News
A Message From SEARCH
12th March 2026
Our recent ‘Together’ day, held at St Nicholas Church, began with a poem called ‘Turning To One Another’ (written by Margaret Wheatley), which starts with the line:
‘There is no power greater than a community discovering what it cares about.’
The ‘Together’ day had been designed to try and call forth many of the invitations held in that wonderful poem, and so we started the day by “checking-in” with one another, “talking to people we knew, talking to people we didn’t know, and talking to people we never talked to”, using pictures as a way in to sharing how we were really feeling at the start of the day.
“Remembering that we don’t fear people whose story we know”, we heard stories from different people SEARCH had been working with over the last few years. We heard how coaching, courses and communities of practice have been used to help people “unlock their emotions”, “bring their questions to God”, deepen their sense of community, and become more aware of the impact of trauma and complex attachment-styles in their families and schools.
You can find out more about SEARCH and our work from our new website: Home | SEARCH
After lunch we had a time of prayer and sharing before going on a collective journey together, inspired by the “Active Hope” process designed by Joanna Macy and Christopher Johnston (Active Hope). We started by grounding ourselves in thanksgiving and gratitude before spending some time in lament, feeling and naming what’s breaking our hearts about our city and world. We then opened ourselves up to transformation, exploring how God might be inviting us to see things afresh, with new eyes, before finishing by asking ourselves how God might be “sending” us out again, to take action for a better and more beautiful world.
The poet David Whyte claims that poetry can offer us an “invitation back into the world,” enabling us to face and embrace life in all its fullness - the difficult and the easy, the speakable and the unspeakable - while finding joy in the process! Just as we began our ‘Together’ day with Margaret Wheatley’s poem, we ended with a second poem, that helped us to do just this. This time it came from Fiona, who had been given the unenviable task of writing a poem out of all that had been shared during the day. She read out this beautiful creation (to the right), which gives a wonderful flavour of the day!
There’s a poem in this
Somewhere, somehow
On this day of togetherness
In this marvellous medley of humans
These souls full of stories
Here we are:
To be intrigued, surprised
To treasure the gentle goodness of each other
To listen deeply to wisdom, for one another’s flourishing
To be curious
To bring our questions to God
And to draw mountains to navigate over, or around
In this safe, brave, sometimes hard space
This joyful, discerning, together space
God answers us in different ways
And at different speeds
And none of them are a sign of failure
Bring it all in! Bring it all together
The rough, the raw, the ready, the unsteady
The riotous, wrangled, mangled
Bashed up, mashed up, blurred, brilliant
Mess of it all. This SOUL
As we go from this small-is-beautiful balm of a day
(A balm that can’t be made or told or sold,
you have to be in it!)
We ask ourselves:
How do we pass on this richness? This goodness?
These deep roots of trust and friendship?
How do we tell these stories
Threaded with joy, peace, belonging
Vulnerability, respect, honesty and depth?
We do it by doing it
Curating and creating spaces
With love and care!