Living, Thinking, Loving, Faith

All churches take their inspiration from the life of Jesus and the teaching of his followers, so what makes St Mark’s distinctive? 

Our vision is to practise a living, thinking, loving, faith. 
Living Faith which is inclusive, vibrant & engaged.
Thinking faith which engages with scripture, tradition, reason & experience.
Loving faith which serves our communities by following Jesus. 

We celebrate the wonderful diversity of human life, believing that Jesus revealed God’s love for all people. We’re attracted to the big questions of life and faith and understand that we are called to engage with our world, to challenge the barriers which seem to separate the sacred from the secular or which try to define us according to categories such as gender, sexuality, wealth, race, ability or age. 

We believe that Jesus came that we might have life in all its fullness (John 10.10) and we encourage people to join in with God’s work of transformation and hope wherever they are. We are not afraid of being political, especially where people feel excluded, marginalised or misunderstood, but we try not to be partisan. 

We are committed to being rooted in Jesus of Nazareth and celebrating diversity in the community of Christ. We engage in critical and creative dialogue between the Christian faith passed down to us and the challenges and opportunities of our contemporary world. We are comfortable living with questions and exploring faith. In previous decades this approach to Christianity was called a liberal approach. Over time labels can change their meaning and many people now find these types of terms (such as liberal, or evangelical) uncomfortable or problematic. If you want to find out more about liberal theology and how it has developed beyond this terminology, do explore our online library, and the article Is Liberal Theology Dead? might be a good place to start. 

To aid our exploration and study, we run LOGOS - an online monthly Bible Study Group, and run various study groups during Lent. 

Our online and physical libraries host theological, spiritual, and liturgical resources from an open, inclusive, and questioning approach to Christianity.

We hope that you will find a warm welcome at St Mark’s, whether you are exploring Christianity for the first time, have an established pattern of belief or you are wrestling with faith. You don’t necessarily need to identify with any denomination or group. 

Growing in faith is the work of a lifetime and we understand that each individual’s faith journey is unique. We recognise that people come to church with a range of experiences, joys, sorrows, hopes and disappointments and we know we have much to learn from one another. We aim to offer opportunities for exploring faith which allow plenty of space for questions and discussion. This extends to include our liturgy and music in worship. We prepare services with care, recognisably Anglican whilst weaving in contemporary and creative expressions of prayer. 

We’re all on a journey together, come and see… 

St Mark’s is affiliated to Inclusive Church and we are committed to fostering a spirit of openness and generosity.