In 2019 the first CMS Pioneer Mission Training students embarked on a doctorate in theology (DTh) at the University of Roehampton. In February this year, the first of those students, Paul Bradbury, successfully defended his thesis in his examination and was awarded his doctorate.

Dr James Butler, leader of CMS Pioneer Mission Training, talks to Paul about his experience of doing the doctorate,  what he studied and what’s next.

James: Why did you want to study for a DTh?

Paul: I started a DTh because I wanted to explore an issue that arose through my ministry as a pioneer. So much resource from the central Church of England was going into particular models of mission and particular forms of church that many pioneers were struggling to find the space or resource to carry out their ministry.

J: So, what did you discover?

P: In my thesis I argue that the nature of the church can’t be reduced down to particular models or forms. Instead, the very nature of the church is a becoming: it is always being formed and reformed through its engagement with the world.

I discovered that pioneers often resist predetermined models. Instead, pioneers build community through conversation with people in their context. Their focus is on prayer and the leading of the Holy Spirit who they regard as present and active in the midst of the community that is forming. As I listened to the stories of how these new communities were forming, I heard how the pioneers involved were often surprised by what happened, finding that their assumptions about forms a church could take were disrupted.

I also learned from two dioceses about how they were trying to encourage pioneer ministry alongside more traditional parish ministry. I’ve argued that the tension experienced in this process might be seen as a creative tension as we develop toward a mixed ecology of church.

J: Sounds interesting, how can we find out more?

P: I hope to develop the thesis into a book soon. In the meantime, if anyone wants to have a conversation about what I’ve been learning they’re welcome to get in touch. [You can contact Paul via CMS here]. I’m also working with CMS to create a space for the kind of listening and discernment that is needed to support and enable a becoming church. We are looking to develop a resource of theological accompaniment, research and reflection to support pioneers and others.

J: And how has it been studying a DTh with CMS at the University of Roehampton?

P: The DTh has been a great experience. It’s honestly been the hardest but best thing I’ve ever done. There was never a point where I wanted to give up, though there were numerous times when I was pushed to think harder and more deeply than I thought I was capable of! It has answered the question I set out with, in ways I hope will be helpful to others. It’s also raised a whole host of other questions for the future!

J: It’s been a pleasure working with you on this Paul, and we’re so delighted that you have achieved your doctorate. All the best with sharing your findings more widely.

The DTh programme is designed for those who are actively involved in mission, ministry and pioneering and want to explore the things they are discovering in more detail. The first two years are taught part time, helping you to focus your ideas into a research project, before you then carry out your research over the following three to four years.  Do get in touch if, like Paul, there is something you’d like to explore.

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Are we letting buildings, structures and practices distract from conversation, the lifeblood of community?

A few years ago, I was involved in a series of round table discussions, focused on the church and its mission. The room was full of people invited from the wide range of traditions within the Church of England. Our task was to explore what a missional ecclesiology for the future of the church might be.

The day involved facilitated discussion on three themes: mission, kingdom and church. And what was interesting was that, while discussion on mission and kingdom revealed a high degree of common ground, the discussion on church saw a few sparks flying!

Out of that day the idea was developed to publish a book that reflected the spectrum of perspectives and missional practice represented by that conversation. Being the People of God (SCM 2025) continues the conversation and, we hope, widens it by giving people a chance to hear how, in a variety of contexts, the church is responding in mission to our changing cultural context.

Clare Watkins, a Catholic lay theologian and a professor at Durham University, has said that the church might understand itself as “a community of discerning conversation, open to the necessary incomplete and flawed contributions of all who seek what is most true”. But do we see the church and its ongoing life as “a discerning conversation”? I am not sure we do. Most often our attention is drawn to more concrete things like buildings, or to the organisational structures of the church. Or it is drawn so easily to the practices of the church, what we are doing (or not doing), and how we can do it better (or do it at all!).

Yet conversation is the stuff of healthy communities and healthy organisations. Without conversation, through which ideas, information, innovations and ideals flow, are reflected on, adapted and reinforced, organisations ossify into rigid institutions or machines. Good, open conversation is the life of any community. Conversation is also a key locus of discernment, making space and time for that slow work of reflection and evaluation as communities navigate their life and purpose through changing circumstances.

It is in the spirit of that need for discerning conversation that Being the People of God was put together. We recognised that the struggle to find sufficient common ground when talking about the church was not a problem to be fixed. Instead, it simply highlighted the nature of the church. That the church is not a fixed star somehow detached from the world, but an ongoing communal conversation on what it means to live together as disciples of Jesus in the world as it is.

Furthermore, the world as it is undergoing a period of change perhaps unlike any other in human history. We are engaging in this conversation in wildly turbulent days. The strapline for the book therefore reads “Missional ecclesiology in uncertain times”.

I invite you to join in this conversation at the next CMS conversations day on Tuesday 17 March. The day will explore many of the themes of the book. And we will be helped to do this through the contributions of some of those who wrote chapters for it. As you might expect there will be plenty of space for you to engage in conversation! We look forward to seeing you. Book your place now

About Paul Bradbury

Paul is an ordained pioneer minister in the Church of England, based in Poole, Dorset. He is a freelance practical theologian, writer and researcher, and a tutor and lecturer in missional ecclesiology.

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Independent research has found that Pioneering Parishes is impacting the fulfilment of the Church of England’s six bold outcomes at the parochial level.

Recent independent research demonstrates that the small, start-up training organisation is giving long-established parish churches the tools and confidence to revitalise for mission, enabling them to reach out to children and families in the wider communities, and cultivating a framework for growth in discipleship. Read the Executive Summary here.

The research was independently commissioned by the Church of England Vision & Strategy team to evaluate the impact Pioneering Parishes is having on those who have attended courses and on the parishes they are part of. It was carried out by Paul Bradbury, ordained pioneer minister in the Church of England and associate tutor with Sarum College, Church Mission Society and Ripon College Cuddesdon. This research evaluated the experiences of Pioneering Parishes attendees against the six bold outcomes of the Church of England’s Vision and Strategy.

The data in this research indicates how Pioneering Parishes enables parishes to renew their life of worship and witness in their communities. The result is a move toward community listening, prayer, new initiatives and to changes in existing provision which makes it more welcoming and accessible.

Parishes are complex places, with long histories and multiple influences. Yet, it is also the case that many participants credited PP directly with many of the changes they were seeing in their parishes.

This is the work of culture change; work to help move parishes toward renewed vision and values for their common life. Such work can be slow and difficult. This research indicates that Pioneering Parishes is a significant and powerful tool to help parishes make substantial progress in this area in a relatively short period of time.

Read the Executive Summary of the research.

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CMS’s Britain team were delighted to welcome visitors from the board of Fresh Expressions Germany in October.

“God, we need seven Bavarians to send into context!”

This prayer, written by a German visitor to CMS House in Oxford in October, refers to one of the founding stories of CMS: that the first missionaries sent by the newly established charity were seven Bavarians.

The story goes that the search for UK volunteers proved fruitless, but there were seven committed Jesus-followers from south Germany who were willing to go overseas to share the good news of God in Christ.

The story testifies to a strong connection past and present between the German church and CMS which is underpinned by warm friendship lived out through learning exchanges.

The Fresh Expressions movement in Germany looks to the UK as if – it seems – to an older cousin or sibling, and on 20 October a group of 17 visitors dragging damp suitcases and shaking wet umbrellas arrived in the foyer of CMS House to a very warm welcome from us.

The visit was organised by the Fresh Expressions board of Germany and made up of Protestant and Catholic office holders from different parts of the country in a variety of roles connected with pioneering mission. First order of the day was to agree on an understanding of mission as participating with God through Christ in the healing of all things.

Jonny Baker shared something of the more recent history of CMS in the context of UK church planting and pioneering, inspiring with his understanding of Jesus’ desire to cross social boundaries to engage with people like Legion in the story of the Gerasenes ‘on the other side of the lake’.

I was delighted to be in a room for several hours with old friends whom I first met through online webinars with Paul Bradbury as we launched and tested the Pioneer Spectrum tool online during the pandemic.

Since then a number of the visitors have worked hard on contextualising and translating the Pioneer Spectrum for a German audience. 

The overarching inquiry for the visitors was ‘How does mission shape the church?’ and it was great to be able to share the learning of Greg Bakker in this area over three decades as a parish priest in multiple contexts summarised as the five key dynamics of a Pioneering Parish as well as the Beatitudes for Pioneers and Priests we have been featuring in our monthly newsletter, ably backed up by the Beatitudes map designed by our gifted graphic designer Sophie Killingley.

In the afternoon I tested out some theories I’ve been considering that connect the character of Jesus, neuroscience, play and clowning with a new audience.

The group did amazingly to engage with this topic across language barriers and joined in with some embodied activities aimed at awakening their more lateral-thinking ‘baby brains’.

There was lots of laughter, plenty of wonderment and some insights for me from the subsequent discussions.

We finished by creating a shared poem in which each participant shared their key insight from the day (below).

Wir sind die kirchliche No-Go-Areas die dich zittern lassen wie Espenlaub, dort, wo alles heilvoll werden kann.¹
Let’s be fringe-dwellers!
Little things matter to a bunch of lake-crossers to help others focus on worlding the world.

Become a baby brain and don’t stop playing.
Wenn ich nicht werde wie ein Kind… ²
We need more baby brain in our church.
Be the change you want to have with a playful baby brain!

Finally finding my own tribe and play space
Trust in the playful guidance of the Holy Spirit!
God, we need seven Bavarians to send into context.
Don’t be so serious!
Schaut Tina mit ihrer roten Nase an…³
Spot the niche to intervene, be playful, and live your job as a clown.

Clap for the failures
Folge seiner Intuition⁴
Let’s go to the other side of the lake
Cross the bridge of understanding.
Be brave, be even more brave, just try it and dance!

1. We are the No-Go-Areas for the church, that make us tremble like an aspen leaf, where everything can find healing. ︎
2. Unless I become like a little child… ︎
3. Look at Tina with her red nose… ︎
4. Follow your intuition ︎

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Our professional doctorate programme run in collaboration with the University of Roehampton adds to the richness and depth of the conversation about mission and pioneering.

On a sunny Thursday a few weeks back, Cathy Ross and I travelled into London on the train, to the University of Roehampton to meet with a group of doctoral students (pictured above) to help them put together their research plans ahead of beginning the research phase of their programme.

This is the sixth year we have had CMS students studying their doctorate at the University of Roehampton, focusing on themes around mission and pioneering.

We see having doctoral students as a key way to encourage and support research into mission and pioneering and it has been great to see the wealth of subjects being studied by our students.

We have students studying questions of innovation, emergence, the Holy Spirit in mission, pioneering and church, spirituality, prayer and many more, all through a lens of mission and engaging with lived practice. 

One of the beauties of the DTh programme at Roehampton is the fact that for the first two years students get to journey with fellow doctoral students as they focus their research topic and develop the skills they need to do the research.  

As Jo Allen, in her first year of the DTh with us, commented, “I love the opportunity to design my research with others on my course, bouncing ideas of each other and exploring new avenues that I wouldn’t find on my own.”

They study two modules each year and meet six times throughout the year to learn together. 

While Cathy and I were meeting with the second year students who are reaching the end of the taught stage and putting together the details of the research plans, the first years were also meeting, thinking about the other voices and writings within their chosen fields of study.

Ben Morgan Lundie, who is coming to the end of the second year, reflected: “I chose to study my DTh with Roehampton and CMS because the team are experts in practical theology and bring a missional edge to how we shape our projects. The last two years of the taught programme have stretched me intellectually and I am really looking forward to the next few years of research and writing.”

On each DTh teaching day we also have the opportunity to come together for the Practical Theology Seminar, where various academics in related fields are invited to come and share their research and thinking. 

On this most recent visit it was the turn of Dr Pat Jones from the University of Durham, who shared her research into abuse in the Catholic Church and the learning which has come from listening to a wide variety of voices and experiences. It was a powerful session, not just because of the content, but also Pat’s engaging and reflective presenting.

I look forward to these teaching days and the chance to think deeply with students and learn together. It has been a real joy to see people develop their research around their passions and their pioneering and mission practice, and to see the kinds of deep insights beginning to emerge from their careful work. 

I enjoy hearing people express the same feelings of joy and privilege that I feel from doing qualitative research; having the opportunity to listen to people talk about their lives and seeing the ways in which deep and careful listening opens up new learning and practice.  

Paul Bradbury, coming towards the end of his doctoral research commented, “The DTh programme gave me such a good grounding and support for carrying out my research into pioneering – it has been a fabulous process.”

We anticipate our first students finishing their doctorates over the next year, and look forward to helping them to share their learning and findings more widely. 

If you have something you have a burning passion to explore and find out about, do get in touch to explore the possibility of doing the doctorate with us.

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A recent research conversation day at CMS looked at fresh ways to express and think about pioneering and church planting.

One of our priorities at CMS is enabling thinking and theological engagement around mission and pioneer practice.

One of the ways we have sought to do this is through the doctoral programme that we offer in partnership with the University of Roehampton.

Another way has been through our conversation days where we invite different contributors who have been thinking and researching around mission, church, and pioneering. 

In March these two things came together when Paul Bradbury, one of our first doctoral students, gave us a snapshot on his doctoral research and the implications for pioneering and church.

Fresh expressions of pioneering?

Paul has been looking at the experience of pioneers within two Church of England dioceses. 

Through listening to what the pioneers do in their work, and how they talk about their pioneering, he is expressing pioneering and church in ways which take seriously the more emergent nature of their work.

He has noticed a tendency when thinking about church planting and new worshipping communities, to turn to models, but what he heard from the pioneers was a much more responsive approach to the formation of ecclesial communities. 

He described how:

• pioneers create space through their work for mutual dialogue, where the primary aim is be with each other, and learn from one another;
• this is part of what it means to participate in God’s mission, being together and learning together;
• in this space the pioneers journey with others, noticing how church is coming into being through the work of the Spirit;
• this idea of becoming church allows a much more dynamic understanding of church as a community on the move, rather than a fixed sense of what church is.

His account stimulated a great conversation with people in the room and those online, whose questions and comments encouraged discussion around discernment, the work of the Spirit, what a ‘models’ approach to church planting might offer, and how what Paul was discovering resonated with the practice of many pioneers in the room.

New churches: working with the Spirit

Later in the morning we reflected on the recent book New Churches: A Theology which a number of people from across the CMS network had contributed to, including Cathy Ross, Tina Hodgett, Paul Ayokunle, Paul Bradbury and me. 

Through a panel discussion format, the contributors discussed what we had valued in one another’s chapters. 

Paul Ayokunle’s chapter explored an omolúàbí understanding of church planting, drawing from a tradition within his own Yoruba Nigerian background. 

Through this tradition he expressed an emphasis on both the character of those planting churches, and on the way in which human agency and the Spirit’s agency work together.

In fact, Cathy pointed to an emphasis on the work of the Spirit being a theme across the different chapters we were discussing. We were pleased to have Rachel Edge from SCM Press with us, offering a discounted copy of the book. Do get hold of it and have a read.

We have two Conversation Days a year, which cover themes relevant to mission and pioneering and draw from the wealth of wisdom across our work and networks, particularly connecting it to the pioneer, African and Asian conversations we are developing in our MA programme.

Look out for future Conversations through our Pioneer Newsletter and Events page.

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The feasting of Christmas and Epiphany may be over but behold! – arriving in bookshops and online is a feast of thought, research and story from the community of people who have in recent years enabled the genesis of new churches.

New Churches: A Theology by Will Foulger and Joshua Cockayne (eds)

A number of teachers on CMS pioneer courses as well as contributors to the Anvil journal have provided chapters, along with practitioners and thinkers from across the church.

They serve up a tasty banquet of 12-page reads reflecting a diverse range of approaches to starting and thinking about starting new churches.

Topics cover, for example, Anglo-Catholic church-planting (does it happen?!), church planting as a craft based on medieval guilds, an exploration of church planting hints in Romans 16, and community organising as a resource for church planting. Plus Thomas Aquinas on asking for help!

Is your appetite whet yet?

The editors offer a thoughtful introduction as to why such a book is needed. They suggest that the doers – those who get on with the business of starting new things – and the reflectors – those who are wary of ‘jettisoning the task of real, slow, deep theological reflection’ on any area of practice may need a conversation with each other if new churches are to arise faithfully (if at all).

The introduction addresses some of the binaries that have grown up around the conversation: theory and practice; old churches and new; pioneering and church planting.

The book takes a non-partisan stance, speaking generously of pioneers and planters, recognising their different instincts, suggesting that pioneering has a particular part to play in enabling the church to remember that mission is about the slow, patient and emerging work of God in real people’s lives among those who will never come to any of ‘our’ churches.

It was a joy to me to see how many of the CMS pioneer community had peppered (or salted) the book with some compelling themes to a wider readership.

Paul Bradbury writes about small, simple, slow communities; James Butler about contextualised mission spirituality and the agency of the Holy Spirit; Paul Adekunle offers an ecclesiology drawn from the overlaps between Yoruba culture and Christian ethics; Cathy Ross directs our attention to the edges and to the place of surprise in mission work; I (Tina Hodgett) write about co-creating churches playfully.

There is much to savour, digest, find nourishment from. It’s pricey at £30 but I hope your resourceful networking may enable a copy is shortly delivered to your door. Bon appetit!

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The word ‘pioneer’ is a classification. Our brains are wired to classify things in the world around us to help us manage the huge abundance of information we have to take in. There are broad classifications and within them usually lots of varieties.

by Rev Tina Hodgett

I opened the shed last week and was amazed to be met with the sight of a huge male peacock butterfly perched with open wings on a box. On the back of my utility room door is a poster detailing in words and pictures the most common types of butterfly, which is how I knew I was looking at a peacock. I was chuffed I immediately recognised it for what it was and went back to the poster to check and compare with other varieties, excited about extending my knowledge of the natural world.

Within the pioneer world there are equally many varieties. Pioneers are influenced in their approach by a range of different factors. Personality, for example: you will pioneer in a different way as an introvert than as an extrovert. Education and training – often influenced by personality – will direct a person’s attention to different things, and give a person different skills and approaches: an engineer will approach a creative task differently from a fine artist, a personal shopper to a nurse. Theology in all its variety will play a major role. How does the pioneer see God and God’s world? What do they understand worship to be? What church practices have influenced their faith development, and what do they see as the essential nature of church?

Beyond the principles and preferences, nature and skills of the pioneer or pioneer team engaged in missional activity there is the context. A pioneer is always in relationship with the place she or he is set. The local people and the local environment shape the pioneer’s thoughts and actions as a child is shaped by the context and culture into which he or she is born.

Some years ago Paul Bradbury and I gave some thought to all the factors that go to make up individual pioneer approaches and gave birth to the Pioneer Spectrum; an aid to identify and potentially classify pioneers. You can find it here: pioneerspectrum.com It consists of diagrams, games, explanations and questions to enable newcomers to this conversation to understand the range of varieties of pioneers you might be or might encounter. Enjoy!

Whether you’re taking your first steps as a pioneer or grappling with the challenge of developing a pioneering culture we have tools that can help you. Find out more.

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Created for any curate designated as a pioneer or with a specific pioneer brief to their curacy, join this learning community to access dedicated pioneer training.

Run on a three year rolling programme in partnership with Church Mission Society, these sessions are designed to support the fulfilment of the learning criteria for pioneer IME2.

Examples of learning include:

• Listening in context
• Pioneer Leadership
• Pioneer Priest and Pastor
• Pioneer Spirituality
• Resilient Pioneer Ministry
• Pioneer Ecclesiology

Drawing on relevant texts, resources and experience you will explore what contextual pioneering looks like and what it means to be a pioneer leader. During these sessions we’ll be exploring issues such as:

• How do we listen and respond in context?
• What do worship and the sacraments look like in fresh expressions of church emerging from pioneer ministry?
• What does it mean to be a pioneer leader inhabiting two different spaces?
• What is church? in what ways is pioneer ministry posing new and creative answers to this question?
• The pioneer spectrum attempts to identify different expressions of the pioneer vocation, we’ll look at where you sit on the pioneer spectrum and also explore the theology and language around pioneer spirituality.
• What do we mean when we talk about sustainability? What models are emerging for resourcing pioneer ministry for the longer term?

Facilitated in the South and the North

The training is facilitated online.

You must get permission from your DDO/IME2 officer to access this course. Please do this before filling in the Google form (link below).

For more information please contact:

The South – Paul Bradbury: paul@poolemc.org.uk
The North – Richard Passmore: richard.passmore@carlislediocese.org.uk

Explore

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Welcome to the Toolbox

Here you will find all the relevant material to help you understand and use the pioneer spectrum.

Guidebook

Before leaping in, we invite you to take time to engage with the Pioneer Spectrum and its theology.  Our guidebook will take you through all you need to know:

• how to use all the tools provided
• how to get the best out of the Pioneer Spectrum
• how to use the card game
• how to facilitate discussions using the downloadable resources
• glossary: how and why certain language is used

Introductory videos

Diagrams

Version 1

Download version 1 Related article

Version 2

Download version 2 Related article

Card game

This activity is to help you as a pioneer – or someone who supports and enables mission – to investigate and explore two things:

1. Yourself, your beliefs, practice and personality as they shape your missional work
2. The context where you are engaging in God’s mission

NB For the card game you will need a desktop computer. 

Play

Discussion resources

These downloadable discussion sheets and images are designed to help you develop constructive conversations around the theology of mission and church planting. 

They probe into the different perspectives in theology, practice and personality people bring to missional leadership. 

They explore how these perspectives connect with the cultural diversity in which we live today.

Download

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We passionately believe in pioneers and the gift they bring to the church. But there’s lots of terminology and confusion about pioneering, ordained pioneer ministry and just who is a pioneer.

Here are some of the questions pioneers and others who want to support them have faced:

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Our students say they find a vibrant learning community and build friendships with like-minded pioneers that help to sustain them long after they have completed their qualification.

Here are some of the ways you can connect and find ongoing support.

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