New flavour is being added to Diocesan support for the ministerial development of all its licensed Clergy and Lay Ministers.
Bishop Tricia and the Diocesan Training Oversight Group are bringing a fresh approach to our Christian ministerial development (CMD) this year with a programme to provide more in-depth full day offerings, and also occasional shorter evening sessions.
The May evening session, hosted by Christchurch, Laxey, gave a vibrant introduction to Bubble Church, and ended with some social time for everyone over drinks and fresh nibbles.
Bubble Church in Laxey
Bubble Church is an emerging new approach to Sunday worship for families. On arrival at Christchurch for the CMD evening on Wednesday, everyone received a warm welcome from the Bubble Church team, with refreshments to take in with us, and a special Bubble Church sticker to wear.
Following the introduction by Bishop Tricia, and a two-minute countdown that is part of the Bubble Church service, everyone became fully engaged with singing, puppets, a Bible story, prayer, activities, fun challenges and praise. Team member Louise Beckett led the service in a lively, friendly way; the wonderful puppets performed fantastically, thanks to Marissa and Margaret.
Laxey Bubble Church Champion, Hazel Smith, then provided a helpful summary of Bubble Church’s purpose, history, ingredients, strengths, potential, funding, and how a church can set it up. A Bubble Church service has all the elements of Anglican liturgy, shared in a relaxed context for 30 minutes.
A strong message that came through from the Laxey team is that involvement in Bubble Church, with its supportive chat and prayer connections around the UK, makes the team members really feel part of something, as well as feeling inspired by the response around them here.
Bubble Church
Bubble Church was the inspiration of Rev Marcus Gibbs of Ascension Balham in London,
and is specially geared for participation of younger children.
This is the Bubble Church website.
Christian Ministerial Development (CMD)
Ministerial development offers lifelong learning, with information and training events
for sustaining and developing all aspects of ministry
from pastoral, spiritual, liturgical and theological through to self care.
Some sessions in this Diocese are specific to licensed clergy.
Diocesan CMD information in item 5 on this web page.
Some fun moments from the Bubble Church evening
View these 3 as popouts, or ‘picture in picture’