Reaching out and engaging with the community as Christians continues to be the key means of expressing faith.  Most contacts have been amongst people who have a very traditional view of the church, many would only attend for a christening, wedding or funeral.  The Christian message is taught well in the primary schools and so it is amongst the adults that little is known of Jesus.

Opportunities to encounter and share the faith are largely through the Christians working as part of the Cross-Links team (paid and voluntary) and opportunities to explore the message are being developed as part of the mission strategy. 

In expressing ‘church’ it has always been intended for worship to be appropriate to the context and is expressed creatively through art & crafts, visual displays and acts of witness, eg the annual Dover Carnival procession.  It has been our experience that occasional public worship events have been met with a mixed response and so we are currently developing a regular worship event using a café style approach based in The Cross-Links Centre.  Fellowship (Cell) Groups are being developed that provide an opportunity for fellowship and growth, but are still in the infancy stage.

For a handful of people, Cross-Links Dover is their ‘church’.  Part of the work we are doing with Church in Society will enable us to reflect on the shape of church in the contexts of a housing estate.  We shall draw on local and national experience as part of this reflection.

Worship & Fellowship

 Opportunities are provided through:

• Kids 4 Jesus (K4J) – weekly Bible study and worship for children.
• Fitzwalter Court Worship (FCW) – monthly worship for older people.
• Cafe Church - monthly worship in a cafe setting for people with little or no experience of ‘church’.
• Junior Church Camp – annual event for children and young people.
• Cell Church – a weekly lunchtime gathering for adults.

Nurture & Discipleship

Opportunities are provided through:

• Alpha EXPRESS – 11 session daytime Alpha course. (please see forthcoming events/diary for more details).
• “Come & See” – regular event to promote Alpha EXPRESS courses at Cross-Links.
• Cell Church – a weekly lunchtime gathering to explore what it means to be a follower of Jesus in today’s world.  It is the intention to start new groups as the need arises.

A Church for the Future 

Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury speaks of the need for the Church of the Future to have a mixed economy in the sense of offering both traditional forms of church and fresh expressions that will complement the Mission of ‘mainstream church’. 

At Cross-Links we acknowledge this and seek to provide an alternative ‘fresh expression’ of being church alongside the two traditional churches that are also present on the Buckland estate:  Our Lady of Dover (Roman Catholic) Church and St Nicholas’ (Church of England) Church. We wish to affirm and encourage the Christian congregations of these two churches and would wish to promote their Ministry and Mission in the community.  Some details below: 

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