The Building

Expanding our Mission

If the church is to grow we must appeal to a wider and younger audience. We already have some worthwhile links with the community by hiring rooms to various groups. Sadly few who visit the hall become regular worshippers. We must improve our outreach.

A solution to reduce heating costs and make better use of our building could be to reduce the area of worship and make changes that enabled us to use the church more in the week. Here's a picture of what has been done to a similar Methodist building of great beauty.

What is our Mission?

Why should our Mission come under the heading of Buildings? It seems increasingly likely that we will need a smaller area for worship in the next decade and indeed for the next generation.

The hard facts are that far fewer people come to church now than did when Trinity was designed and built a century ago. To be realistic we need less space for public worship than our forefathers needed, and it costs a lot in heat, light and high maintenance to keep a Grade 2 listed building up to scratch.

We are already beginning informal discussions with those responsible for Listed Buildings to see if we can alter the church. At the moment, the church is used for 4 or 5 hours a week. We need to increase 'throughput' and 'footfalls' to use modern terms, and we must attract greater numbers to use Trinity.

Let's have your suggestions for growth - both spiritual and temporal.

The Task Force

The task force was formed to do the many things that will be necessary to take Trinity forward into the next generation. It is open to anyone who is willing to help, taking on a small job among the very many ideas that now seem to be developing. At present the task force includes:

Ceri-Lou Newman	O777 924 3126
George Speed	2070 0895
Jacqueline Marshall	2070 8762
John Hines	2070 5437
John Jevons	2070 3091
Mike Dunn	2030 2679
Mike Newton	2070 6305
Naunton Liles	2070 4020
Roger Mundy	2070 7622
Tim Coward	2063 6668
Tony Farmer	2033 1591

The Task Forcehas met again on 7th July and 1st September and reviewed very many ideas of what must be done to secure our future. We need helpers, "doers" and willing volunteers for straightforward and simple tasks. If you have an hour, please contact anyone on the above list.

An autonomous sub-committee has been set up to organise an event every month for the next year, each of which we hope will raise some additional money. Please ring Jackie Marshall on 2070 8762 for more details.

Report of the Brainstorming session

At our brainstorming session held in the church, I was surprised and delighted that some fifty members attended the 25th June session. I am very grateful to those who came along and gave up their time to discuss the very vital reason for it taking place, namely the future of Trinity as an active and flourishing church. Members who for whatever reason were unable to attend did miss a most stimulating and uplifting meeting. The retiring collection raised some £85 and on behalf of the church and the Task Force I give my thanks for the members' generosity.

From the word Go the suggestions and ideas for fundraising events (and ways in which the whole church can be sustained and made to grow for the future generation), flowed almost continuously for nearly an hour. I had about fifty or so widely diverse ideas on my flipchart by the end of the session at noon. In between suggestions there was also a lively interaction of comments resulting in an interesting ebb and flow of debate almost without pause. At then end of the session I am sure all members will have been very satisfied with the event and have derived a lot of satisfaction that so many issues could be aired in an atmosphere of fellowship and goodwill. For it is only by such interaction that the grave issues which will need to be addressed will, in time, I am sure be resolved. BUT, we still need more and more suggestions and ideas. Let us have your thoughts. The contact details of the whole Task Force are on the website or, of course, speak with any of the church officers.

All of these ideas will be discussed in detail by the Task Force at its next meeting on July 7^th. We have a huge amount of material to sift through and I am certain we shall be able to produce a large number of projects worthy of implementing to plug the funding gaps which will be apparent this year and next year. This will not be the panacea to Trinity's ills, but it is hoped it will enable the church to sustain itself over the next few years in order to allow a long term plan to be devised and implemented, thus ensuring Trinity will be saved for Future Generations.

I am grateful to all of those members of the Task Force who so ably assisted me in this most worthy endeavour and for the considerable encouragement, help and advice I have received from members of my family and not least the ever present help from Teddy, for which much thanks.

The brainstorming is not the end, it is just the beginning – a new beginning. The road will be long and hard and strewn with many obstacles, which at times will seem insuperable. But the gifts from God which we have all be given will help us to win through. I shan't give up, I can't give up. I hope you won't either. I was rather overcome by the enormous amount of goodwill which I sensed yesterday. I earnestly hope that that goodwill can now be harnessed and that we shall all face up to the greatest threat to Trinity's existence since the church was built. Let us all take up the challenge and work together for the benefit of Trinity and the work it does in Penarth.

With grateful thanks

Roger Mundy

The big debate

We know Trinity Church is expensive to maintain and that we are spending more than we receive each year. We started a serious discussion in May 2011 and these are some of the thoughts that were under consideration.

Stay as we are but reduce expenditure and increase giving to break even.
Sell the hall and use the money to reduce the worship area in church, then build new meeting rooms, toilets and kitchen in a part of the church.
Sell the church and use the upper hall for worship and continue to use the back rooms for community activities.
Sell everything and build a modern fuel-efficient dual-purpose building for worship and for communal activities.

I has now emerged after three months study, that sale of half our property does not raise anything like enough to refurbish the remaining half unless we obtained a substantial grant.

Grant are currently being investigated.

Constant repairs

Whilst out forefathers have looked after the building well, it is now over 100 years old and weathering now leads quite quickly to erosion of the fabric.

These are some of the pictures taken in the spring of 2011 showing work that needs doing.

The trough is over the flat roofed lounge, where this abutts the church.

This shows how stones decay over 100 years of varying Welsh weather