St Mary's Church, Dymock

Diocesan Vision

The Diocese of Gloucester has a 5-year Vision called LIFE that all the churches in the diocese are asked to make their own for a period of 5 years. The letters of the word 'LIFE' stand for Leadership, Imagination, Faith and Engagement and are explained in the five sections below. The Vision is intended to help every church grow the faith, its members and its engagement with the wider world through imaginative programmes, so it has a tag line taken from St John's Gospel, chapter 10 verse 10:


Those principles have been adopted in our current programme to re-organise the benefice (click here for details).

• Developing diverse and lay leaders from the communities we serve


• Piloting liberating models of leadership and ministry, especially in multi-parish benefices


• Creating learning networks for lay and ordained leaders

• Investing in our engagement with baptism families to spark an amazing adventure with Jesus Christ


• Placing schools at the heart of our mission with creative connections between churches and schools


• Encouraging new and courageous ways of worshipping in different places, which connect with more people


• Approaching the use, upkeep and future of our church buildings in bold and creative ways

• Enabling people to discover new depths to prayer and spiritual growth, individually and together


• Nurturing confident disciples to live out their faith seven days a week


• Sharing our stories in new and differing ways, including through digital media

• Being advocates for human flourishing, through initiatives which combat injustice, environmental destruction, exclusion and isolation


• Using sport, music, and art to build and share the Christian faith


• Connecting with new housing developments in innovative ways


• Investing in people and programmes, which excite young people to explore and grow in faith