Diluting distinctiveness?
Is the distinctive vocation of pioneer ministry being diluted? Are ordained pioneer ministers being pressed into more traditional roles? Paul Bradbury investigates.
Paul Bradbury
National training programme for pioneer curates
Announcing a supportive learning environment to bring pioneer curates together as our IME2 training for ordained pioneers goes national
Off target? Can we aim to plant 10,000 churches in 10 years?
Paul Bradbury considers the new (multiple) plans to plant 10,000 churches. To keep our priorities right, we need to make sure our ambitions serve our vocation, and recognise that faithfulness can look like failure as well as success.
Another way of seeing – developments of the pioneer spectrum
The creators of the Pioneer Spectrum, Paul Bradbury and Tina Hodgett, reflect on the popularity and the flaws of this diagram and how they have been working to develop it into a useful missional tool.
Is pioneer ministry a ‘neoliberal destruction’ of the parish system?
A recent pair of articles by the parish vicar and commentator Giles Fraser caused a lot of heat. Paul Bradbury responds.
Doctoral study ‘in the middle of things’
Paul Bradbury, part of the first cohort of doctoral students in CMS’s partnership with the University of Roehampton, reflects on his experience so far.
Passing it on – handing on leadership in pioneer communities
When pioneers move on, we need to think about the models we have for handing over leadership, says Paul Bradbury.
Wilding the church
Earlier this year I was part of a conversation where we talked about the need to ‘rewild the church’. Not long after I was given the book ‘Wilding’ which tells the story of the Knepp Estate in Sussex which in the year 2000 embarked on a remarkable project to rewild. Arable farming, the traditional means …
InFormation 19 – Day Conference for Pioneers in the South
Following the success or our first InFormation day event last year we are busy organising for InFormation 19 coming up on Monday 10 June at Salisbury Arts Centre. InFormation is a regional day conference for pioneers in the south of England. The day is designed primarily to resource, inspire and refresh participants in their journey …
What are we aiming for? Sustainability? Fruitfulness? Or Resilience?
At a recent gathering of pioneers we discussed the subject of sustainability. For a number there the very word ‘sustainability’ was problematic. Sustainability it was argued implies a formed, settled state, one that can be maintained, most probably for as long as one might be able to imagine. But in a world where change is …