PROJECT Gateway blog - February 2024
What’s the vision?
Here is the February edition of our Gateway Blog to keep you updated with all things to do with Gateway, brought to you this month by Adrian Beavis (Vicar of Christ Church), who shares more about the vision for Gateway and how we are progressing.
Dear friends,
As you will probably know by now, the Gateway Project is our building project to renew and expand our building to enable us to serve God’s vision in 21st Century. Whilst we await final Church of England permission to start work (aka “Approve our Faculty”), and whilst the final detailed work on the plans progresses, I wanted to remind us about WHY we are doing the project.
WELCOME Gateway
For years there has been a vision to make the church more visible to the town square community and more easily accessible than we are at the moment. We will open up the west end of the Café to create a new welcoming entrance.
WORSHIP Gateway
As we grow, we need more space on Sundays for our Kids and Youth ministry, our main worship space needs renovating and updating, our lights are now unserviceable and unreplaceable. The Gateway Project will address many of these issues.
WITNESS Gateway
Our youth and community ministry is growing so we want to build a dedicated Youth and Community Centre. This will be the only dedicated youth space in Woking centre and enable us to serve vulnerable people during the day and young people in the evenings.
WORLD-CARE Gateway
Our heating systems, which are in the top 500 MOST INEFFICIENT heating systems in the Church of England, will be replaced and updated to dramatically reduce our carbon footprint and to create a more sustainable building.
Do let us know if you have any questions about Gateway or if you would like to get involved in helping to make this project a reality.
With best wishes, Adrian
Latest News
First grant received – we’ve received our first grant towards the project of £75 000 from the Benefact Trust, which gives grants to church building projects. We are very grateful for their support.
Start date targeted – we aim to start construction work immediately after Christmas in Jan 2025.
Fundraising – we plan to have a large Gateway Fundraiser Event in May 2024, and then a final Gift Day in October 2024. With the addition of the grant, and some extra money promised by the Donard Living Development (who will develop the British Heart Foundation site), we’ve now raised almost £3.1m.
Find out more
If you want more information about the project, or to find out how you can support it financially, take a look at our Gateway pages on ChristChurch’s website, or you can chat to any of the members of the team: Adrian Beavis (Vicar), Steve Roberts (Project Leader), Walter Coxon (Finance), Mike Pearce (Technical), Peter Wichmann (CCW building knowledge and expertise), Rachael Purvis (Project Coordinator). If you’d like to email us with a specific query you can do so at this email address: gateway@ccwoking.org.