Church finances

It costs over £3,000 per week to run St Mary’s and meet all our financial commitments.  We don’t receive any money from the church or the government and we are entirely reliant on the generosity of those who worship at St Mary’s.

For many years now, our income has not covered our full expenditure – and this has resulted in consistent financial deficits (although in some years this has been mitigated by substantial one-off legacies or donations).  We are having to eat into our capital reserves, which is not a sustainable situation and sooner or later we will run out of money.  Furthermore, we are unable to make the contributions and investments we would like to make to the life of the church in Shenfield and wider Essex.

We would therefore ask everyone prayerfully to reflect on how they can help respond to this challenge, and give back to God some of the resources He has generously granted us.