Lay Training Pathway

The lay leader training pathway is a suite of training courses and resources designed to enable Incumbents to support and develop lay people serving in their parishes as Lay Pastoral Visitors/Assistants, Service Leaders and Occasional Preachers.

These roles are locally recognised and under the supervision of the incumbent or another designated church leader.

Within the pathway, there is scope for leaders to explore more lay ministries, including the path to Licensed Lay Ministry (LLM) through partnership with the Local Ministry Programme.

The pathway comprises six components for each role:

An annual cycle of confirming and appointing, commissioning, supporting and reviewing lay leaders.
Initial and Additional training (click on link for further details of each course by role).
A Role description template to set parameters for the role as required by the parish. Each role description details the safeguarding training and DBS requirements pertinent to each role.
A suggested format for commissioning lay leaders in parish.
Resources to help review the work undertaken on a regular basis.
An annual ministry review form.

The annual cycle runs as follows:

January/February

Lay leader roles should be reviewed in terms of confirming who is in each position and appointing new lay leaders in line with the needs of the parish for the year. Meet with all existing Lay Leaders for an Annual Ministry Review (AMR), using the AMR form.

Role Descriptions are (re) drawn up for new and existing lay leaders. Training and development needs are discussed, and courses identified and booked via the Diocesan Annual One Training plan.

April/May

All Lay Leaders are presented to the APCM and/or 1st PCC following the APCM, and are locally (re) commissioned in a service.

Regular support and review meetings should also take place throughout the year, using the relevant ministry development feedback form and volunteer support meeting template (see Documents below).

Also included in the resources is a vocations tool, designed to enable incumbents/supervisors to have a broader vocations conversation with relevant lay leaders at an appropriate time.