An Easter appeal: enriching our spiritual and artistic heritage
March 2021
As our building accessibility project comes to fruition, and as the country prepares to emerge from lockdown, more than ever at Ridley we see our buildings and grounds as a precious gift from God, and their important role in our worship, learning and spiritual formation as a community. Along with colleagues and students, Ridley's Principal Michael Volland has been working on a plan to enrich the spiritual and artistic heritage of our site.
An environment to reflect today's community
The community is more diverse now than ever before. Half of those training for ministry at Ridley are women, and a growing proportion of our students are from a range of ethnic backgrounds. We want the images and artworks in and around the site to glorify God and to reflect and inspire the community as it is now. Our aim, therefore, is to commission new works of art for our buildings and grounds to celebrate this God-given diversity.
Three projects of spiritual enrichment
Our Easter Appeal seeks to fund three artistic initiatives:
- Bringing new art to the sacred space of our chapel is important to us, and we are developing plans to commission a local artist to create altar frontals that will glorify God, better represent the Ridley community, inspire us and draw us into worship.
- We also see our grounds as a resource and a blessing, and we want to use this gift from God wisely by developing a spiritual space that will include a new garden-building for prayer and reflection.
- And thirdly, we have been particularly inspired by the work of photographer Jim Grover, whose Of Things Unseen collection of images of Ridley alumnus Kit Gunasekera and photo-essay Here I Am, celebrating the 25th anniversary of the ordination of women, are hugely powerful. We are keen to purchase some of his images to exhibit permanently in our Seminar Rooms and the new library.
How to contribute to the appeal
The cost of completing these three projects is £10,000, and this Easter we would be deeply grateful to you if you would consider a gift to allow us to bring these initiatives to fruition.
You can make a gift right here:
Stay connected with us on social media and through the website to see how these projects come to life in the college chapel, gardens and community buildings. You can follow us on instagram, facebook and twitter.
