Urban Expression Bristol

Bristol Background

Bristol is, like many cities, a divided city; the River Avon divides it North / South and the M32 motorway splits off the East section of the city – the wealth being concentrated mainly in the North. Also typical is the large area of deprivation (lowest 10% on the national multiple deprivation indicator scale). The contrast between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’ is particularly marked in Bristol because it is one of Britain’s wealthiest cities, having the highest average personal income outside of London. Bristol’s urban deprivation typically exists in two kinds of areas: multicultural inner city areas and majority white estates built as slum clearances in the 30’s and 50’s. In both these the denominational churches have suffered serious and long term decline; the very existence of the denominational churches in white estates is now in question.

Urban Expression in Bristol

In response to the missional challenge Urban Expression agreed that we should start working in Bristol and in autumn 2009 we started working on setting up two steering groups in the city – one to focus on the multicultural East of the city and the other to focus on the mainly white estates in the south. These steering groups will be getting to grips with the challenge throughout 2010 with a view to starting teams in the autumn.

Dynamic Partnerships in Bristol

The mission challenge in Bristol is very significant. However it seems that the Spirit is moving and in some senses we are running to keep up. Creative working relationships exist already between denominations, especially Anglican and Baptist with the exiting involvement of both the Baptist and Anglican colleges in the city: both of them are very involved in mission in Bristol and developing new ways of training people to be involved incarnational mission and church planting in some of the most challenging areas. The Baptist college has formed a partnership with UE locally so that we can bring together the strengths of the college with the church planting energy and expertise of UE. 

Opportunities

 We are praying for people of all kinds with a passion for Jesus and a heart for urban church planting to get involved. Opportunities exist in both white estates and multicultural urban areas to join teams and incarnational communities which are associated with UE. In south Bristol, on the Knowle West estate a small community started in Sept 09 and is a very exciting incarnational expression of church based around a weekly Sabbath meal and a journey of exploring and living out convictions such as simplicity, prayer, hospitality, attentiveness … In East Bristol there seems to be a steady trickle of people over the last few years moving to the area with a vision for living in incarnational community. Opportunities also exist for those wishing to be involved in bi-vocational approaches to ministry and mission or for those who are seeking accredited ministerial training but want to be able to do it ‘out of the box’. To find out more about these opportunities or more about the Bristol scene, contact Mike Pears on pears@pobox.com Our mission partners in Bristol include: Re:Source www.resourcebristol.org/ West of England Baptist Association www.webassoc.org.uk/ Bristol Baptist College www.bristol-baptist.ac.uk/