral services are used as a significant opportunity for outreach; families are welcome to use the church premises and café for after service receptions

Huge commitment is shown in supporting the bereaved before and after the funeral

Large number of funerals undertaken per year both at All Saints and elsewhere

Links with local funeral companies

Many blessings from such work including numerous families joining church

YOUNG PEOPLE Our 2 to 17-year olds are split into different groups both on Sundays and elsewhere

Separate groups for ‘Mums and Tots’ and ‘Grandmas and Tots’ meet regularly

Dance, sing and run the IT at our deceptively chaotic Family Service

Bible discussions Weekends away: Local get

togethers, visits to Soul Survivor, Big Church family etc.

SCHOOLS Engage with children and teachers at all the schools in the parish with assemblies and roadshows (themed RE Days)

Regular school assemblies 500 attended Easter

Services at All Saints and 1,000 attended a mixture of shows and services at

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Spread the word by inviting schools to All Saints’ and holding Bible clubs

Incumbent and congregation are members of the governing bodies and PTAs

Christmas Many examples of Biblically

themed holiday clubs in the summer

COMMUNITY GROUPS We encourage secular and Christian groups to use rooms

Viewed as outreach accepting donations, not a business arrangement

Groups participate in church life, surrendering meeting rooms for events and joining us in café

We want more such organisations to join our community hub and experience the richness of God’s welcome

Used by 20 groups with several hundred attending per week: Vulnerable: Alcoholics

Anonymous, Art Mental Health, Dementia Groups, Drugs/Smart

Support Groups: Men’s Matters, Sands, Breast Cancer, Crafts Groups

Affiliations: Rainbows, Brownies

Ad hoc: one-off meetings, local councillor sessions, specific courses

CAFÉ The Running Man Café (5th year) is an important part of life at All Saints’

Open for fantastic coffee, tea, a wide range of breakfast and lunchtime snacks & homemade cakes

The café is part of our offering to the community

Used by: those gathering before a

funeral or baptism those using the counselling

services in the church and other groups

A growing number of local residents and workers brought in by its amazingly low prices

Church membersCHURCH SOCIAL GROUPS, EVENTS and TIME AWAY

All regarded as part of building up the church family and community: Many social groups and

activities meeting in the recent past

Organised popular social and fundraising events for church and community

Major events and fairs seen as part of outreach

Weekends away

Social Groups: e.g. Book Club, Christian Aid, Film nights, Men’s social group

Social and Fundraising events: Wine Call My Bluff, Themed Food, Quiz Nights, Jazz evenings, Barn Dances, Rock Bands

Major events: “Dare to be Dedworth” festival and a whole host of fairs, craft events both at the church and around the community

Pilgrimages include Iona, Lindisfarne and Canterbury (2016); Family weekends at pastoral centres.

3.2 CURRENT WORKING STRUCTURE

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At present All Saints’ is run by eight teams (see table below). Each small team of up to six members has a team leader. It is the responsibility of these teams to ensure the mission of the church continues through their work and to draw in more and more church members into the mission. The teams meet once a month for a practical session and once a month for prayer time.

Table 3.2 Teams at All Saints since February 2018

Accounts SchoolsBuildings and Grounds work TechnologyMusic Worship Worship LeadingPastoral and Spiritual Care Youth

There are also three paid members of the church. A husband and wife who manage the running of the café and are paid from café profits and a mother of two boys, who is being paid while she discerns her call to ministry. After having been an intern for over a year she now has responsibility for funerals (she has completed a celebrant training course), for homes for the elderly and for working with families with autistic children. Her salary is provided by a legacy recently given to the church.

It has been All Saints’ policy for the last ten years or so to find money to enable lay people to develop their ministries by taking a year out from their usual form of employment, and in so doing, to discover where God might want them to go next.

3.3 RECENT DEVELOPMENT OF OUR FAITH – A YEAR OF TEACHING, AND PRAYER and our BIBLE WORK

We continue to run many Bible study groups, house groups and alpha-type courses. At least three Bible studies per week and some home study groups have taken place including a men’s Bible group, with around 30 men working on courses such as ‘Christianity Explored’. A prayer session is held every Monday where we pray alternately for Schools, Community, Church and World

In addition, from September 2016 to August 2017, we had a year of learning, praying and waiting. We closed down many of our activities in order to have a year of theological and practical training, with weekly classes using our own material but l based on St Margaret’s Theology Academy and other sources, including: Hermeneutics; History of Discipleship & Today; Mission & Evangelism Training; and Pastoral Care Training.

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4. WORSHIP AND PREACHING4. 1 SERVICES

We offer a range of services to suit different inclinations and styles but at all of these we show particularly warm hospitality to visitors.

Table 4. 1 Current weekly services at All Saints

Day Time Typical numbers

Type and participation

Sunday 9:30 50 Traditional communion service Sunday 10:45 80 - 100 Family service offering. It is a lively, varied, sometimes “messy” and

joyful service - and different every weekTuesday 9:30 10 Celtic prayer - informalWednesday

12:30 20 Traditional Holy Communion service-quiet and reflective

Wednesday

19:30 25 Holy Communion, for adults of all ages-joyful, prayer, praise and move to charismatic

Not every weekday service is always taken by the incumbent.

All Saints is active at Christmas and Easter, with many different services including some 400 attending our Christingle services from the church and the community. This year, we gave services in the church and from our double decker bus right round the community on Christmas Eve. Over 1,000 children from local schools enjoyed our short pantomime on the Wise Men in Advent and there were several other carol services. At Easter 500 children attended special services at All Saints.

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4.2 MUSIC AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

We have musicians and organists and praise God with new and traditional songs We have an up to date IT system, which has brought a new dimension to our worship although

with the usual new skills needed

4.3 OUR VISION

Our vision is firstly to increase the commitment of all the congregation to walk more closely with Jesus and to be open to the Holy Spirit and secondly to increase the numbers attending our services as we win more souls from the community and change lives

http://www.allsaintschurchdedworth.co.uk

5. OUR PARISH All Saints’ Church, Dedworth, based to the west of central Windsor, in Berkshire. The Parish accounts for 37% of the entire population of Windsor. However, it is important to

realise that this is separate to and unlike central Windsor.

This is a self-contained urban parish significantly poorer than surrounding areas. It has its share of challenges, hardship, real needs and opportunities for us to help.

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FIGURE 5.2 DETAILED MAP OF DEDWORTH

1= All Saints Dedworth, 2= Spital (part of St Andrew’s Clewer) 3= St Andrew’s Clewer

Table 5.1 Parish of Dedworth

Feature Details

Dedworth population, (1) 11,422 (Other neighbouring parishes populations: Clewer St Andrews 7,152, Clewer St Stephen with Spital 4,532, Windsor Holy Trinity 2,620, New Windsor 5,297)

Geographical size 1.2 square milesComposition Mainly residential housing and support servicesHousing Wide range of housing stock with expensive and social housing existing

alongside each other High rise social housing and MOD estate of married quarters Large estates of small owner-occupied housing as well as some large

detached properties Population increasing with one new housing development having 450

new homes, several apartment developments underwaySchools and Elderly Four community first schools and one community middle school, plus

a C of E first school in the neighbouring parish of St Andrews which is attended by many church families

Three care homes for elderly, fourth shared services with St AndrewsChurches Friendly relations with nearby Baptist and Catholic churches

Also with neighbouring parish of St AndrewsOther services & employment

Small industrial estate One marina, another marina nearby Two significant garden centres Royal Windsor Racecourse nearby

Shops Number of local shops in two main areas near All Saints and 500 yards further east

Tesco superstore 400 yards to west of All Saints Regular bus services to Central Windsor town centre

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6. WHAT CAN WE OFFER TO OUR NEW VICAR?Dedworth offers a great opportunity as a training ministry:

Friendly, liberal and open-minded church offers great learning support, keen to experiment with new initiatives and working structures

Deeply established links, embedded voice and networks within the community such as schools, elderly, funeral links

Strong congregation with developed skills Experience of many activities and initiatives in the last years and of going on a journey with the

present incumbent Recent move towards charismatic alongside traditional and lively family services offering

opportunities to work with a wide variety of styles Our Wardens and PCC are highly supportive of our current incumbent and work closely with her

alongside the various teams to ensure God’s will is carried out in the church Warm and welcoming approach which we would extend both to our new vicar and members of

his/her family Well-maintained and modern buildings giving our new vicar opportunities to build on present

work and develop new activities and combinations previously untapped

7. WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?We need a vicar to share our vision of God’s calling:

In Christ Jesus and through the Holy Spirit, our heavenly Father calls us to grow:

in intimacy with him; in deep commitment to one another; in lives which show the fruit of radical obedience; and as a beacon of God’s love, in Dedworth and to all nations.

All our activities are underpinned by the five marks of mission and evangelism.

There is a lot of love for All Saints in the community, and we need a new vicar to harvest this into winning souls for Christ. He/she will be able to build upon our many years of seed-sowing activities and start to reap, taking God’s message to congregation and community alike in Dedworth. There will be new areas of work for our church mission and curtailing of some existing activities, but critically we need someone to:

shake us up so that we will always be aware of God keep us close to God; and lead us in our mission for Jesus

Every church wants a superhero, but we know vicars are human too. We are open to God’s spirit for the exact profile of the new vicar and are not making a prescriptive list of requirements for “God’s ideal person”, but personal abilities of the new vicar could include the following:

a spirit–filled and energetic person who has the gifts to lead our new and existing activities; someone able to have the discernment of God’s will in order to decide on priorities; the perception to know what he/she cannot do and the will to encourage and support those

who can; and

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someone to build on God’s existing work and to lead us on to new challenges and start to harvest using the opportunities that have been created.

 Some of the qualities which God may need our new vicar to have in order to inspire us with are as follows (and his/her previous experience could reflect these):

their burning desire to continue our mission in the community, including our community group guests at our church and our many external activities;

the desire to support and work with those seeking to engage and inspire young people in our congregation and beyond. Our youngsters love the singing and dancing in the Family Services. Our extensive work with the local schools reaches hundreds of children in our community;

the sympathy and determination to bring God’s message to the elderly, especially at the end of their life;

personal qualities to, in God’s wisdom, meld our congregation, our teams and our community network into a harvesting force in Dedworth;

willingness to work with several different styles of worship and old and new traditions within the congregation.

8. CHURCH BUILDINGSSituated right at the heart of Dedworth, we have a 1970’s modern building, with capacity to seat a congregation of approximately 300 - 350. It is a very adaptable building, providing venues for a variety of community activities as follows:

Table 8.1 Main parts of church and purposePART OF CHURCH WHAT IS IT USED FOR?Main Body of the Church Services: Sunday/Wednesday and special services at other times

Community Groups (Alzheimer’s, Art, Brownies) and Events (Salsa,Call my Bluff Evenings)

Chapel (2016) Devotion: Private prayer and groups, Bible study, Sunday school Opened up for big services

Porch building (2010) Meeting and counselling rooms for external, community driven organisations and church groups/Sunday School

Office (used by Cross Roads Social Care)Running Man Cafe Church & Community café for community drop ins and

congregation Named after a statue on the cross of All Saints’ steeple

Fig Tree Courtyard Play area for children Relaxing area used after Sunday services Café tables in the summer

Two features of our modern church are:

The foyer and main altar area are famously graced by some William Morris/Burne Jones stained glass windows; and

we also have highly attractive murals painted in the church and chapel by a member of the congregation depicting the life, death and resurrection of Jesus

With several other recent jobs completed we can now give our new vicar a fully-functioning modern and multi-purpose building with which to continue current activities and initiate new ventures.

9. FINANCES

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The total outgoings for the church on an annual basis are approximately £125,000. This includes the Parish Share which is currently around 50% of our costs. A recent gift day helped raise £15,000 to supplement overall finances. Some income is derived from The Running Man Café, although its primary function is outreach. Like many churches, All Saints’ congregation has a very mixed income profile. The emphasis of all our fundraising and social activities has rightly been to be inclusive, with those who can pay more doing so and those who cannot able to participate and come for free or donate what they can

10. THE VICARAGE – SL4 5RJThe 4 - bedroom Vicarage is located on one of the main estates approximately half a mile west of All Saints Dedworth, within a short walk of Tesco. It includes an extension with a separate office.

11. MESSAGE FROM THE BISHOP Thank you for your interest in this opportunity at All Saints Dedworth.

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All Saints is a vibrant, outward-looking Christian community, on the edge of Windsor. Over the last few years, with their previous incumbent, Louise Brown, the Church here has encouraged, equipped and released many people into ministry, both within and beyond the walls of the building.

One of the first things you will want to know is, what the churchmanship is. To be honest, that is a challenge, and that is one of the things that makes this parish different and so special. Importantly, they describe themselves as evangelical and inclusive. If you were to join them on a Sunday morning, you would find lots of lay participation, a good sermon, home-made music, and a blend of traditional, charismatic, all age, and ‘new monastic’ influences. They are clearly eucharistic, but they enjoy a variety of non-eucharistic worship, too, and they are completely and impressively committed to loving this part of greater Windsor.

I think we are looking for someone with an attractive faith and high emotional intelligence; someone who is deeply centred in Christ, who will happily encourage others to participate and share ministry. Woman or man, whoever is appointed will not be precious about churchmanship or church politics, and will have passion and commitment for community outreach. They will need to be adaptive, and have a real heart for God’s mission to love this world He created and redeemed. They will be someone who not only sees possibilities, but is able to invite others to join in; someone who is creative and not afraid to innovate, but will not just go-it-alone.

This is an exciting time to be in the Oxford Diocese. Our Diocesan Bishop, +Steven Croft, is leading us to explore together what it means to be a more Christ-like church; a Church of the Beatitudes. Our expectation is that the next Vicar of All Saints will share this journey with us, in the parish, Deanery and Diocese, wholeheartedly and joyfully.

+Andrew Reading. 22nd May 2018.

12. DEANERY PERSPECTIVE The Parish of Dedworth is in the Deanery of Maidenhead and Windsor, one of 6 deaneries in the Reading episcopal area. Other parishes in the deanery can be seen at http://oxford.anglican.org/who-we-are/reading/deaneries/maidenhead-and-windsor/

The previous incumbent supported the life of the Deanery and was a regular host of the Deanery Synod, but the involvement of the congregation has been less evident. The Deanery looks forward to an increased level of involvement by the parish through its Deanery Synod Representatives, so that it can take its rightful place as a parish that has an important contribution to make to mission both within its boundaries and wider.

The Deanery Plan envisages a continued role for the Parish of Dedworth under the current pastoral arrangements and there are no plans at the moment to make any changes to these.

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APPENDIX 1 PROPOSED JOB ADVERTISMENT FOR OUR NEW VICAR