FOUR years have passed since the Coming Home report outlined a bold vision for housing, church, and community (News, 26 February 2021). Progress has been made — slower and more challenging than hoped, and yet significant. Much of the effort has focused on laying the groundwork for change rather than working on the change itself.
This is why visiting Birmingham last November was so inspiring. I saw early-stage development sites and met future residents. It was also a chance to see in action the Church’s unique ability to unlock development for local communities. Social- housing providers face mounting challenges — Grenfell-related safety concerns, the Rochdale damp-and-mould scandal, and the need to meet net-zero commitments — limiting their capacity to address the housing shortage.
As one of the largest landowners in the UK, the Church can drive development where it is needed most. It offers resources, a local presence, and a commitment to partnership in local communities.
The areas that I visited are among the most deprived in the country. Families are shuffled between temporary homes, often without cooking facilities, and forced to endure long commutes to school. Elderly couples are separated, and vulnerable individuals are placed in overpriced, low-quality houses in multiple occupation (HMOs). I heard tragic stories of addiction and mental-health struggles, exacerbated by a lack of promised support. Without stable, affordable housing in safe communities, everything else becomes harder.
YET, amid the hardship, I saw extraordinary resilience. At the Newbigin Community Trust, people come together to support one another. A single mother, recently relocated, found help from her community, which sourced carpets, furniture, and kitchen essentials. Others have secured better housing, thanks to tireless church-led advocacy. Most important, they have a place where people genuinely care. This is the Church at its best: embedded in the community, sharing life, and fostering hope.
But local churches and community projects alone cannot solve the crisis. At the Lodge Road Church Centre, in Winson Green, front-line workers were clear: the missing piece is access to good-quality, genuinely affordable family homes. Increasing social-housing supply is essential, and they asked for the Church’s help. Even at a diocesan level, this is an immense challenge.
This is where the new Coming Home infrastructure is making a difference. The Church Development Agency is turning vision into reality: experienced housing professionals are identifying sites and driving projects forward. In Birmingham, I saw churches, housing experts, and local councils working together to shape these developments. The Church Housing Association, meanwhile, has created financial models to deliver social rent housing in the most challenging circumstances.
Each project I visited was still in its early stages. Large-scale developments take years, sometimes decades, to complete. Existing social-housing providers often lack the capacity for such long-term commitments; but the Church, with its enduring presence in communities, is uniquely positioned to think generationally. I witnessed, first-hand, the strong community relationships that will make these projects successful. In one instance, I sat with councillors, council officers, a vicar, and an archdeacon reviewing development plans. In another, I visited a Sikh community exploring a joint regeneration project with the Church.
For the Church, addressing housing need is, first and foremost, a matter of mission. All five marks of mission are reflected in these projects. But it is also about stewardship: ensuring that land and buildings serve their communities. One project will replace an outdated church building with one better suited to modern needs. Another will generate funds to restore a church that is an important landmark and a vital community hub. These developments also have commercial benefits, ensuring financial sustainability while supporting ministry.
MOST importantly, the Church is not a passive observer: it is an integral part of these transformed communities. Done well, this work strengthens churches, both financially and socially, through the value that they create. Building housing and infrastructure with deep community involvement, offering homes at social rent, and focusing on areas of greatest need will make a profound impact.
Getting this work off the ground in Birmingham required an initial contribution from another diocese, which tithed profits from its own housing projects. The initiative has since attracted substantial multi-year funding from the Oak Foundation, reflecting strong external confidence in the part that the Church plays in housing. Oak has already expressed interest in expanding the Birmingham model to other regions, recognising the urgent national demand for similar projects. Further investment will be needed to replicate this work across the country.
Of course, this is not the only church-led housing initiative. I am particularly grateful for the work now beginning in the Faith and Public Life team, funded by the Archbishops’ Council, on mapping of land, housing advice, and guidance to dioceses, and for the commitments from the Church Commissioners to increasing the rate of building homes.
This is complex and challenging work, not without risk, which is being done in the context of pressing national issues and priorities for the Church which take away focus and reduce our collective appetite for risk. As I say, the progress has therefore been slow and painful.
Yet progress — wonderful, exciting progress — has been made. The vision of communities transformed, in which people walking into new, safe, and stable homes that they can afford, because of the work of their local church, feels closer than ever. As the lead bishop for housing, I am very much looking forward to my first cup of tea in one of these new homes in Birmingham.
Dr Guli Francis-Dehqani is the Bishop of Chelmsford.