Rural Mess

31 March 2010

Can anyone share some ideas? Sandra from Hoy in the Orkneys is just starting up with Messy Church and could use some solidarity from rural churches. And reading about her motivation and situation, I'd like to send her lots of encouragement and cheering-on for a great start in a tough situation. Not many of us can say we had 7% of our local population at our first Messy Church!

Here's her request:

'I live on a small island with a community of just about 250. There are 36 children on the roll at the school. Apart from my son (aged 22 months) and one six-year-old girl, no children attend church. Our church congregation numbers 13 with everyone, apart from myself and the two children mentioned, above retirement age.

'For this reason, I have organised a Messy Church event for this coming Saturday (27th March) to try and get young families involved, else there will soon be no church at all on our island. I would like to be put in touch with organisers whose churches may be similar to ours in order to swap ideas specific to running an event in this type of environment. Is this possible please?'

And here's her account sent to Reuben Addis, the regional coordinator for Scotland, of her first Messy Church:

'Our first Messy Church was OK. Nerve-racking and exhausting.
19 people attended, which represents 7% of the islands population of which 7 were children (4 from the same family) ranging from 18 months to 10 years.
I would have liked to have attracted more young families. The older ones did tell me afterwards that if they had known what it was going to be like they would have brought along their grandchildren etc., so this may be encouraging for future events. I suppose the first one is always the hardest.

'Our program went like this:

3pm - Messy Signing In - we made a template of a huge cross and people signed in by dipping their hand in paint and placing it on the cross. Everyone, even the lady who is 93, enjoyed this.
3.05 - 4.00 - Messy Crafts - we made Easter gardens, Easter cards, bright colourful fish and did some pebble painting
Alongside this, we had a baby play area and an Easter quiz with the questions dotted around the room. I think I might include a sand box and some playdough for the very little ones next time.
4.00 - 4.20 - We had video Christian action songs projected onto a big screen which everyone seemed to enjoy.
4.20 - 4.35 - We told the story of the miraculous catch of fish in an interactive way, with images projected on the big screen too and involving the fish made earlier.
4.40 - 5.15 - We had a lovely meal and some cake and a cuppa.

'The programme seemed to work well with the right amount of time allocated to each bit.

'I have been to Messy Church events in Liverpool, before I moved to Orkney, but I had never been involved in organising one... I am very grateful to the inspiration of Messy Church and hope that there will be many more. If the church agrees, I will do a Messy Pentecost.'

Sandra, all power to your elbow!