"History is a
vision of God's creation on the move"
Arnold Toynbee
During 2008 the church, with the increasing maintenance costs of a building over 50 years old, potentially major expenditure looming, and insufficient space to meet its needs, asked its members and users what they wanted from the building. A strong message was given to us:
A building that is a 'Spiritual Beacon of Light' shining to all areas of Bracknell. A building structure that says unequivocally 'I am a Church'. Not hidden from sight, visible from all sides'
And so it was that the Vision 2009 Project was launched and with God's help we now persue an exciting time to redevelop our property.
Bracknell Methodist Church will be:
Learn more about our aims and what the new building will offer on our Objectives page.
Planning application for the project is imminent and a contractor will be chosen soon. Work is scheduled to start during September with the new building to be completed in spring 2011.
The overall cost of the project is £900,000 of which the Children's Centre are funding nearly half from a Government grant. Application is in progress for a number of Methodist and external grants. The balance of £150,000 needs to be obtained from local fundraising.
Over Pentecost weekend, May 22/23rd, a Prayer and Gift Day weekend was held.
Quite a number of fund raising events are being organised throughout the summer. Please visit our News page where details of these will be shown.
Donations can now be made from our website, and these are handled by Charity Giving which is aimed at fundraising for Charities. You can donate either by clicking on the Donate button on the left or by visiting our mini-site at Charity Giving. On our mini-site you can also see the progress in our fundraising. Donations can be made in various ways (credit/debit card etc) as either one off payments or monthly. If you pay tax Charity Giving will claim the Gift Aid back on our behalf.
After discussing our ideas extensively both within the church and among its users a requirement definition for the new church was agreed. In April 2009 we appointed an architect to evaluate how best to achieve our aims and to produce plans for the new premises later in the year. Our journey has begun!
On Saturday May 2nd we held a prayer day at the church giving all an opportunity to join us in praying for the project and any other concerns.
The architect has completed the feasibility study and the findings were presented to an open meeting at the church on Saturday September 12th. A prayer day was held on October 3rd for us all to reflect on the proposals, which will be put to our Church Council at its October meeting.
Late in 2009 interest was expressed from the local Children's Centre for an extension to our building to act as a centre for local parents and young children. The building scheme has been modified to include this, and is seen as a very fitting use for our land. At the Church Council meeting on March 15th approval was given to progress the scheme to outline planning permission, and if approved to proceed with full planning permission and a build to start later in the year.
On April 12th Church Council agreed to proceed with the development with a timescale for completion of the first stage in Spring 2011. This consists of the extension for the Children's Centre, improved kitchen and toilets and changes to the foyer area. This is a very short timescale and you are asked to pray for all involved with the development.
