Derek Purnell

A reflection on nearly twenty years experience as an Inner City Minister and resident on a Manchester Council Estate.

Church

The Church that I had ministered in is a small independent evangelical church (over 70 members and 80-90 in Sunday attendance at that time). The other churches in the area consisted of two other Evangelical Churches which are now without Ministers and are somewhere between ‘holding their own’ and ‘struggling’, and a Methodist and an Anglican Church which also appear to be shrinking in numbers.

Leaders.

Of the four couples that shared with us in full time leadership as Pastors or Assistant Pastors working with us for between two to five years all have left the inner city, though one lives and works on a housing estate. Two went to the rural areas, the other, though living nearby, never lived in the area and sent their children to a private Christian School.

Church Members and their children.

The church was made up of people who predominantly had grown up in the area and you could describe them as white working class ‘done good’ (which reflects the area). Some live a little way out but 95% lived within a mile of the Church building and the majority in the local community.

Those children of older members who were my contemporaries (slightly younger) all moved out or moved further away when they got married. Out of 20 children of church members who were contemporary to our own only two are still attending church (one of whom will probably leave for University later this year). Four went with their parents to the suburbs, two moved to other countries after University, one moved away through marriage, four stopped attending and moved away, another five have stopped attending but continue to live in the area, one joined the forces, and another moved away to get work as a teacher.

Why do they go? One one level the answer seems obvious; it isn’t as nice living in the inner city. The fabric of the inner areas can often be poorer as an inner city report states that,

"A characteristic of living in the inner areas as far as individuals are concerned is that personal and collective deprivation frequently over-lap and reinforce each other. Thus being poor in the inner areas is worse than being poor elsewhere." [1]

The report explains that personal deprivation is recognised as "things which impinge directly upon an individual and his family..." such as "low educational attainment, few marketable skills, ill health...poor housing, unemployment and physical and social immobility"; all of these are seen to affect an individual's life and family. The report also describes collective deprivation as 'poor physical environment... inadequate local facilities, vandalism, and the stigma attached to some areas... '. This report was made in 1978 and it is evident from a further report [2] from 1991 that there are still problems in all of these areas.

What someone might be prepared to come to terms with and adjust to oneself is one thing; whether or not someone is prepared to bring their children up in such an environment is another.

Our own children have moved away on leaving for University but actually live in inner city areas all of which are multi-ethnic. They also continue to attend church in the City.

Over the twenty years that I was involved in the church there was always a good number of young people in the contact with the church. Sunday school would range from 20 to 30 in attendance and occasionally more. The teens generally had a solid core of 10-15 with much more when we ran a football team. However, though faith commitments were confessed, none have continued that I am aware of.

The question must be considered what sort of youth programme was available. While what was available certainly was not comparable with some suburban churches, it was better than most inner city churches. The Sunday school was always well staffed and well attended, midweek fun evenings, holiday clubs, outings and regular fun events. The teens always had significant input from full-time staff, often a full-time youth leader, adventure holidays, weekends trips out, and their own social youth night each week. One Sunday morning service each month was a dedicated all age event with a strong bias to the younger end.

My personal evaluation is that as a church we failed to penetrate the culture of the community in a significant way to hold the youth of the local community as they entered their adolescence. The children of church members have followed the trend of moving away after college or just moving to better areas, in many ways they seem to have mirrored the values of some church members and full-time leaders.

Community

Insecurity, Transience and instability. These are often the words that describe inner city areas, however this not uniformly true. Given a chance and support, community can be stable. In a block of six flats for seniors younger unsuitable tenants were introduced. Within a couple of years there was a complete exodus, the flats could not be re-let and they all now stand derelict. In our street there is considerable unease when someone is about to move out or even indicates that they might. The remaining tenants often lobby the local housing officer to put decent tenants in. This is not ‘snobby class’ attitude but just a desire to be able to get on with their lives without intimidation and continual disruption. The common plea is: “You won’t put any ‘smack heads’ in will you?” The term ‘smack heads’, is a generic one that symbolises violence, theft and disturbance.

As I indicated before, stability is possible where real ‘ownership’ is exercised and permitted. While NIMBY (not in my back yard) has negative implications, the simple fact is; if you don’t take responsibility for your backyard no one else will, and when several residents take this attitude together, formally or informally, a significant difference can be made. It only took four persistent local residents to stop the theft and burning of wheely bins that had been going on for several years. Unfortunately it took so long because of the apparent indifference of the Police and local housing officers. Similarly further destruction of the seniors flats was also stopped by the same action.

Culture.

I think it would be fair to say that the church has not penetrated the local culture. Some would argue that the local working class culture is breaking down, but culture does not break down, it just changes. What we witness is a change in beliefs, values, and behaviour which is a result of their changing worldview. Christian values will continue to decrease in the absence of a Christian presence as Christian values are not embodied or communicated in a text but in relationships. The often negative experience of inner city people will also influence their worldview. Inner city culture could easily be represented by broken or temporary relationships, fragmented families producing isolation and hostile attitudes to others in the community. Yet that is not the whole story; as our experience demonstrates there can be mutual help and support, neighbourliness and fellowship that many in the church could learn from!

Statutory Agencies.

Professionals who work for ‘Statutory Agencies’ don’t generate a great deal of confidence in the community for themselves. Support from the Housing office is not always forthcoming and one gets the distinct feeling that these may be ‘public servants’ but serving the public is not always on their agenda. While I can appreciate that ‘Statutory Agencies’ regularly have dealt with difficult characters in the community, the vast majority of people in the community have genuine and reasonable concerns. Unfortunately when these reasonable people encounter an inappropriate and terse response from representatives of ‘Statutory Agencies’ it reinforces a ‘them and us’ attitude which perpetuates hostility. Often those with poor communication skills express themselves badly which is sometimes interpreted as aggression. Whenever I contact Statutory Agencies I make a particular point of being courteous; however it isn’t always reciprocated!

Conclusions

If the trend of the Church to move out and abandon the inner areas and city housing estates continues, then before long the Christian presence will be virtually non-existent and remaining elements of Christian values will dissipate. We will in fact discover that we have permitted these communities to become truly godless. I state quite intentionally we have permitted because Christians individually have the responsibility to be ‘salt and light’. It is too easy to say ‘the Church ought to do something’; the theology that identifies ‘the Church’ as an institution is faulty theology. The Church is the accumulation of the individual believers. Only when every Christian starts to examine him or herself and consider their responsibility to the inner areas can we say we are beginning taking the problem seriously.

Unfortunately often inner city churches have failed in our discipleship to challenge the ‘redemption and leave’ principle because of the assumption that it is part of the 'redemption and lift’ principle.Also in our discipleship generally we have accepted a capitalist and unbiblical ideal that our career is the most important factor and where we live and worship works out from that. Rather than recognising that every believer has a call on their life and needs to discover how and where God want us to serve Him in this world, our career then serves that principle rather than dictating it.

What will make the difference is individual believers moving into the inner areas. What the Church as ‘an organisation’ (of whatever denomination) can do is to help encourage and facilitate that remigration. In many cases it will require Christians to enter another world, an alien culture and learn another language. They will have to face up to their own cultural prejudices to permit them to begin to be able to identify what is good, bad or just different. It will be necessary for them to penetrate that culture and not just to colonise within it as the Church has so often done in the past.

The Yeast principle. So often the symbol of ‘Yeast’ carries a negative connotation, however we do well to remember that Jesus told the parable of the ‘Yeast of the Kingdom’:

He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough." (Matthew 13:33, NIV).

If we are prepared to penetrate these inner areas, then even a small number in comparison to the masses can have a significant effect. To have an effect two things are essential. We must ‘mix’ into the local culture as the yeast mixes into the dough, and we must live out our Christianity in that context just as the yeast dispenses its own life on the surrounding dough. Do we hear echoes of Jesus prayer in John 17:15: “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one”?

By moving into these communities, Christians can bring their personal resources of gifts and skills to the local community and church and they can help bring stability to needy situations. They can be ‘salt and light’ where it is disperately needed as well fulfilling the Great Commission; their presence alone can begin to restore and maintain Christian values.

Derek Purnell - Urban Presence - 1st July 1999

Notes:

[1] Manchester and Salford Inner City Partnership Group, MANCHESTER AND SALFORD INNER AREA STUDY (Manchester: Dept of the Environment, 1978)

[2] North Manchester Health Promotion Unit, TIME FOR A CHANGE (Manchester: North Manchester Health Authority, 1991