A new parish: Christ Church, Selly Park

After the decision to form a separate parish was made, things proceeded remarkably quickly.

Once agreement in principle had been achieved, the parties involved drew up a "Pastoral Measure" to establish the new parish boundaries, how ministers should be appointed, and other legal details concerning the creation of the new parish. Following a period for public comment, the measure went to the Privy Council for approval, which was granted on 6 May 2004.

25 years after the first weekly service was held in the Church Centre, the parish of Christ Church, Selly Park formally came into being on 1 June 2004.

New church, new noticeboard. Note that our phone number and email address have since changed!

Launching the new parish

A weekend of prayer was followed by a joint evening service at St. Stephen's in which the two churches gave thanks to God for our life together over nearly three decades.

in September 2004 a leaflet was delivered to all households in the new parish. We also held some special events in and around the church to make ourselves better known to local residents.

On Friday 1 October 2004, the Bishop for Birmingham, John Sentamu (now Archbishp of York) formally licensed Nigel Hand as priest-in-charge of Christ Church.

A leaflet was delivered to every household in the new parish

What difference did it make?

At a practical level, the Church Centre had become increasingly self-sufficient over the years, making the transition to Christ Church more of a continuous process than a sudden change. We had to establish new office facilities, and we elected churchwardens and a PCC (Parochial Church Council) at our first Annual Meeting in June 2004.

As a small but significant sign of our new status, we got used to hearing banns of marriage read out in morning services.

Most of our activities were already separate from those of St. Stephen's, the main exception being youth work. Within a few months we had made great progress on this, and our own activities were thriving.

The main consequence of independence was that we could press ahead with the Building Project and bring it to fruition. Two years later, having raised the best part of half a million pounds, we vacated the site and moved all our activities to other venues so that rebuilding could start.