CHURCHES around Herefordshire are hoping to open their doors to wider community use thanks to a new guide.

Based on a similar guide published by the Diocese of Hereford in 2005, the new guide has been updated and expanded.

The new version of the guide has been funded by a £12,000 grant from the Allchurches Trust and a contribution of £2,000 from the diocese, to the Historic Religious Buildings Alliance (HRBA).

The guide aims to provide support and practical guidance to parishes, with a view to churches remaining open as places of worship, as well as to the wider community running activities and support groups in them.

It is being written by a specialist consultant, along with contributions from an architect and practitioners as well as from other professionals.

Allchurches grants officer Peter Mojsa said: “We hope it will help even more churches not only to remain open as places of worship but also to become places where the wider community can enjoy a whole range of activities and services that will improve the quality of their lives.”

Ann Stead, chairman of Stadhampton Community Building Project, said without the guide it took her five years to change their local church.

She said: “We started our project to modify our local church so that it could become a village hall in 2008 and it took us five years to achieve it.

“We lacked the information we desperately needed about the sensitivities involved in creatively modifying a religious building so we felt very alone for much of the time.

“I cannot recommend this toolkit enough.

“I wish I had known about it when we started.”

Crossing the Threshold: a step-by-step guide to developing your place of worship for wider community use and managing successful building projects is set to be launched on November 3, at St Martin in the Bullring, Birmingham.

It will be free to download online with a printed version available on request.

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