Job vacancy: Lay Pastoral Worker 2025
Are you warm, friendly and welcoming?
Have you good listening and communication skills?
Can you plan and organise?
Would you enjoy working within a local church to help grow its ministry and outreach?
The Church at Carrs Lane is a local ecumenical partnership between the United Reform Church and Methodist Churches in central Birmingham
We are looking for a
Lay Pastoral Worker
who can join worship with us each Sunday and work as part of a team with the ministers, elders and congregation to grow the ministry and outreach of the church and share its open, inclusive, justice seeking vision and develop the Church’s ministry of welcome and hospitality,
The Church at Carrs Lane is a city centre church. There are new people in the congregation most weeks, young professionals new to the city, students, refugees, individuals with multiple needs, seekers of all ages looking for a new or more inclusive community
Candidates must be a member of the Christian Church and willing to work in accord with the vision and values of The Church at Carrs Lane
Salary £29,120 pa if the role is full time
Funding is available for 35 hours a week but a part-time role 16-20 hours a week is possible instead. If you are interested in the post and would prefer a part-time role please do still apply.
Please complete the application form below and send to clerk@carrslane.co.uk or if you need more information kindly send an email with the title: Lay Pastoral Worker.
Closing Date 10 February 2025 noon Interviews 1 March 2025
Application Pack
Job description Lay Pastoral Worker
Person Specification Lay Pastoral Worker
Application form Lay Pastoral Worker
Accessibility
Access information for anyone planning a visit – information on, for example, slopes/steps, parking, lighting, sounds, children, neurodiversity, money, tattoos, communion, and more.
Please click on the link below to download:
Access Information. TCACL. March 2023
Job vacancy: Maintenance Officer/Caretaker
th 2023
Maintenance Officer/Caretaker
12 hours a week / £15 an hour
The Church at Carrs Lane in central Birmingham is an exciting, inclusive, thoughtful church, looking for a Maintenance Officer/Caretaker to keep our building clean, well-maintained and safe.
We need someone who is practical, conscientious and self-motivated
who is willing to undertake the general cleaning of the inside and outside of the church building
with experience of building maintenance and managing service contracts
and able use a computer for record keeping and email
Hours to be set by agreement but ideally to include Wednesday lunchtimes For further information and an application pack please email clerk@carrslane.org.uk
Closing Date: noon 23rd May 2023 Interviews: May 25th 2023
Maintenance Officer/Caretaker
Job description Maintenance Officer v2
Write for Rights Campaign
Amnesty International: Write for Rights Campaign
On Sunday 4 December 2022 during morning worship, the congregation at The Church at Carrs Lane wrote greetings cards to prisoners of conscience, families of those who had been persecuted, or groups who were being denied their human rights. This was all part of Amnesty International’s Write for Rights Campaign which takes place every year.
It is hard to believe but The Church at Carrs Lane has been doing this in one form or another for 40 years on a Sunday around Human Rights day (10 December).
In 1977, church member Rev Frank Rock set up an Amnesty group based at Carrs Lane. It was called the Central Birmingham Amnesty Group. That group is still going today and meets regularly in the city centre. The way the group operates has changed over the years but it is still campaigning against Human Rights abuses of all kinds. Some time later it was suggested that the church took part in the Greetings Card campaign around Human Rights Day which was organised by Amnesty International. Members and friends of the church have written in the region of 100 cards each year so we must have sent about 4000 cards in that time. It has always been a team effort, with various people making the cards, particularly Margaret Cross. I am extremely grateful to Jan Searle who volunteered to make the cards this year.
We know from Amnesty International that these cards are much appreciated by the groups or individuals who receive them. As a result of the 2021 campaign, Imoleayo Adeyeun Michael of Nigeria wrote:
‘I sincerely appreciate all who have been supportive…and Amnesty Nigeria who stretched out arms of love towards me.’
On occasions people at Carrs Lane have received individual replies but many replies or messages of thanks are received by Amnesty International itself.
Each year Amnesty focuses on a particular group of people to send a card to. Last year it was to people and groups who were being persecuted because they had been using their right to protest.
For example:
- Chow Hang-Tong from Hong Kong was jailed for remembering victims of Tiananmen Square.
- Aleksandra Skochilenko in Russia was detained for protesting against the invasion of Ukraine
- Vahid Afkari in Iran has been tortured and detained in solitary confinement for protesting peacefully.
These are only some of the people we campaigned for last year. We hope that we make a difference to their lives.
If anybody would like more information about the work of Amnesty International, please talk to Christine Rowntree at church, or visit https://www.amnesty.org.uk or twitter @amnestyUK or https://www.facebook.com/AmnestyUK/.com
Christine Rowntree
Fairtrade Fortnight at Ethical Superstore
Source: Ethical Superstore
Fairtrade Fortnight 2022 was another successful year getting people, businesses, schools and other organisations involved in Fairtrade. We now look forward to Fairtrade Fortnight 2023 which will take place from Monday 27th February to Sunday 12th March 2023.
For two weeks each year thousands of groups, companies and individuals get together to share the stories of the people wo grow our food and drinks, mine our gold and grow the cotton in our clothing, people who are very often underpaid and exploited. It’s easy to just pick something off the shelf without giving a thought to where it came from but it has certainly become more apparent in the last couple of years that we living in an interconnected world and we reply on each other.
For Fairtrade Fortnight 2022 the online Choose the World You Want festival returned from Monday 21st February to Sunday 6th March. The coronavirus pandemic taught us how interconnected we are globally which is at the heart of the Fairtrade message and is where our role begins. We are all part of the Fairtrade movement and we all have the power to drive long term change buy choosing Fairtrade when we shop, but also by supporting and spreading the message.
Last year we had the G7 and COP26 take place. COP26 came with much hope and many promises but also came with disappointment as the wealthiest nations failed to recognise the urgent need to invest in farmer expertise by delaying their promised $100bn annual funding to the most climate vulnerable countries until 2023, at a time when it is needed more than ever. Whilst COP26 was never going to result in climate justice, but have a cohesive global strategy to reverse climate change, it didn’t live up to the expectations it could have done. This makes Fairtrade Fortnight ever more important to highlight the problems people face around the world, the very same people who work to provide much of our food.
Fairtrade Fortnight 2023
Click here to read more about Fairtrade Fortnight on the Fairtrade Foundation website
Click here to source fair trade goods at the Ethical Superstore
Click here to buy Zaytoun products from PALESTINE
Click here to see the range of fair trade products online at Oxfam
Palestinian farmers have been cultivating their lands for thousands of years and continue to do so, despite the challenges of farming under illegal occupation in the West Bank.
Whether it’s peppery olive oil, fudgy Medjoul dates, sweet crunchy almonds, zesty za’atar, smoky freekeh or nutty maftoul, we’re dedicated to bringing you the very best from Palestine’s fertile groves and fields