Too many churches are keeping their doors closed. An open church can fulfil an important role in the rebuilding of our common life
What does it look like to be the People of God in this time of deep change? We believe it involves upholding what it means to be a human person, building relationships with our neighbours in the local and putting Common Good principles into practice. Explore our stories to find out more.
![Featured Image for “Always Open”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/ryan-ng-X_E5MPZakKI-unsplash-edited-scaled.jpg)
![Featured Image for “Day of Transformation”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/OLLBC-220423-2.jpg)
Things are happening in the neighbourhood – God is at work in and through our relationships
![Featured Image for “The importance of connection”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/cup-and-hands-edited.jpg)
On the surface this is a story about how relationship with each other and with God makes it easier to face the natural reality of death.
But it is also a story about the meaning of life.
![Featured Image for “All hands to the parish pump”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/foodbank-queue1.jpg)
Spirituality is not a personal holiness project. Churches are called to be places that irrigate relationships and which mediate between the realms
![Featured Image for “A good neighbour”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/karen-on-porch_LE_auto_x2.jpg)
What does it means to be a follower of Jesus in fraternity with our neighbours?
![Featured Image for “Pavilion”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/rowheath-2-scaled.jpg)
Shaping a community of hope: God is calling us to join with the Spirit in an emerging story that will reweave the life of a desiccated world
![Featured Image for “Ice cream social and curbside library”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Picture-6.jpg)
God is calling us to practices of reweaving in our neighbourhoods to form community in the places where we live
![Featured Image for “My hate-affair with economics”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bank-money-finance-dollar-750x350-1.jpg)
Edward Hadas explains why the financial system is inherently unstable and argues that the Church must speak prophetically for economic reform
![Featured Image for “Housing and land: a common good approach”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/brick-wall-64208ef8.png)
How can Catholic social teaching help to tackle the housing crisis and reform land use?
![Featured Image for “From space to place”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/rowheath-food-festival.jpeg)
In an era of social fragmentation, how should the church pursue mission? Martin Robinson advises starting by listening to the neighbourhood
![Featured Image for “Pilgrimages of Grace”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/pilgrimage-picture-scaled.jpg)
The ancient tradition of pilgrimage is an antidote to individualism and a countercultural sign pointing us to the Common Good
![Featured Image for “Where the Kingdom is”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/nick-graves-1.jpg)
Middle class church is offputting to poor people. Read about a leader who decided to do church differently.
![Featured Image for “The soil of community”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/TMN-Web-Pics-16-1536x1024-1.png)
Alan Roxburgh advises church leaders to let go of programmes and listen to the life of the Spirit in the neighbourhood
![Featured Image for “Wrestling in Church”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/tattoos.png)
How a posture of listening in the neighbourhood led to an unlikely relationship and revitalised the life of a local church
![Featured Image for “Maranatha”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/font.jpg)
In the spirit of anticipation, amidst the unravelling, a church turns decline into renewal
![Featured Image for “Feeding the roots”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/tree.jpg)
More than just buildings, churches have a role in the local ecology, and like trees, their roots need feeding, says Andrew Rumsey
![Featured Image for “Re-neighbouring: the upside down Gospel”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-13-at-10.59.57-AM.png)
As the urban pressure to be ultra-mobile undermines the Christian call to place and proximity, we explore ways to “re-neighbour” the parish
![Featured Image for “to live a decent life”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/2000px-Thames_river_1882.jpg)
Reflecting on the Great Dock Strike of 1889, we explore the covenantal relationship between Cardinal Manning and the dockers of London’s East End
![Featured Image for “Divine irrigation”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/tap-kitchen.jpeg)
Facing the reality of church decline, a vicar uncovers the true vocation of his parish
![Featured Image for “Rebuilding the Broken Body”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/04-art.sinclair.jaywick.jpg)
Why did so few see Brexit and Trump coming? Jenny Sinclair explores the underlying reasons and how the churches should respond
![Featured Image for “Communities need jobs to thrive”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/6-14-CP-jobs-march-morleys-001-scaled-e1621090442254.jpg)
An inspirational story of church leaders’ collaboration with civic partners to keep and attract jobs to communities
![Featured Image for “Solidarity in Hard Times”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/homeless-large.jpg)
The Christian way of tackling poverty must be relational and personal, not delegated to welfare or activism
![Featured Image for “Down on the allotment”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/2015-06-112017.48.24-scaled.jpg)
Tim Lea reflects that God’s idea of mission is different from our assumptions: we should unlearn old practices and believe that it is only God who makes things grow.
![Featured Image for “No God-forsaken Places”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/billboards-combi.jpg)
How neighbours working together transformed their neighbourhood with a little help from the local church
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We cannot liberate ourselves from the natural world and still flourish. We must cherish memory and place.
![Featured Image for “Becoming one family”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/grub-club-scaled.jpg)
How a social action aim to feed hungry children grew into a multi-layered patchwork of flourishing local relationships
![Featured Image for “Bridge-building leadership”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/DS-DW-garden-Shakeshaft-picture2.jpg)
Andrew Bradstock reflects on the role of the Church in a time of division and examines the bridge-building leadership of Bishop David Sheppard
![Featured Image for “A calling to build the Common Good”](https://togetherforthecommongood.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/js-ds-gs-1975.jpg)
Jenny Sinclair, daughter of Bishop David Sheppard, takes a personal view of her father’s calling and how he fulfilled his ‘vocational responsibility’