Category Archives: Heritage

Faith, place and planning issues relating to heritage, typically those of minority faith groups that have established premises for many decades.

Planning for Religious Diversity in Wales

Events, Faith and Place network, Guidance, Heritage, Local Planning Authorities, Places of worship, Planning, Policy, ,

Network leaders Richard Gale and Andrew Rogers have been leading a series of Faith and Place Dialogues in the Welsh context, with support from RTPI Cymru and Planning Aid Wales. The background to these events is that religious diversity has been increased substantially in Wales in recent decades, leading to a growing need among some groups for designated spaces in which to congregate and worship. Although crude, data from recent censuses give some indication of the scale of this change. For example, in the decade between the 2001 and 2011 Censuses, all non-Christian religious groups grew in Wales, with Buddhists increasing by 69 percent (from 5,407 to 9,117), Hindus by 92 percent (from 5,439 to 10,434), Muslims by 111 percent (from 21,739 to 45,950), Sikhs by 47 percent (from 2,015 to 2,962) and ‘Other non-Christian’ groups by 84 percent (from 6,909 to 12,705). In addition, while the Christian population fell overall by 16 percent (from 2.09 million to 1.8 million), this masks significant growth in the presence of Black Christian groups, with African Caribbean Christians growing by 39 percent (from 1,810 to 2,513) and African Christians growing by 346 percent (from 1,662 to 7,406). Currently, non-Christian faith groups make up 2.7 percent of the Welsh population, an increase from 1.5 percent in 2001.

These trends are likely to continue for some while into the future, and present important challenges for planners. As such there is a growing need to explore how relationships between planners and faith groups play out in the Welsh context. Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), these events are drawing together Welsh Government officers, local government planners, faith group representatives, interfaith organisations and academics. The events seek to promote knowledge exchange, networking and ongoing dialogue between key stakeholders and to embed the Welsh version of the FPN Policy Briefing, ‘Faith Groups and the Planning System’.

Three events are taking place in total, in Cardiff, Newport and Swansea, which between them accounted for 64 percent of the overall growth in the non-Christian religious presence in Wales between 2001 and 2011. The final event takes place in Cardiff on Thursday 24th January.  A final report on the project will be submitted to event participants and the Welsh Government in Spring 2019.

Heritage of Minority Faith Buildings

Heritage, Places of worship, ,

Historic England are running a day conference at the Society of Antiquaries on Monday 12th March (click here for full details).  Organised by network member, Dr Linda Monckton, many other Faith and Place network members will be contributing, including Dr Clare Canning, Dr Jasjit Singh, Dr Andrew Rogers, Nairita Chakraborty, Shahed Saleem and Dr Richard Gale. The grand finale of the day is the launch of Shahed Saleem’s book, The British Mosque.

Signs of Wonder

Church signs, Heritage, Migration, New Black Majority Churches, Theology of place

Faith and Place network members, Dr Andrew Rogers and Dr Richard Burgess, have received funding from Southlands Methodist Trust to investigate the iconography and aesthetics of black majority churches in a London borough. Entitled “Signs of Wonder”, the project reflects on the theologies embedded in their signboards, banners, architecture, websites and media products. Dr Mark Minott, the lead fieldworker, has just completed photographing churches and interviewing pastors about the meanings and narratives associated with these signs. Watch this space for further updates later this year!

Faith and Place in the Netherlands

Heritage, Members, Migration, New Black Majority Churches, Places of worship, Transnationalism, , , , , , ,

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The network leaders, Andrew and Richard, recently visited Amsterdam and the Hague to get a sense of how faith, place and planning issues play out in the Netherlands. Meticulously organised by Dutch network member, Rev Dr Rens Schalkwijk, we met faith group leaders, policitians, architects, academics and spent Sunday at church. It also felt like we had cycled round the whole city!

Ruud Schurmann from Task Force Future Church (translation) explained to us his organisation’s work in preserving historic church buildings, and the parliamentarian, Cynthia Ortega-Martijn, explained some of the political realities for faith groups in Dutch cities. We gained a strong impression of many issues being similar to those faced by faith groups in the UK. We visited network member, Pastor Felix Asare, of Victory Outreach Church in the Hague, who spoke to us movingly of the church’s community outreach programme in drug rehabilitation. Pastor Emmanuel Koney met with us, pointing out there were over 300 ‘migrant’ churches in Amsterdam. He told us the story of the Kandelaar in Amsterdam South East, a purpose-built multi-hall centre for the use of up to 15 faith groups, as well as the trials and travails he had experienced in making this initiative happen. One of their projects with the police department was a ‘Reporting a crime without worries’ card for illegal aliens.

Sunday morning saw Richard and I heading for Escape – the largest nightclub in Amsterdam – right in the centre of town on Rembrandtplein. This is where Hillsongs Amsterdam meet, running four services a Sunday, so as to include all their members in worship. As for many churches who rent premises, whether small or large, setting up and setting down takes many hours of volunteer effort (especially as it was operating as a nightclub into the early hours of the morning). We headed south-east in the afternoon, and joined the Ghanaian majority Pentecost Revival Church, to see the Kandelaar for ourselves first-hand. Called on to speak to the church as a double act, we explained the purpose of the network and our visit, and were very warmly received.

There was time to visit VU University to meet with network member, Professor Hijme Stoffels and colleagues. This proved a very useful opportunity for making connections with their work in urban theology and human geography. A quick tour of faith based business and community initiatives concluded our visit, with Andrew then having to run at top speed through Schipol with all luggage, in order to be the last one on the ‘plane.

Critical Themes for Explorations event

Events, Faith and Place network, Heritage, Migration, New Black Majority Churches, Places of worship, Planning, Report, Theology of place, Transnationalism

Following on from the first network event, Perspectives, and the subsequent report (see previous post), Andrew and Richard have identified four critical themes to be explored in more depth at the upcoming Explorations event on the 19th March 2015 in Birmingham. These themes are set out below or you can download them here. Continue reading Critical Themes for Explorations event →

Perspectives report

Events, Faith and Place network, Heritage, Places of worship, Planning, Report, Social cohesion

The Faith and Place network met for the first time at The Royal Foundation of St Katharine on 4th December 2014. The report below summarises the key themes and discussions of the day.

1.             Introduction

1.1          The purpose of the first event of the Faith and Place Network was to explore, from a diversity of perspectives, the interrelations between faith, place and the politics of planning. Above all, it placed emphasis on exploring accounts from faith community representatives, planners and policy professionals, to begin teasing out the hidden histories and current realities surrounding the faith, place and planning nexus. This was a significant first step towards achieving the network goals, both to bring together participants from a range of faith, planning and professional backgrounds and to produce policy relevant guidance on religious space and planning practice.

1.2          This report attempts to capture and synthesise the rich variety of themes that were explored throughout the presentations and discussions that made up the Perspectives event, and in turn, to provide network participants with a platform on which to build in the subsequent network events. The various sections below are our attempt to organise the key ideas articulated by network members, according to the over-arching topics and themes that emerged throughout the day. Continue reading Perspectives report →

New £15 million fund for urgent roof repairs to listed places of worship

Heritage,

One of our Faith and Place network members, Anthony Collins solicitors, drew our attention to the roof repair fund of £15 million announced by the Chancellor on 3rd December.

This is available to congregations of all faiths and denominations who are responsible for maintaining a listed building. Grants of between £10,000 to £100,000 are available, with an application deadline of 30th January 2015. See the The Listed Places of Worship Roof Repaid Fund website for further details.