Rural Good News Stories

Donald’s Story

We started doing Cafe Church about a year ago. It happens monthly and is an early start at 9.30am. We have coffee and bacon rolls and other breakfast things. The first half an hour is just catching up and then at 10 we start, well I don’t want to say “start the service” but we do have most of the traditional components but we do them in a different and informal way

It’s been successful. Most of the people who would come to the normal church service come to cafe church. It is in the village hall and there is something important about it not being in the church. We have one or two people come who have not come into the church building before. We regularly get around 30 people and a lot of the locals have enjoyed the informality and the opportunity to talk about real, important things: To talk about their faith round the table.

We sing songs and they can be traditional or contemporary and that has led to some interesting conversation about what type of music helps people engage with God.

We pray, sometimes in a traditional style and sometimes more innovatively and interactively, perhaps using a prayer tree or spreading out the newspapers to connect with what is happening in the world.

Our bible readings tend to be contemplative, asking “what do you hear from these words, what are you prompted to think and do in response” – this often leads to lively chat. I don’t deliver a sermon, it is more about asking some questions or giving a few thoughts that lead to conversation, I might ask them to reflect on those things alone, then discuss on the table before perhaps feeding back to a whole room discussion.

I think there is more theological reflection going on at cafe church than I am aware of going on at traditional services. I am pleased that most people do come and even those in the congregation who are great supporters of very traditional forms of worship come along and have said they enjoy it and receive from it.

It is encouraging and exciting to see where there is growth. We are changing not declining!

Jim’s Story

The Kemnay Kirk Anytime Anywhere project was conceived to help make church more accessible to people who could not attend for a variety of reasons. Littlewood Court is the local sheltered housing complex where a number of residents would find it difficult or impossible to get to church services some of whom are long time church attendees. This became a core focus for our project which was called Kemnay Church Anytime Anywhere (KKAA). The broad objectives were to provide a system which facilitate the live viewing of church services and also provided a catchup service where people who miss a service for any reason can view it when convenient any time.

A subgroup of our Outreach working group was formed and work started to detail our requirements. We wanted to ensure that the system did not cause any distraction to the normal operation of any service but gave any remote viewers a sense of being present. We also wanted where possible to extend a sense of community to those listening. As the project evolved, two main threads of development became evident. The Technical specification of the systems needed, the people needed to operate this and also the setup of a rota of people who would provide a presence where people gather to watch the services.

For many years the church provided a service where audio recordings of services on Audio CD where handed to people who could not attend. This was popular particularly with people who live alone and could not make it to the Sunday service. A few users still receive these recordings today.

We were able to form a proposal for the expansion of our existing church AV system through the addition of four cameras, video mixing desk and web streaming equipment. Audio feeds where taken from the existing sound desk and a video feed from the video projection computer. The cameras are remotely controlled from the Audio Visual Desk area and the video signals can be switched/mixed to send camera or projection screen video to the live stream.

KKAA as a technology project manifests real benefits by helping to reduce social isolation and improving a sense of community

John’s Story

Twenty-two years ago, a group of church youth leaders in rural Berwickshire met to pray about the decline in the number of young people attending their churches. By the end of that time of prayer, they all felt that God was telling them to go into the places where the young people were – their schools. They asked headteachers whether they would welcome their involvement and received a very positive response. They presented their vision to local church leaders who agreed to provide financial support for the establishment of a Trust, which became an Associate Trust of Scripture Union. So Berwickshire Christian Youth Trust (BCYT) was born.

BCYT is supported by churches in Berwickshire to be their agent in schools to reach out to young people. Its management committee consists of representatives from local churches, who support the one full-time and one part-time schools worker whom the Trust employs. For much of their work, they rely on the support of volunteers from churches to run Bible clubs during lunchtimes in schools, to take assemblies, to introduce a Christian dimension into the curriculum at the request of headteachers and to run weekend camps, summer holiday clubs and activity days during half-terms. Churches are pleased to support the Trust financially, and to provide volunteers, because they see this, in many cases, as their only outreach to young people, or as complementing their own youth work.

'One sows, another waters, but God makes the seeds grow' (1 Cor. 3:6). We trust God that that is happening!