A New Church Initiative with children with disabilities and their families
At Christ the King, Kettering, we are getting ready to start ‘Messy Church’ for children with disabilities, and their families. The idea is to provide a one-a-month activity afternoon (on Sundays) which will be Christ-centred and lots of fun. We will have a multi-sensory approach, incorporating arts & crafts, songs/worship; story-telling/drama; lots of food!
Our plan is to create a welcoming environment where everyone can feel free to be themselves. We will provide ‘buddies’ for children who need additional support and over time we hope to get to know families really well.
We aim to help everyone to engage in activities by providing whatever additional support necessary (large print, signing, picture symbols, visual objects, or whatever) and to create a real sense of belonging.
We want to create a God-centred environment where everyone knows they are loved and accepted; where Jesus is at the heart of all we do.
Please join us in praying for this exciting new venture.
Ian Hames
Christ the King, Kettering 

Christ the King Church and the Moldova Charity Mission for the Disabled
At Christ the King we have been partnering with the Moldova Charity Mission since 2006.The link started when a member of the church, Ian Hames, met representatives of the Mission at the European Conference for Disability Groups (hosted by Prospects and Through the Roof) in Bognor Regis. Since that time the church has adopted the charity as a ‘Mission Partner’ which has enabled ongoing support. The Charity Mission is a Christian charity which aims to work with and support families who are affected by disability. In particular, the Charity Mission runs a Day Centre, enabling children with additional needs to learn and play together, as they are denied access to schooling in Moldova. The Charity also hosts a monthly Mothers’ Group, drawing mothers together to learn about disability issues and supporting them in the daily issues they face. Every year they run Summer Camps for children with special needs (and their families) and for adults with additional needs; the church sends a group of volunteers annually to help at the children’s Summer Camp. Over time the church has done lots of fund-raising, investing in the Day Centre and new minibus, and sending equipment of every kind to help at the centre and in the family homes. Moldova is the poorest country in Europe, so all gifts are always greatly appreciated. Something truly wonderful is now happening… the Charity Mission is now sharing their expertise and helping other churches and charities in the country to set of similar work with children and adults with disabilities and additional needs, so God is multiplying the work they are doing.

For further information please see:  
Ian Hames 

Announcing a new Diocesan Group  -  Enable
Seeking to transform the churches of the diocese to enable people with a   health issue, impairment or disability to be fully involved in the life of the church community.

Enable sees the image of God in all people

Enable will encourage:
	Increased awareness
	Change of attitude
	Empowerment
	Equal vocational opportunities
	Practical actions

Enable will offer:
	Information
	Signposting
	Training

To express an interest and get involved in the work of Enable please make contact through the following e-mail: enable@southwell.anglican.org

Provision for children with additional needs
The vision of Riverside Church is to reach out to people with the Christian gospel. Image Ministry is one of the ways that Riverside is reaching into the community to share God’s amazing love for us. The mission of Image Ministry is to encourage and support the participation of children with special needs and their families in the vibrant life of Riverside church in the truth that we are all created in God’s image. We provide a safe environment for children of different abilities and needs, including those who benefit from one to one support or in a more multi-sensory environment as they learn of God’s love.
Image Ministry currently provides the following ministry programs:

Volunteers who support children with additional needs to access their peer mainstream Sunday morning group.
Trekkers: A special Sunday morning group designed for children of different abilities and needs where God痴 love and the good news of Jesus Christ are demonstrated in a creative and accessible way that is matched to the individual child痴 needs. There is one to one or one to two care provided in this group.
Parent Night Out: An opportunity for parents of children with special needs to connect with one another over a meal. Evenings are arranged throughout the year.
Individual pastoral support for families of children with additional needs from families in similar circumstances, or people with expertise in this area.
Saturday Club Stay & Play is    a time for children with additional needs, their families and friends, to meet, play and be entertained.     All of our sessions are led by play volunteers who engage children in a variety of activities and games designed for children of all abilities, including siblings. Everyone will enjoy the friendly, fun, atmosphere. Parents can join in the fun or take some time out to chat and relax. Each session has a planned activity or performance. Information is also provided on other local services and activities. Held once a month on Saturdays from 11:00am E1:00pm at . Refreshments included, per child.   For further information contact:  Anne Roche, Children Pastor,   0121 442 4484

For Enabling Church 2014: A Prospects Alpha Course for adults with learning disabilities (run in Autumn 2013)
In essence, we condensed the course to five sessions including a Saturday 'Holy Spirit afternoon' with lunch. The sessions each tackled a eBIG QUESTIONf, 'Who is Jesus?', 'What is prayer?', 'What is the bible?', eWho is the Holy Spirit?f, and 'What is the church?', the last of which touched on sharing the good news to help make God's family bigger. (On reflection, we would add a sixth session 'Why tell others?'  next time). In the earlier sessions, we gave everyone a name badge on arrival, which really helped with communication and personalisation!  We extended our normal 90 minute monthly evening Prospects sessions to 2 hours to incorporate a nice 3-course meal to start with (allowing a whole hour for the meal, for plenty of chatting).  Icebreaker activities where subgroups discussed and fed back from a question about themselves related to the session eg 'What are your favourite books, TV programmes and films?' for the bible session, and 'Who helps you?' for the Holy Spirit session. Then a powerpoint presentation to bring out the essence of the mainstream Alpha talks (it's worth scrutinising Nicky Gumbel's latest talks to extract what one might call ethe essence!f), using lots of pictures, and asking lots of questions along the way, like 'Who is this?' about  pictures of the Queen and heirs to the throne in the 'Who is Jesus?' talk. For the discussion part, we asked people to think of a response to a question which could sometimes come back as a question, eg, in session 1, 'If Jesus was standing right here in front of us now, what would you ask him?'  Everybody threw a beach ball randomly around the group, and when each person caught the ball, it was their turn to give their response. People unable to speak were encouraged to join in the throwing and catching, making eye contact and made to feel included. We ended with songs at the end related to the session. (Cliff Richardfs eMillennium Prayerf was very appropriate for the eWhat is Prayer?f session). Illustrated take home sheets summarising the Powerpoint presentation for each session, people liked collecting these.    

I can certainly say that our Alpha course has put new life into the Prospects group, it has revitalised existing members - including myself!- and we now have 2 new ladies who hadn't been to the group previously. We did posters and a parish mag article to advertise the course, I informed all our neighbouring Prospects groups too. I can't actually remember if we told the local Churches Together (would have been a good idea if we didn't!!!) but, as is so often the case, the best form of advertising was through personal contacts and word of mouth.  For more information contact:  
 
Michael Kirby, coordinator of the Waltham Chase Methodist Church Prospects group, Hampshire.    Email: kirbybunch@btinternet.com

Exeter Diocese  -  Disability Update
We have a programme called 'Church is for Everyone' to encourage churches to consider how they can become more welcoming to people living with disabilities and include them in positions of responsibilities as well as all usual church activites.  Several clergy, office holders and members of Diocesan Synod have disabilities or care for those with disabilities.  We have looked beyond physical access details to whether people are able to take part fully in the life of the church.  Advise and useful links are made available on our diocesan website under ‘Your Church’.

Last year we took an informal audit of the 500 churches in the diocese to see how thing were going.  From the 119 replies by email we found 19 examples of good practice where people have considered both building and activity adaptations to include people and perhaps appointed someone to monitor activities to ensure plans include those with disabilities.

A voluntary Disability Advisor, the Revd Debbie Starling, is available to parishes to give specific advice particularly when making alterations to their buildings.  She also helps organise an annual service in Exeter Cathedral for disabled people, their carers and everyone to come together and celebrate the contributions and gifts as well as highlight the needs of disabled people in the county of Devon.  She also work part-time for ‘Celebrate Together’ which includes both a weekly time of fun and friendship and a monthly ecumenical service in the Exeter area, for people with learning disabilities.

The national awareness campaign launched this year called ‘dementia Friends’ has been very popular and there is some discussion about where any future work on dementia should sit - whether with disability or ageing issues.  Plans for a workshop on dementia for those with pastoral responsibilities are under way.  These are going to be run with our local ecumenical partners to facilitate local partnerships particularly visiting residential care homes.

We have begun to consider establishing a Diocesan Steering Group for Disability Issues to help draft a Diocesan Audit and Policy and sample policies for churches, amount other things.  This will continue once our new Diocesan Bishop is in place later this summer.
Sally Farrant, Social Responsibility Officer	

Christ the Vine Community Church, Milton Keynes
Since the Chruch was established 30 years ago, the congregation has always had members with a learning disability.  They currently make up a third of the congregation.   This is the hisotry of how this has developed.

The development came about initially from the attendance of aperson with a learning disability at a local evangelical church.   The Deacon was concerned about how much of the church service the person was able to understand, without being segregated from the main service, like a child.

At this time about 30 years ago we were working at Bracken House, a residential home for adults with a learning disability.  We worshipped at a local ecumenical church, accompanied by several of our residents.   Our minister was approached by the Deacon to discuss a way in which the Christian message could be given at a level appropriate to the understanding of people with a learning disability.

Initially the Deacon led a few sessons in Bracken House Lounge, assisted by two from our church and one from the Deacon's church.  Eventually we used to meet regularly in the Deacon's Church (we didn't have our own building then).   We met fortnightly ona Tuesday evening, calling ourselves the 'Tubestday Bible Study Group.'   My fortnightly working rota – involving – involving 'sleep ins' prevented us from meeting weekly.

We moving ino our own church building in 1996 and 'Tuesday Bible Group' still meets fortnightly with 10 members and 2 helpers.   Our sessions are usually made up of: a bible story, the bible 'reading' (we all open our Bibles at the correct place, showing that our stories really are from the Bible; an  activity (mainly photocopies, colouring stickers, glueing, singing hymns and sons, prayers - they all make prayer requests and we keep a record of them.   We usually close with the Grace.  We conclude with light refreshments.  Everyone has a folder in which to keep any worksheets, etc relating to the Bible story, they may have done.

In the early days before Bible Study had developed, there were a couple of residents with challenging behaviour.  Ray and I were mostly there to help and supervise, etc, but if we were going away then we would suggest that staff distract these residents from going to church.  It is important the introduction to integrated events is done in such a way that all partiies are comfortable with each other.  This can at times be a slow process.

It is also important for the building being used to have suitable facilities for a range of disabilities the users may have.  At Christ the Vine, numerous modifications (ramps, door and passageway widenings) were undertaken after the conversion from The Walnut Tree Pub to Christ the Vine Community Church.   For some years now the use of a powerpoint projector has meant that we no longer need hymnn books and those leading worship can use pictures to show the key parts of the Service.

Several members with learning difficulties ask for help in finding the correct page in the Bible which is willingly given, one member 'saves' coins all year round for Christian Aid, another for Gideons International.  One member is on the flower rota, one occasionally brings biscuits for Sunday refreshments.  Another regularly taken the offertory and another does it in their absence.  All members bring money for our Christmas Shoe Box Appeal and then help to fill and wrap the boxes.

What a Friend we have in Jesus
'We would like somewhere to go, to meet up with friends, somewhere that isn't noisy like the disco, is somewhere safe'.

These were responses given by adults with learning disabilities to a survey about how well the local council was doing in meeting their needs.  They were quite happy with daytime residential provision, but time and time again they spoke about what they would like to do in the evenings.
As a carer representative on a panel given the task of going through these responses, Jane thought to herslef, 'Our Church could provide that!  It could built on all that we've done in the past.  Is this the next step in the Lord's leading for the work of Bethany?'

Genesis of the Work
Bethany began in 1979 as part of the work of, what was then called Deeside Evangelical Christian Church.  Jane had been involved professionally with children with a learning disability and, personally having a brother with Down's Syndrome.  After coming to faith in her early twenties, she had begun to think through a biblical response to people with a lelarning disability.  Two things seemed particularly important - to share the Gospel and to support and strengthen the family unit, undergirding our input with bibilical principles.

Practical Developments
The eders of the church encouraged her in developing links with families.  The church soon took this project to heart, prayerfully, practically where assistance was required, and financially as the work developed into a full-time commitment.  As a church we sought to express a Christian concern for families in our local area who had children with learning disabilities.  This was long before such statutory provision was put in place, so over the years we have sought to provide different kinds of support, depending on the needs of the families, including Saturday play sessions, family days, Parents Forum meetings, small group outings and short breaks.

Jane visited parents at home, seeking to encourage them in their vital role, discussing practical strategies for handling behaviour, providing information and sharing God's word where possible.  Family situations have changed inevitably over the years.  There have been bereavements, grown-up children leaving the family home, but as a church we still have very warm friendships with some of those families in our local community.

Initial Spiritual Input
When the children were younger, we included simple Bible songs in our Saturday sessions and used Bible stories.  As they grew into teenagers some joined our church Youth meeting and enjoyed differentiated teaching sessions but joined in everything else with the church youngsters.

We produced simple teaching tapes, called Truth Learning Aids, which could be borrowed and listened to at home.  Different church members had skills and gifts that were used in producing these.

In recent years we had a Sunday afternoon meeting called 'Come Together and Worship', when a handful of adults with learning disabilities and their family members would come along.  However, all of these folk already had church connections of one kind or another, so the vast majority of adults with a learning disability in ojur local area were still unreached.

Busy Buddies
So here Jane was thirty years later in a local authority meeting, realising that these mature adults, who the church knew as children and teenagers, were appealling for an opportunity to have genuine friendship in their local community.  Our church building would lend itself to such a social gathering.  We have a core of enthusiasstic and very caring church members.  We have a very simple formula that seems to work, but above all we pray for God's blessing on our evenings together.  Busy Buddies has become the latests development of the work of Bethany.

'Busy Buddies' suggests what we are about - we are Buddies who are Busy.  Warm friendship is on offer every Monday nights.  We have a range of activites on offer, table-top games (maybe things families have grown out of), some individual games, some group games.  There are activities to suit a variety of of abilities and interests.  We have a craft organiswer who prepares activigties that are relatively simple, but not childish, so that our friends go home proudly with a lovely finished article.  Some just like to sit and chat over a cuppa.  Towards the end of the evening, we all join together to share our news, have a large group game, or sing, but invariably have fun.  The whole evening lasts just one and a half hours.  God has used these evenings to bless our Busy Buddies, their carers and church members alike; a spirit of friendship pervades the evening.

It has also proved to be a great bridge-building exercise into our local community.  We have a large number of 'employed' carers who come with their clients, who we would never have got to know otherwise.  Some now bring their clients to Sunday services.  In fact, we have five adults with a learning disability regularly worshipping with us.

It has been a joyh for us as a church to see folk, who we knew as children thirty years ago, coming now to Busy Buddies as mature adults.  Friendships are renewed, the fruit of God's blessing on the work of this local church, now called Christ Church Deeside.

But, over and above meeting social needs, our greatest desire is that God would meet our friends' spiritual needs.  From the very beginning of Busy Buddies, we have had a different kind of meeting at the end of each 'term'.  We use these 'Specials'; as Gospel opportunities, where we share simple but profound truths about Christmas and Easter, and in the summer, about Someone Special -The Lord, Jesus Christ.  In an appropriate way, we have songs with signs, a talk, maybe a sensory activity, or pictures on a screen, followed by a craft activity that links in with the theme.  The 'Specials' are finished off with us all enjoying a special supper together.  We have also had two summer courses, during the months of August, comprising four weekly sessions on a Bible theme.

Having people with a learning disability in our regular congregation has challenged us as a church about how 'inclusive' our services are.  We have rearranged things practically to meet particular needs.  We have, on occasions, had a similar 'Bite-Size Service that purposefully cuts things down into more 'digestible' chunks for our friends, but which also many other folk in the church have found helpful and refreshing.

You?
We find our friends are very open to the Gospel but have had very few opportunities to hear it clearly explained to them.  Could our expereience with Busy Buddies encourage you and your church to reach out to this relatively unreached people group?  You and your curch will have different gifts and experiences, you may do things differently from us, but the Great Commission is the same wherever we are, and people with learning disabilities are in every community - they need to be in every church.

If you would like to discuss anything in this article please get in touch with us - Christ Church Deeside:   www.christchurchdeeside.org     There is a dedicated e-mail address that will come straight to us ・ bethany@christchurchdeeside.orgbethany@christchurchdeeside.org     Another address which can be used ・ Bethany, Christ Church Deeside, Victoria Road, Shotton, Flintshire.  CH5 1ES or you can use the church's Tel No. 01244 816347      Rhys & Jane Morgan are members of Christ Church Deeside.     First published in the Evangelical Magazine, July / August 2013

WEST BROMWICH BAPTIST CHURCH
To know God better,  To Serve Him,  To love one another,   To win others for Church
West Bromwich Baptist Church is a lively multi-cultural church based in the heart of a unique and diverse community.  We are a warm, caring and friendly church working with people of all ages and the community.

We offer fellowship among all ages.  Jesus has shown us how much He loves us and he wants others to know and experience it themselves.

Within our fellowship there is a small percentage who have impaired hearing loss, to assist / support them an induction loop system has been installed.  Some members can use British Sign Language.

To assist the wheelchair ussers there is a ramp with grab rails.  Main doors to the church building also have grab rails in place.

Currently several members support another member who is suffering dementia.  Owing to the progressive condition communicating with the individual can be very difficult to maintain, as they are living alone in their home.  We do our best to maintain their safety in getting them to and from church and aroudn the church building.

There are a couple of individuals with servere learning difficulties who have been part of the fellowship since childhood and are encouraged to take part in the activities.

To assist those with vision impairments there are large print song books and the words on the overhead projecton screen is magnified.

We have a long way to go in understanding and supporting the differing needs within our local fellowship, but with the insight gained from the conference today we should be far better equipped in serving them.
www.westbrombaptisst.org.ukWww.westbrombaptisst.org.uk   Tantany Lane, West Browmich, West Midlands.  B71 1DS   
Minister - Rev'd Michael Woodall 			
Church Secretary �Mrs Sarah Thomas