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Celebrating Family Diocesan Projects: Diocese of Middlesbrough
The Diocese of Middlesbrough has received a grant of £67,500 over three years from the Celebrating Family Fund to create a part-time post to promote family-sensitive, friendly parishes and to raise awareness of marital and family spirituality through establishing a volunteer network and providing appropriate training and awareness events.
Fortunately,
the creation of the Celebrating
Family fund enabled the diocese to apply, successfully, for the
resources to employ a dedicated Celebrating Family Project Development
Worker, and Caroline Dollard was
appointed in October 2008. A
student of pastoral theology, with an MA in Liturgy, Caroline had worked
for the church, in a number of capacities, for many years.
Jane Cook took on the role of Project Manager. The
aim of the Project was to promote the three progressive strands of Celebrating
Family – Everybody’s
Welcome, Home is a Holy Place and Passing
on the Faith across the
diocese, with a 3 year programme of parish workshops and meetings.
In 2009 in collaboration with parish priests and key parish personnel,
Caroline held 6 regional meetings to introduce Everybody’s
Welcome, followed by 15 deanery and parish based workshops. Caroline
compiled an Everybody’s Welcome information/advice pack and visited
parishes to help them reflect on their ‘welcome’. Newspaper articles,
a newly designed diocesan MFL website and Caroline’s ‘Family
Matters’ newsletter all helped to raise awareness of the initiative.
The results have been encouraging. Working parties are being
created to improve the ministry of welcome and people are beginning to feel
less isolated as a result. A
young Middlesbrough mother said that she felt ‘truly
welcome’ in her parish for the first time. Engaging parents with the word of God Caroline
noticed that many families weren’t attending church and that she would
have to make contact with them through local schools rather than parish
events. She ran workshops in four primary schools, which were attended by
parents of children new to the school,
as well as those of First Holy Communion children and Year 6 leavers “The course changed my life” A
need for improved listening skills was identified during Caroline’s
visits to the parishes. Caroline
and Jane Cook are both qualified tutors in ‘Advanced Listening Skills’
(Acorn Christian Healing Foundation), skills which encourage a
particular way of listening that is both powerful and effective.
Four ‘Learning to Listen’ courses have now been run in
response to requests from across the diocese.
Some of those requesting training are involved in welcome ministry,
and bereavement visiting, but others are parents and grandparents who
simply want to improve home life and family communications. “The
parish is a welcoming family”
Caroline
officially launched Home is A Holy
Place in September 2009, with Bishop Terry Drainey, at a Diocesan
Family Day attended by representatives from 21 parishes.
Caroline followed up the event with visits to individual parishes and in addition to 65 requests for resource packs, was asked to
provide leadership training for a group of local parents.
Caroline ran the course, entitled ‘Leading with Confidence’, in
June 2010 and all six volunteers are now running parenting courses in the
Middlesbrough area. “This course has made all the difference
to our lives” Caroline
piloted 2 parenting courses, entitled, “What
Can a Parent Do?” (for parents of 5-15 year olds) in Spring 2010
and she hopes to train a second
group of parenting leaders in York and Hull in 2011. Parents who
have attended courses in the diocese have gained confidence and new
friends. Caroline hopes that
attendance on courses will, in time, become part of the school culture,
with many more parents attending. One
mum said, “I thought
the course was challenging and inspiring, and entirely appropriate for
raising children in our current era.”
Caroline and Jane
are also providing on-going training for leaders of Liturgy of the Word
with Children. Caroline
is now working on the Passing on the Faith initiative – the third and final strand of
the Celebrating Family resource.
Middlesbrough is one of three dioceses Piloting the initiative - exploring
the complementary roles and responsibilities of the home-school-parish
network. The first cluster
meeting, for the Pilot, took place on 10th November 2010, with
structured debate between Head Teachers and RE Co-ordinators, parish
priests, catechists and parents. Further
cluster meetings are planned for 2011. The results of the research will be
used to produce a national resource to
support parents and grandparents in their role as first teachers of their
children in faith. “Learning more about supporting families
and sharing experiences – great!”
“The lord is calling you to become
leaders of a new season of hope” A
key project objective has been to encourage people to become leaders in
Family Life Ministry and to ensure that a ‘family voice’ is heard in
the parishes. Part of the
project’s strategic plan has been to appoint deanery representatives to
coordinate the volunteer effort in each region, and to help to audit
existing parish support for families. Caroline has worked hard to find
representatives in each of the four deaneries.
To-date she has recruited two people in Middlesbrough and
one in York. She is hoping to
find volunteers from Hull and the coastal regions in the New Year. Caroline
is able to offer training and support to enthusiastic volunteers wanting
to set up parish groups with the help of their parish priest.
Caroline
was involved in planning the diocese’s first Celebration of Marriage and
Family Life, on the Feast of the Holy Family, in December 2009. And,
in October 2010 the Bishop celebrated a second Mass in the Cathedral.
Couples were given the opportunity to renew their marriage vows and tea
and ‘wedding’ cake were served afterwards.
There are plans to make this an annual event. Following re-structuring in the Diocese, Caroline is now working with the Episcopal Vicar, Canon John Loughlin and a ‘strategic planning group’ to formulate a Strategic Plan for MFL ministry. The Project team hope that this Plan will be adopted by the Bishop’s Council as a way forward for MFL, when the funding period for the Celebrating Family project ends in October 2011. For more information please contact Project Manager
Jane Cook
or Celebrating Family Project Development Worker Caroline
Dollard. Donate to the Celebrating Family Fund
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Website Design : Blank Canvas Designs |
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It
was clear from Middlesbrough’s response to
Listening 2004: My Family, My Church, that families wanted to
experience the parish as a wider family, offering spiritual nourishment
and practical concern for them outside of church.
In
September 2010 a very successful Celebrating
Family study day, ‘Households
of God’ was held in Easingwold parish, and attended by more than 72
people from the diocese and beyond. 
The
diocese’s first “Celebration of Marriage and Family Life”