The square mile around Shoreditch High Street at the Hackney Road interchange is a curious mixture of trend-setting creativity and (often hidden) deprivation – with 75% child poverty and 40% unemployment in this area).

The Shoreditch Group is a network of local Christian leaders committed to social transformation.  Under the patronage of Lord (Nat) Wei, it is overseen CTC’s Senior Tutor, the Revd Adam Atkinson.

The aim of the project is to:

• contribute to the social transformation of Shoreditch, and in particular the reduction of child poverty
• demonstrate and build up the capacity of churches as agents of social transformation
• engage churches with a broader cross-section of Shoreditch residents – in particular young people (14-20) experiencing economic and social exclusion and young urban professionals (20-35) with a concern for social justice (both of these being groups the church usually struggles to reach)

Helen Moules (the Project Co-ordinator, based at St Peter’s Bethnal Green) will be blogging on some of the exciting ways this vision is taking flesh.  It’s a great example of the Contextual Theology Centre’s mission in action: equipping churches to engage with their communities.