Parish training

Picture by Philip King.

We offer a series of workshops and resources to help our parish churches grow and thrive.  This may include:

1) Mentoring with a member of the Diocesan team

2) Visits by the Diocesan team to support your deanery meetings

3) Personalised training that offers individuals the opportunity to learn more about faith and/or progress their calling:

Training opportunities | Weblink

4) Specific parish/benefice programmes (see below).

Mission Shaped Ministry

This is a part-time, one year course that introduces you to fresh expressions of church and equips you to to be involved in this exciting ministry. Group Project coaching is offered to apply the principles learnt into your local context.  Previous courses have included sessions on; What is church?, Starting Something New, Making Disciples and Growing a Fresh Expression to Maturity. The course leaders and teachers include: Dave Gardner, Mark Rodel, Sarah Gower, Phil Marsh, Yasmin Finch and Andrew Payne. The 2019-20 Cambridgeshire & Suffolk msm course is run jointly by the Diocese of St Edmundsbury & Ipswich, Diocese of Ely, East Anglia Methodist District, Eastern Baptist Association, URC Eastern Synod.

Dates for 202/21 will be announced soon.

Clergy, Readers, Elders and Chaplains from the Diocese of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich can use their CMD grant to recover the cost of this course.  For more information contact the Course Administrator Liz Jefferson or 01473 298550.

Mission Shaped Ministry Flyer | PDF

Spirituality for Mission | PPT

MSM Course | Weblink

Germinate Groups

Germinate Groups are affordable rural learning communities which enable lay and ordained leaders to spend time together and learn from each other.  The groups consider:

• what is (what God is doing in our area)
• what cuuld be (the God-given vision for us)
• what will be (our six-month action plan).

Germinate Groups presentation | PPTX

Our Benefice was invited to join the Germinate programme to engage with other similar groups to explore the challenges of rural multi-church settings. The main advantage of the group was to spend time reflecting, taking stock of where we are and working collaboratively to identify our burning issues. There was also an opportunity to listen attentively to each other, and to the other groups, as well as sharing ideas and offering encouragement. It has helped us to sharpen the vision and strategic plan that we had already begun, and gave us the courage to think about how we could do things differently, set priorities and begin to identify the things we might have to let go of.  I enjoyed the groups and all of us got a great deal out of it, particularly having time away together and being with other people who were in the same situation. The materials, delivery and practical exercises were excellent. This programme is suitable for anyone who wants to explore ways of making large multi-parish Benefice ministry more manageable, focussed and collaborative and I would recommend it.  The Revd Canon Julia Lall.

In the Ipswich Deanery, every parish and benefice now has a Learning Community in place to facilitate growth in their church community as part of Inspiring Ipswich. These Learning Communities, supported by a Mission Accompanier, have developed parish plans for growth, and these should now be in their early stages of implementation.

Learning Communities work with their incumbent and lay and ordained leaders to bring their congregation along with the activity and aims laid out in these parish plans, and help others get involved in serving the church and the local community.

To find our more please visit:

Inspiring Ipswich | Weblink

Page updated 2 July 2020.