Update on Faith to Engage – June 2010

Supporting a strong, effective faith sector

Faith to Engage has now successfully completed Year 2 of the 5 year project. 

Faith to Engage's regional partners have been very busy in the last 12 months engaging with their region and building partnerships with individuals and organisations who have showed interest in Faith to Engage project.

It has been an exciting year for us all as each regional partners has started to deliver the project in their region, each with their own bespoke work-plan, compiled with support and input of their respective regional board members. Each designed to best suit each region’s unique needs.

Successful Capacity Building Events
Regional Partners have held the capacity building events around the country addressing issues specific to the area and facilitating networking opportunities for the people in the region.

In the North West region, an event was held in Perinth to give opportunities for people in Cumbria to engage and network with individuals and organisations that they are not aware of and the services that they can benefit from when working in their communities.  Amongst speakers were representatives from Churches Together Cumbria, Cumbria Youth Alliance and Credit Union. This event was appreciated by people in Cumbria as the majority of the events and conferences take place in the city.

In the East of England our regional partner Zedekah held a seminar as a part of Celebrate Norwich & Norfolk under the title of ‘Good news for people of faith’ together with contributors from a church youth project, Norwich Interfaith Link, East of England Faiths Council, East of England Faiths Agency and Norfolk County Council.  There was a great debate and discussion time for both contributors and delegates as they engaged with the material presented. 

Many more events have taken place across all regions and new ones are planned in the coming year. To find out more please log on to Faith to Engage portal. 

Yours
The Faith to Engage Team

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* Contribute to our online community and interact with other local activists

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In addition to improving faith sector representation at regional government level, the project also aims to increase regional bodies’ understanding of what makes faith-inspired service delivery distinctive, to create more service delivery partnerships and to enable more support from infrastructure agencies for faith
inspired organisations.

Faith to Engage will aim to achieve the following:

1. Increased participation by the faith sector in regional policy making.
2. More effective and inclusive consultation and representation mechanism for the faith sector in each region.
3. More service delivery partnerships.
4. More cross-sectorial and interfaith networking and partnerships.
5. More faith-based organisations accessing support from non faith-based infrastructure agencies.  
6. Increased understanding by regional voluntary sector consortia and government of the distinctives of faith-based service delivery.

For additional information on Faith to Engage please visit www.faithtoengage.net