Agenda: to be brought up to date on the planning of the Hope Centre, to be allowed time to discuss the options and to be informed of the wide variety of tasks needing voluntary help.

After a short time of praise and thanksgiving Bob Boland shared with us the
encouraging response he had had from people who had read the flyers asking for
ways in which the Hope Centre could be used. A huge thank you to all those people who took the time to write to Bob. The response was incredibly positive and the path forward made very clear. We all felt this was an answer to prayer.

The new HOPE Centre is moving on a pace. Please have a look at the latest plans and sketches.

Hope in North East Cheshire, is a new body that was established on Thursday 19th November 2009. It has consists of three parts:

• A Forum of all the Church Leaders
• Five Mission Action Groups each led by a Lay Member and with at least one Church Leader as Sponsor
• A Steering Group consisting of four Church Leaders, a Representative of each Mission Action Group, a Treasurer and a Co-ordinator with a Church Leader as Chairperson

It is affiliated to Churches Together in Britain and Ireland.

Hope in North East Cheshire represents Christians in Macclesfield and the surrounding villages generally covered by the new Macclesfield Local Area Partnership (LAP). It is bordered in the north by Adlington and Prestbury, in the east by Rainow, in the south by Wincle and North Rode, and in the south-west by Siddington.

The Objectives of Hope in North East Cheshire reflect those of Churches Together in Macclesfield and Hope4Macclesfield in being a visible sign of the Churches' commitment to each other by:

• providing a forum for consultation and policy-making
• encouraging shared worship and prayer, learning, service and evangelism
• promoting initiatives in mission and service
• encouraging local groupings of Churches
• strengthening sustainable working relationships and reinforcing long-term partnerships between them, other Christian organisations, their local communities and the providers of educational, fire, health, housing, policing and social services