SDF: Resourcing the Urban Church
In December 2018, The Diocese of Lincoln was awarded £2.67M from the national Strategic Development Fund to support the resourcing of the urban church through the development of three resource churches and the establishment or revitalisation of nine urban-centre church plants.
With significant diocesan investment, this was a diocesan response to the urgent need to better resource the urban centres of our diocese where the proportion of the population attending Church of England churches is lowest but the possibility for transformative growth is significant.
Aims and Timeline
The aims of the programme remain unchanged and the SDF Programme Board and central church’s Strategic Investment Board (SIB) positively evaluated our programme in our last Annual Review in June 2022.
Related resources
The initial programme window runs until December 2026, with aims to develop:
- 3 resource churches with a combined Usual Sunday Attendance of at least 1500.
- 9 plants or revitalisations
Within 5 years of launching, so taking us to 2030 for some churches, we expect each church plant to reach a Usual Sunday Attendance of 100-200 people, depending on their location and level of investment.
The aim for total growth is to see 2,500 faithful, confident and joyful new disciples playing an active role in these urban churches and communities.