The incumbent, Pete Wheeler, writes:
St Peter’s Church is a revitalised church in a deprived 60s estate in the north of Aylesbury. In recent years it has grown to become a thriving, intergenerational church family, loving and serving its estate community.
The curate will be fully engaged within the life of this neighbourhood, community and the worship life of the church, leading and engaging in contextual mission and developing pioneering expressions of church.
There is a multitude of learning opportunities, all with the support of a great team, who consider themselves learners too. Currently our local areas of weekly worship and ministry include:
- Breakfast Church – a Sunday worshipping community that includes a healthy breakfast
- Community Café – a weekly free café inc. partner agencies.
- Revelation Fitness – free classes for all abilities, exploring fun, faith and fitness together in community
- St Peter’s Meals – supplying healthy meal kits to schools as a crisis service for families
- Community Garden – a community built around relationships and growing food
- Gro Outdoors – an intergenerational worshipping community meeting in the Community Garden
- Foodbank – a crisis service for families
- Play&Gro – a worshipping parent/toddler group focusing on parenting and wellbeing
- Youth Café - a weekly Youth Café for Yrs 7-13
- SPAN – a peer-support group for parents of children with additional needs
- And more!
St Peter’s has an open evangelical tradition and has some links with the New Wine network. The Ops Team currently comprises two church leaders, two churchwardens, four part-time paid staff, and a youth leader. There is also a Leadership Team and a PCC.
We are shaped by our context. Currently, approximately 60-70% of the church family have little or no church background or prior knowledge of the Bible. We are both messy, yet organised. We try to embody some of the deep liturgical structures of worship and practice spiritual disciplines. We think appreciatively and do a lot with a little. Being part of a Diocesan resourcing network, we resource others in Deanery & Diocese from a place of relative poverty.
We believe this makes St Peter’s a great place to train and learn. As well as enjoying a range of pioneering opportunities to minister, preach, lead, develop and learn within the estate, the Curate will be served, loved, mentored and coached by the Incumbent, the Church Leaders and colleagues in the Ops Team, whilst being given the freedom to develop and lead new mission initiatives, engage in study and IME, find regular rest and restoration, and discover new and exciting ways to preach the good news of Jesus Christ.
For full details and to enquire about applying contact: nicholas.cheeseman@oxford.anglican.org