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The Diocese of Oxford Benefice Profile for the appointment of RECTOR for the LOWER WINDRUSH BENEFICE In the Deanery of Witney 2019 St Giles’ Church, Standlake. St Michael’s Church, Stanton Harcourt. St Denys’s Church, Northmoor. St Nicholas & St Swithun’s Church, Yelford. www.lowerwindrushbenefice.org Patrons: The Bishop of Oxford Diocesan Board of Patronage St John’s College Oxford 1 CONTENTS Foreword by the Bishop of Dorchester 3 The Deanery 4 The Oxford Diocese 5 The Lower Windrush Benefice 6 Mission– where we are now & looking to the future 9 As our incumbent we can offer you: 10 Person Profile 11 The Rectory 12 Our Parishes Standlake 14 Stanton Harcourt 20 Northmoor 24 Yelford 27 Pattern of services 30 Summary of Accounts for 2018 St Giles’ Church, Standlake. 31 St Michael’s Church, Stanton Harcourt. 32 St Denys’ Church, Northmoor. 33 SS Nicholas and Swithun’s Church, Yelford. 34 Benefice Summary 35 2 FOREWORD BY THE BISHOP OF DORCHESTER. 23rd September 2019 I hope you will consider applying for this important post within the Oxford Diocese. It offers the right candidate a position in a beautiful part of Oxfordshire with a very supportive and able benefice. They are looking for someone who has a heart for rural ministry and the inspiration and vision to help them develop still further. The right candidate will wish to work with the wider community and especially with children, young people and their parents as they seek to encourage them to engage with these village churches. Fostering the relationships with Headteachers is also a key part of the role. They are looking too for someone to join them in their pilgrimage, not necessarily someone who currently has all the gifts and skills needed, but possibly someone who will grow into the role. They are also seeking to grow a sense of being a Benefice still further. They currently work well together, and are looking for a pastor to their congregation, someone who can provide love and encouragement, working from where the Benefice finds itself, with a variety of worship styles and with the variety of people who are involved. I hope and pray that having read this profile and the person specification that you might feel called by God to the Lower Windrush Benefice and that you might apply. 3 THE DEANERY. Witney Deanery has 38 churches and is a vibrant collection of very different styles of the Church. As a Chapter we meet together regularly– currently the pattern is every other month together. In the in-between month we meet as a local Mission Cluster to explore issues of common concern with a smaller group from within the deanery. This is mainly geographical. We have 3 deanery priorities: Church Growth, Schools’ Ministry and Deepening Faith and Discipleship. These give us a focus for our work as a deanery where we share in working groups and put on events to facilitate development in our priority areas. At our Synods we have altered the way we work and focus on Study, Inspiration and Vision. As a deanery the clergy go to a residential every 2 years to spend time together in friendship and prayer and this has renewed energy between us as we work. We also have an annual ministry day together and a social in the summer. We have met our Parish Share for the diocese fully over the last 3 years and are committed to continue this important commitment to mission and ministry. We are excited to have the opportunity to have a new colleague come to share in ministry in this beautiful area of the country and we can assure whoever God calls among us, that they will have a warm welcome and firm support! It’s been a joy to spend more time in the benefice during the vacancy. I have been working closely with wardens and ministers regularly and am part of the rota for Sunday worship. I am happy to talk to anyone with further questions. Tess Kuin Lawton, Asst. Area Dean. 4 The Oxford Diocese. The Diocese of Oxford is the Church of England in Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes. Together, we are the Church, called and sent by God as disciples of Jesus Christ and filled with the Holy Spirit. We are a living, growing network of more than a thousand congregations, chaplaincies and schools. Our world is changing in new and unprecedented ways, we must think afresh about inequality, our communities, and what it means to be human. We need to be the best Church we can be in such a time as this: a more Christ-like Church for the sake of God’s world. The journey of reflecting, listening and rebuilding a common vision has included visits by Bishop Steven to 29 deaneries, where he heard from c. 3,000 people. The 3 marks of a Christ-like Church – contemplative, compassionate and courageous – emerged during the deanery tours. They’ve resonated strongly across the diocese. We believe the call to become more Christ-like for the sake of God’s World: contemplative, compassionate and courageous is something that is widely and deeply owned. The 7 focus areas for 2019 are: Making a bigger difference in the world Sharing our faith and growing the local church Growing new congregations Serving every school in our communities Setting the discipleship of all at the heart of our common life Celebrating and blessing Milton Keynes Engaging in new ways with young people, families and children The Diocese has a comprehensive website and is active on Twitter and Facebook. Please also take a look at Bishop Steven’s blog. 5 The Lower Windrush Benefice The Lower Windrush Benefice comprises the 4 rural parishes of Northmoor, Standlake, Stanton Harcourt and Yelford and is situated 10 miles west of Oxford and 5 miles south-east of Witney. Its name derives from the River Windrush which joins the Thames just south of Standlake. All the villages are within five miles drive from the Rectory at Stanton Harcourt. Church tradition may be described in general as “middle of the road” but there are minor variations of tradition and practice between the parishes, as will be seen from the pattern of services. Liturgy is Book of Common Prayer, Common Worship Order One, Family Communion, and a Service of the Word. For day-to-day transport between the parishes and local towns a car is essential. Public transport is only available from Standlake to Abingdon, Carterton or Witney, with a connection to Oxford available from Witney and Abingdon. (www.stagecoachbus.com/timetables/aspx). The other 3 parishes have no bus services. Mainline railway stations are at Oxford, Oxford Parkway and Didcot Parkway. Oxford runs an excellent, regular bus service to London and to all airports. 6 All parishes in the Benefice are surrounded by farmland with a good network of footpaths. The parishes lie within the area covered by West Oxfordshire District Council (www.westoxon.gov.uk) and the local MP is Robert Courts. There are Health Centres in Bampton, Eynsham and Witney, with a Minor Injuries Unit and Community Hospital in Witney. The nearest Accident & Emergency Department is at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford. The local market town is Witney (www.witney.net), where parking is free. It is well served by a wide range of supermarkets, individual shops and banks. A general market is held twice a week (Thursday and Saturday) and a Farmers’ Market once a month. There are facilities for tennis, badminton, cricket, football, swimming and a gymnasium within the villages. There is a sailing club at Stanton Harcourt and extensive facilities for fishing locally. Witney has a sports centre with a swimming pool. There is a multi-screen cinema in Witney. Frilford Golf Club is nearby, with the possibility of free membership for clergy! https://www.frilfordheath.co.uk Northmoor and Standlake have public houses which offer food; the public house in Stanton Harcourt is currently being refurbished. There is a range of local clubs and societies described further under the separate village profiles. There are a number of industries in 3 of the 4 parishes which offer employment. The 2 primary C of E schools in the benefice are at Standlake and Stanton Harcourt, please see individual parish profiles for more details. Bartholomew School, Eynsham (www.bartholomew.oxon.sch.uk.) and The Henry Box School, Witney (www.henrybox.oxon.sch.uk) are the feeder comprehensive schools for the 4 villages and there is a range of good state and independent primary and secondary schools within 15 miles of the Benefice. House prices in the villages are high which results in many of our young people relocating to more affordable areas. All the villages, except Yelford, are expanding either by in-filling or by medium-sized developments and we have been assured by developers that affordable housing is part of their plans. 7 A subscription parish magazine, ‘Contact', is produced professionally and distributed by volunteers to over 500 homes in the Benefice and in the adjacent parish of Bampton with Clanfield. Stanton Harcourt Parish Council produce a free newsletter which goes to every house in the village monthly. A monthly Benefice Newsletter, usually compiled and produced by the incumbent in consultation with the 4 parishes, is available in the churches, on the website and by e-mail. This provides important information on all services, social events, special occasions, prayer meetings and other announcements that need to be shared across the Benefice. The Benefice website www.lowerwindrushbenefice.org has been developed in the past few years and managed by the incumbent but open for review.

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