Several churches in Buckinghamshire, as well as Berkshire and Oxfordshire, will receive around £500,000 collectively thanks to a development fund grant.

The Diocese of Oxford has announced they will support 18 churches across the three counties, with the development fund being a grassroots project which was launched in 2019 to enable missional creativity.

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This is to help churches with practical ways to become more Christian, and potentially attract new people to the faith.

Since its launch, it has donated nearly £1.5million to over 70 local church projects across the Diocese.

Projects awarded in this round of funding fell into four key areas: ministry, (social action, children and youth), buildings and resourcing hubs as well as a number of smaller awards.

Grants to create diocesan-supported resourcing hubs saw the largest share of awards with two projects being awarded six-figure sums, to help build new congregations in both established and new areas of population.

Director of Lighthouse, an organisation that helps Christians across the world, Patricia Reading said: “Lighthouse Central is very excited to be able to launch our new continuity project, a series of ‘as live’ TV shows at key times of the year: a Light Party, Christmas and Easter, thanks to the very generous grant from the Development Fund.

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“This project will be the glue that keeps the Lighthouse family together throughout the year, between our fantastic physical events each summer, delivering the fun, faith and engagement of Lighthouse both locally and those further afield.

“We are so grateful to the Development Fund for supporting this project and to Wycombe Deanery for sponsoring and supporting us through the application process”