Drama

The Nativity and Easter trails are long standing events in the Stirchley Community. The events are designed so that families from across our community can engage with the key stories around these Christian festivals. They involve interactive storytelling, innovative craft activities and tasty food and drink to welcome participants. The events are run by Grace Church Stirchley in local community spaces close to the festivals they represent.

The reading Passion Play
Rise Theatre’s brand new, original, open air Passion Play took place in Forbury Gardens in Reading town centre in March 2024, as part of an ecumenical Easter Festival organised by The Gate. This free event for the people of Reading and the surrounding area attracted large crowds to reflect on and celebrate the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ during the Easter weekend.

Performed by a cast of professional actors, Rise Theatre brought their unique style to create an emotionally impacting performance. Plans are now in place to perform it again in Reading during Easter 2025.

The Pitch funds two short films each year, which use the Bible as a primary source of inspiration. The project supports and develops filmmakers from diverse backgrounds to hone their pitching and storytelling skills, ultimately helping them to break into the industry. The two selected short films are submitted to national and international film festivals, while a mentorship and leadership programme helps to improve the skills of those who are underrepresented in the film industry.

Creative Arts Workshops
Wintershall Education uses the creative arts to bring the Christian story to life for children and young people, making connections between the Gospel stories and our world today. Themed workshops, run in beautiful outdoor settings, provide space and time to support the mental health and wellbeing of children and teachers and provide exciting and unique ways to access Religious Education.

The Stroud Festival of Wonder held in November was designed to inspire wonder in an age of exhaustion. It offered a weekend of free activities centred around 5 spectacular circus performances, Magnificat!, based around the story of Mary saying ‘yes’ to the Angel Gabriel.

This free weekend proved a huge success for attendees of all ages with other events including dance, comedy, magic and music. The festival was based at St Laurence Church: the Stroud Centre for Peace and the Arts. Organiser Phil Coysh said, “This free event for the Stroud community received huge community interest with over 2,000 attending and support from over 100 volunteers. We are grateful to our funders for making this festival possible. It was truly a wonderful and deeply spiritual weekend.

That’s how it really is

With over five decades of global experience in conflict zones, CHIPS is dedicated to fostering peace and reconciliation. We empower communities to instigate enduring grassroots transformations for restored peace. Since 2014, we've been actively engaged in Brixton, UK, focusing on countering youth violence through constructive avenues for young people. Filmmaking has proven to be a powerful avenue for Brixton's youth, teaching teamwork, collaboration, unity through the art of storytelling.

In 2021-2022, our youth crafted the poignant short film, "That's How It Really Is," shedding light on subjects like young carers, self-harm, unhealthy coping mechanisms, and child molestation. With support from Westhill Endowment, we are able to orchestrate eight screening events nationwide, encouraging dialogue, support, and proactive engagement among young people. These screenings provide an opportunity for the youth involved in the film to shape, develop, and facilitate critical conversations on these complex subjects, ultimately offering a platform for vulnerable exploration of the contemporary youth experience.

Lichfield Cathedral is undertaking a year-long project to restore its central spire and increase engagement with its heritage. To do this, we are creating a community theatre project bringing to life the stories of the people connected with the founding of the Cathedral, including St Chad and Bishop Headda, and countless of pilgrims who have visited the Cathedral from AD700 to the present day.

Tales of Wonder, Wisdom and Humour

Religious Education in many schools is not seen as a priority and some non-muslim parents feel concerned when it has anything to do with Islam. Using multi-faith storytelling, with professional award-winning Khayaal Theatre, we hope to build bridges in the primary schools and generate a better understanding of not just Islamic but of other faiths and cultures too, highlighting mutual links and crossover between all traditions. Means of storytelling does not confront orthodoxy of religion; it rather seeks to inform participants in a culturally acceptable manner.

SparkFish is a local collaborative Christian organisation that aims to inspire and encourage young people in faith, hope and love. We engage with young people in schools across Reigate, Redhill and Merstham, East Surrey.

Gospel 2023

With seven years of experience, our next Festival: GOSPEL April 2023 aims to celebrate ‘Christianity and Creativity’ in a mixed arts festival. An invitation for everyone to engage with the expressive arts whether of different faiths or none, to explore and discover more of life in many vibrant ways.

The theme of GOSPEL 2023 will spark curiosity with the Gospel story and introduce or reacquaint people with Gospel meaning, purpose and hope. We strive to eradicate misconceptions about the Christian faith to encourage unchurched people to engage with the Christian faith especially young people, the future of our faith and church.