THE diocese of Birmingham has been awarded £17.8 million by the Strategic Mission and Ministry Investment Board (SMMIB), because it seeks to support church growth and address a £1.5-million structural deficit.
The award, one in all the most important so far, was secured by a bid to “share the Christian message, supporting all parishes to grow, with a give attention to outer estates, rural areas and areas of deprivation”. An initial 47 parishes across the diocese have been identified as priorities for investment. There are plans for a recent congregation in a newly built neighbourhood in Birmingham, and for St Luke’s, Gas Street — a plant from Holy Trinity, Brompton with one in all the most important congregations within the country — to proceed its revitalisation work.
The diocese, home to 1.6 million people, has one in all the bottom levels of investment assets within the Church: £10 per capita (compared with £94 in Ely). More than 60 per cent of its parishes are within the 20 per cent most economically deprived within the country.
Its latest annual report, filed last 12 months, refers to a “difficult 12 months”, wherein the diocesan board of finance had been “required to rigorously consider whether the BDBF could be a going concern for the subsequent 18 months before approving the accounts”. It had free reserves of just over £2 million: lower than the goal of £2.7 million (three months of operating expenditure). The diocesan-finances review found that 23 dioceses were in the identical situation (News, 13 June).
In 2023, income within the diocese fell by greater than £900,000 to £11.8 million, with the most important source — Common Fund — at £4.6 million (compared with commitments of £6 million in 2020). Since the Covid-19 pandemic, the operating deficit has stood at around £1.5 million. From 2020 to 2022, and in 2024, sustainability funding from the Church Commissioners covered this deficit, but in 2023 the diocese had to make use of its Strategic Investment Fund to cover it. This fund, maintained through property dispersals, was designated for “intentional strategic mission investment and in the long run” before the Covid-19 pandemic.
In January, the diocesa-finances review warned of dioceses’ “increased dependency on the NCIs, with many dioceses still running a deficit” (News, 21 June 2024) — a finding that appears to have shaped the brand new spending plans.
ST LUKE’S, GAS STREETSt Luke’s, Gas Street
The latest SMMI announcement in Birmingham follows a series of grants from the Commissioners to the diocese, including £12.5 million in Strategic Development Funding. This included £7.3 million for the People and Places strategy, launched in 2019 and ending this 12 months (News, 1 March 2019).
The pattern of a stipendiary minister for each parish was deemed “not sustainable, fair, or fit”, and a discount of their number (from 125 to 100) “the one solution to long-term financial issues”. Under a reformed Common Fund, it was expected that almost all places would fully fund the price of their paid “oversight ministry”, under which clergy could be chargeable for larger areas and congregations could be led by local ministers.
In November, the diocesan synod was told that 40 of an expected 43 areas had been been formally agreed, and oversight ministers had been appointed by the Bishop to 30 of them.
In March, the diocesan secretary, Dr Jan Smart, told the diocesan synod that the aim was to succeed in sustainability in the subsequent ten years, and “as this rolls out, every parish can be involved in conversations about sustainability.” The SMMIB funding bid was to incorporate a request to “cover — in a tapered way — our operating deficit over the subsequent few years to permit us to release our own Mission Fund for missional activities”.
The award includes £2.4 million to support the diocese in becoming “financially sustainable”. This will include the creation of a dedicated Generosity Team. A complete of £3.6 million has been awarded to support parishes to grow, along with £6.1 million to assist the diocese “find, form, and deploy additional missional leaders”, including curates.
Andy Winmill, director of mission support, and Steve Cook, director of strategic transformation, told the March diocesan synod that “a church-planting and revitalisation approach can be more readily understood and supported by the funder.”
The recent grant includes £5.7 million for brand spanking new plants and revitalisations. The parishes chosen for involvement include St Luke’s, Gas Street, launched in 2016 with £350,000 of national support. In recent years, significant sums have been invested in planting by Charismatic Evangelical churches within the diocese.
Last 12 months, the SMMIB awarded the diocese £1.6 million for a “church revitalisation”, at St Mary and St Ambrose, Edgbaston, to “mix” it with Anchor Church, a plant from Gas Street (News, 15 November 2024). SDF grants have also supported Gas Street Shirley and Gas Street Longbridge, alongside investment in a five-year Anglo-Catholic Mission Project.
Diocesan-synod minutes note that in a discussion in regards to the SMMIB bid in March, the Vicar of St Chad’s, Rubery, the Revd Claire Turner, said that she was “increasingly concerned that consultation isn’t written in to our process, leaving us with something that might be experienced as very ‘top down’”. The Bishop of Birmingham, Dr Michael Volland, told members that “priorities have to aligned with the priorities of the National Church”. Mr Winmill and Mr Cook spoke of the necessity to “construct sufficient financial capability of our own to enable us over time to find a way to prayerfully discern how God is likely to be leading us and have the resources to specific this without relying solely on external funding that necessarily comes with conditions”.
In 2014, the diocese reported that it had the country’s lowest church attendance in relation to population, and the bottom level of stipendiary clergy per capita. Despite financial challenges, numbers within the diocese have held up higher than the national average. Between 2013 and 2023, average weekly attendance fell by 25 per cent, compared with a median of 30 per cent, while child attendance fell by 28 per cent, compared with a median of 40 per cent.
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