Three of our movement whānau have been awarded honours this Queen’s Birthday weekend.

We recently celebrated with our Diocesan Advocacy team five years of campaigns and advocating for positive change and acknowledged the hard work of Kate Day and Elise Ranck who have been behind it all.

On Saturday, St Paul’s Kapiti and All Saints Palmerston North hosted our northern training days. It was a great day of fellowship, connecting with old friends and making new ones as well as receiving some great input across a range of topics from having God Conversations, and putting them into practice to ministering to the dying to helping our children grow in their faith.

As part of the Thy Kingdom Come season our Peninsula Parish whānau are holding a contemplative prayer vigil on Saturday night.

Two training days down, two to go. If you’re on the fence about coming along to our Kāpiti or Palmerston North days here is what people had to say about Wellington and Wairarapa.

Thy Kingdom Come starts this Thursday, Ascension Day, and runs until the day of Pentecost on Sunday 5th June. Every year, millions of Christians around the world commit themselves to praying for 5 people to come to know the love and peace of Jesus Christ over this 10-day period.

My name is Annie Hawkes and my ministry is to those in residential dementia care. As the daughter of someone who had dementia, I realised how important faith was to the being of my mother. When so much of her identity was stripped away, her love of Church, her familiarity with the liturgy and faith in Jesus remained long after much of the rest of her life had disappeared.

For some of you reading this, you be thinking “Training Day is coming, yeah! Can’t wait.” For others you may be thinking, “What is this Training Day you speak of?” Training Day is for everyone and anyone!

Becoming a vocational deacon is something I’ve cogitated on (to borrow a phrase from my father) for many years. And, to be completely honest, it’s something that I tried to avoid for a long while! But as I’ve journeyed on this journey, I’ve come to realise that it’s not what I want but rather what God wants from me. So, here I am.

On Sunday 29th May we will gather together to tautoko/support the call of God on the lives of Annie and Christine, two of our own who are called to be ordained as vocational Deacons.

The Teams and Worshipping Communities course, led by Bishop Justin and Archdeacon Gendy, started last month. The course is designed for teams within a worshipping faith community to encourage team health and function. We spoke to Rev. Andy Hickman about what he and his team at the Onslow Anglicans are getting out of the course.

With Easter weekend behind us many of us have a meaningful time remembering the cost that Jesus paid for us – and some of us may have had a bit too much chocolate.

What do sprained ankles, scoffing dry Weet-bix, cold showers, mosh-pits and lost voices all have in common? If you guessed a youth camp, you are right! Also in common with these are dumb dogs, night-vision goggles, strangler fig roots, and young people learning and leaning into Jesus.

Rev Di Woods is taking on an exciting new role as Dean of Waiapu Cathedral in Napier. Di will be moving on from the role she has held over the last six years in Wellington as Principal Chaplain, Class 2 (Wing Commander) for the New Zealand Defence Force. We caught up with Di about her time with Defence Chaplaincy and what she is looking forward to in her new role.

At 9:20am Sunday morning Patricia Cooper received a call from Jake at the Red Cross, “That family of five you collected for a little while back need to move into their new house on Tuesday evening. Can you do it? Oh, and they are now a family of seven!”

Two of our goals we have this year regarding our ‘out’ aspect of discipleship are to more closely tie our giving to relationships and be involved in a hands-on way rather than to just have the treasurer write a cheque each year, and secondly to integrate our children into our ministries of justice, mercy and creation care.

After 7 years of helping to resettle former refugees, Patricia Cooper is stepping down from her voluntary coordinator role. We talked to Patricia about her time as Refugee Resettlement Coordinator.

For over a decade our movement has made strides, through a variety of means, to better align with the fifth mark of mission, “To strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth.” With this in mind, we invite you to consider what it is you can be doing in this present day with your families, churches, and communities to limit your carbon footprint.

The Chaplaincy Team at Victoria University are making it count twice. University is a time where there's so much pressure on students to perform. It's also easy to feel a sense of lack; that they are confronted with these huge problems of the world in their courses, but don't have enough time or money to contribute, or don't know how.