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We are an inclusive, welcoming local community church, passionate about transformation in ourselves and the world around us. We are part of Oasis Hub Bath.
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As we draw our ‘Trajectories’ speaking series to a close, it’s time to Dream Big together! Can we imagine a brave, proactive, sustainable community, where people feel a sense of ownership and are reimagining their faith? Come and be part of the conversation, and dream with us.
Due to our constantly changing world we need to explore ways of making ourselves more sustainable and secure for the future, ensuring we have the resources and people we need to fulfil our vision and be mature followers of Jesus who can hold reliance and sustainability in tension. At Oasis Church Bath this Sunday, Gaynor Williams shares some thoughts that can help us navigate this tension, as part of our current trajectories speaking series. This service will also include a brief reflection on the theme of remembrance.
We’re joined on the sofa by three wonderful creative people from Oasis Church Bath for a panel discussion on creativity and spirituality. Claire Shelswell chats to Julia Trickey (botanical artist), James Otto (composer) and Jo Rich (designer and all round creative genius!) about how their faith impacts their art, and vice versa.
Reprising this topic from before the summer, Jo Dolby explores what it looks like for the Oasis community and for each of us as individuals to move from being a safe space, to a brave space.
We welcome Jill Rowe, the Director of Ethos and Formation for Oasis UK, to discuss the next in our series of Trajectories - 'from reactive to proactive'. While we always have to respond to changing circumstances, constant fire-fighting gets in the way of us progressing towards being the community, people, and world that we dream of. Jill helps us to reflect on what it means to proactively move towards the future that we envision, and how we can play our part.
Sometimes it feels like our church and our community work can exist in different worlds, but for Jesus it was just as important to feed the hungry and help the vulnerable as it was to teach people how to live. In this conversation, our Community Work Manager Claire Henwood and our Associate Minister Amanda talk about what we do in our community projects and why, working through some of the jargon and language barriers towards a unified view of what makes us Oasis Bath.
We start a new speaking series, where we take some time to reflect on the trajectories from our new Hub Plan. What are they, why are they important, and what difference might they make? Expect phrases like ‘the priesthood of all believers’ as Amanda Higgin talks about taking agency and responsibility for the things we care about, and how the Baptist Church tradition of church membership puts power into the hands of the people at the heart of the community.
For lots of us, August is an interruption to our usual routine – whether that's because of work, school, hobbies, family, or our Oasis Summer Sundays. Amanda Higgin helps us to reflect on our return to the joyful ordinary, thinking and praying about where God is calling us to right now, and celebrating that we each have our own purpose and path in the world.
An interview with Karen O'Donnell. Karen is a lecturer and ‘trauma theologian’, and has recently released a book called ‘Survival: Radical Spiritual Practices for Trauma Survivors’. We talk to Karen about her helpful concept for trauma survivors of ‘remaking the self’ as opposed to ‘recovery’, and ask her about some of the spiritual practices she suggests in her book, many of which are unusual and radical.
We welcome Chrissie Chevasutt as our Sofa Sunday guest at Oasis Church Bath. Chrissie is employed by the United Reformed Church in Oxford as ‘Outreach and Development Worker with the Transgender, Intersex and Non-binary Community’ as well as being part of the team at Exeter college chapel. She has been a key support for LGBTQ young people in Oxford in recent years, pioneered the national Transgender Theology Conference, and this year will be launching a conference to gather national voices on Safeguarding LGBT+ People in the Church. In 2021, she published her memoir of coming out and finding faith: ‘Heaven Come Down, The Story of a Transgender Disciple’.
At Oasis we’ve been honoured to be a small part of a new and emerging partnership project that provides access to Trauma Informed Yoga to people with experience of trauma, who might otherwise not be able to access it. Trauma informed Yoga teacher Anna Caldwell joins us on the sofa to explain what yoga is, how it links to our faith/spirituality, why it can be so impactful, and some tools and techniques from it that might help us in difficult times.
Reading, understanding and applying the bible is a practice that will always form an important part of who we are at Oasis Church Bath. Rather than zooming in at specific verses and passages like we often do, Amanda Higgin zooms out and reminds us of the big picture view of this fascinating library of stories, poems, letters and songs.
In our recently released Hub Plan, one of our hopes is to move from ‘safe spaces to brave spaces’. We also know that throughout the Christian story, God has asked people to be brave and do difficult things that have brought change and transformation. Jo Dolby will be unpacking a little more of what this means, and how we can know we’re safe as well as have the courage to step out and be brave when we need to.
How should we understand giving in the light of both a reimagined faith and a cost-of-living crisis? Is the practice of tithing still something we should be doing and if not this, what? Nathan Jones, Senior Minister at Oasis Church Waterloo, offers his perspective on why giving is still such an essential part of our discipleship as Christians.
Many of us who have deconstructed an inherited faith or define ourselves as progressive Christians, cringe when we hear words like 'evangelism'. This word often evokes images of angry street preachers, pushy door knockers or emotionally manipulative events or 'gospel tracts'. That said, of course we want people to experience the goodness in our faith that we experience, we want to pass it on! Firstly Amanda Higgin shares her experience of a recent Baptist Assembly event and then Jo Dolby explores how we might find a balance, and how we can reimagine what evangelism needs to look like in 2025.
We were pleased to welcome our special guest Nik Jovčić-Sasto to the sofa at Oasis Church Bath. Nik is an Eastern Orthodox Christian, theologian, LGBTQ+ activist, musician, and drag performer. They joined us on the sofa for a conversation about their life and experiences, including a range of topics from music and activism, to mysticism and Midsomer Norton!
The first Sunday of Holy Week, when Christians around the world remember the last week of Jesus’ life. At Oasis, Amanda Higgin will be exploring with us how Christian faith has grown and developed around the symbol of the cross, and what it might mean for us to find life-giving faith through the event of a public and political execution.
Human beings are infinitely valuable partly because in each of us is reflected the image of an infinite God. This Sunday at Oasis Church Bath, Andy Salmon reflects on how this motivates how we interact with and care for each other, and inspires our core values concerning justice, inclusion, and Asset-Based Community Development.
Living a Christ-centred life is easier said than done! Gaynor will be reminding us that, throughout the Bible, God often has to remind his followers that justice and love are more important than elaborate feasts and festivals. We'll be reflecting on what God might want to say to us about this today, and how we decide what is most important in the way we choose to live.
We're delighted to be joined by Amy Peake for this months Sofa Sunday. Amy founded the charity project Loving Humanity in 2015 to provide dignity and agency to women and girls in slums and refugee camps by setting up micro-factories to produce sanitary products. Come along to hear her fascinating story and find out how love motivated Amy to start building factories in war zones.
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