Last updated 21st August 2026

Centenary Parish Mission Weekend: All age resources and promotional advice

Supporting the Centenary Mission Weekend

As part of the celebration of our Diocesan Centenary in 2026, Bishop Philip has called for a Diocesan-wide weekend of parish mission and outreach, between 11 and 13 September 2026.

The invitation is for every parish across the Diocese to put on a weekend in which simple, often fun events are held, to which both Christians and non-Christians can be invited, to enjoy themselves and to engage together - and at which there will be an accessible presentation of what it means to be a follower of Jesus.

These Centenary weekends also offer us an opportunity to do something special with Sunday morning services, and to invite along those who perhaps haven't yet experienced the worship of the Church. 

It was so good to see so many of you in 2025 at the special deanery meetings to begin planning for the Diocesan Centenary parish mission weekends, to be held between 11th and 13th September 2026.

The energy and engagement at those meetings was very encouraging, as has been hearing from so many of you about your plans so far. Thank you for all you are doing. We are praying for you as you step out in mission! 

We are delighted to share with you three resources that will help you in your planning in the months ahead.

Your planning guide

A practical, accessible guide to help you cover the most important elements of planning a parish mission weekend, which includes a suggested planning timeline and an appendix of helpful additional resources. 

Click here for centenary missions planning and preparation material

Printed copies of this resource were sent in January, but if you would like further copies please do get in touch.

Children and young people's resources

Loads of ideas to engage children and young people in your mission events in all kinds of ways are available here: Parish Mission Weekend CYP Ideas v2.pdf

Extravagant Sowing course

This is a simple, three part course, based around 3 short videos and some accompanying session notes.

It has been designed to use individually or in small groups, to help participants think about how to pray for others, invite others, and share our stories of faith, ahead of the mission weekends. 

Centenary missions planning and preparation material

A preloaded USB drive was also sent out in January. If you need further copies of this, please do get in touch. All the Centenary Mission Weekend Planning Materials are also available via the diocesan Fruitful app via the links here... 

... to the course - Extravagant Sowing course

... to the Pdfs - https://dioceseofblackburn.subspla.sh/5m6wj

Follow-up course webinars

In June we ran a 90-minute webinar to help parishes understand the various enquirers and follow-up courses that are available, with advice on how to run them well. 

Meanwhile there is also Hope Explored. Rev. Sarah O'Donoghue (Diocesan Renewal Officer) and Joy Rushton (Being Witnesses Manager) ran a Hope Explored Course in July, a three-week course exploring hope, peace and purpose.

This was an opportunity to find out about the course and how to run this for your own parish.

For more information on how you can run a similar course, please email Joy at joy.rushton@blackburn.anglican.org

Promoting your events

The Diocesan communications team is working on promotion of the whole centenary mission weekend initiative.

Unfortunately, we aren't able to promote individual events. There are two reasons for this. As far as possible we want to ensure we provide equal coverage without giving weight to one particular event or place.

From a missional standpoint the second reason is parishes are being encouraged to focus the best of their energies on prayer and personal invitation.

One of the things we've found to be consistently true with mission weekends is that personal invitation is the most effective way to gather people.

That being the case, when you are promoting your events locally, choose readily available channels to do so. Some examples follow ...

A Church Near You

All Diocesan communications are directing people, especially those who may not currently attend one of our churches, to the A Church Near You (ACNY) website to find out what's happening near them.

Please make sure your ACNY page is up to date. All parishes should have a page on ACNY so make sure you populate it with all the details of our mission events; offering a clear invitation to all to attend. 

Social media posts

Post to your social media channels regularly, if you have them, and tag the Diocesan social media accounts for reposts and further amplification.

The Diocesan Facebook page is reposting some great examples of mission-focused content from our parishes as the weekend approaches. Why not check it out for inspiration for your own channels?

Here are two examples of videos promoting mission weekend activities that do the same thing and essentially the same format but in different styles; one from St Lawrence with St Paul's, Longridge and St Paul's Church, Ansdell and Fairhaven. Have a go and tag us! 

Generating media interest

As well as on social media, the Diocesan communications team will be promoting the entire event with information/releases to the local and regional media. 

You can still send information about your own local events to your own newspapers and community newsletters; either online, printed or both. 

You will find advice for writing quick press releases, alongside a template release, all here and please remember to set your event in the context of the Centenary Mission Event. 

A sample opening paragraph might be ...

St Anywhere Church in Elsewhere will be one of hundreds of parishes across the County holding mission events this coming weekend, as The Church of England in Lancashire continues to celebrate its centenary year. 

Then add your event details below that paragraph following the style on the templates linked to above and remember to invite people to come along (ideally via a quote, eg from your parish priest) - whether they go to your church regularly or not. 

And finally...

Rev’d Steve Haskett, Director of Mission, adds: "We held four study days on evangelistic speaking and preaching, for all licensed clergy, LLMs, PTOs and ALMs. We have had an extraordinary response to these days, and the teaching was very well received. 

"Many thanks once again for all you are doing to lead and equip your parishes to make the most of this exciting opportunity. Please do be in touch if you require any additional support. My team would be delighted to help."

Blessings,

Steve

Further information

For any further information please contact ...

Rev. Steve Haskett, (Diocesan Renewal Lead) at steve.haskett@blackburn.anglican.org

Rev. Sarah O'Donoghue (Diocesan Renewal Officer) at sarah.odonoghue@blackburn.anglican.org

Janet Sanderson (Operations Facilitator to the Diocesan Renewal Programme) at janet.sanderson@blackburn.anglican.org