Fegans - Empowering local churches
Over the past two years has your church seen an increasing need for professional therapeutic support for families you’re seeking to support? Whether you want to be better-equipped to meet the needs of those accessing your projects, or to create pastoral structures and run courses that benefit from outside support, you may be interested to explore the work of Fegans.
Set up originally to provide education and homes for Victorian boys, Fegans (named after its founder, James Fegan) has a legacy which spans 152 years. The charity’s work is now focussed on providing ‘professional, affordable and effective therapeutic services to primary and secondary schools’. Their aim is to ‘care holistically for children and families through counselling and parenting support’, (see the scope of their work here). Fegans services joined Spurgeons Children’s Charity in July 2021, in order to unite and extend the work of caring for children and vulnerable families across the country and in different sectors.
Fegans’ services are delivered via schools, local authorities, GP’s as well as through churches. The charity’s remit includes offering counselling, as well as parenting courses for families of children with additional needs. It also runs pre-schools in two deprived areas in Kent and is involved in providing early intervention parent support in eight geographical areas.
Many churches already have active family outreach programmes, running toddler groups and youth work that attract people from their local communities. Some churches are involved more significantly in schools’ work. Fegans’ work is now expanding, and one popular initiative on offer is the training, equipping and supporting of local churches to create vibrant Family Hubs. For some churches this could be the means to integrate and add to what they are already doing, with the benefit of additional professional expertise.
Operating a Family Hub in their local community can enable the church to meet the needs of children, young people and families, with professional therapeutic care and the ability to link to other wider support agencies.
This particular Hub initiative can take one of two forms. In their first model Fegans equips the church itself to deliver support for children, young people and their families. A specific Children and Families Worker or similar member of the church team undergoes direct training in order to deliver the Fegans Parent Support programme to families. The church is then provided with bespoke support as they navigate specific situations, with the ability to access qualified counselling services if needed.
The second model equips the church by providing referral access to Fegans’ general online parenting and counselling services. In each case the local church is enabled to deliver a range of the Fegans courses within their local church/community. The charity can provide significant professional resource input at the local church level as well as maintaining ongoing contact, sharing good news stories and testimonies of what is happening elsewhere.
At whatever level a church might decide to be involved, Fegans’ aim is that partnership will empower local churches. In recent years some local churches have sensed and experienced more favour with local councils. During the Covid crisis, especially, many churches already working in their local communities, found themselves approached for help by local authorities and other organisations.
Could partnering with Fegans, or running a Family Hub, enable your church to link your projects together and make a greater impact on struggling families in your community?
If your team would benefit from the outside expertise that Fegans offers, please contact Sarah Wallis to explore partnership further.
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Written by Richard Wilson
