Our plan for Financial Growth is challenging. We all know how tight things are. Our outgoing treasurer John Lewis has been telling us for over a decade that we need to be less dependent upon fundraising (after all if it rains and the fete is a washout- or the organizer gets ill how do we pay the bills.) John has done a terrific job helping us get our planned giving (that is you and I paying for our own church) up to about 59% of our income.

Over the next five years we need to be aiming to pay all our regular commitments and routine costs out of planned giving- our basic response to God’s goodness- So we are aiming for a 10% increase this year. This is not going to be easy because our parish share is increasing by 5% so if we can better that we will- but the endgame needs to be that we fundraise for social outreach and to raise money for charitable giving and special projects. The more of us who can learn a scriptural attitude to giving the better placed we will be for mission.