A vibrant and diverse evangelical Christian community.

‘And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight’  Philippians 1:19

Cranmer Hall, St John’s College,

3 South Bailey, Durham DH1 3RJ

Church Army Research Unit Archives

For over a quarter of a century, Church Army’s Research Unit (CARU) and its predecessor, The Sheffield Centre, were at the forefront of research on mission, evangelism, church planting, pioneering and fresh expressions of Church. In June 2025, it was announced that due to financial challenges at Church Army, CARU would sadly close. Church Army have kindly shared CARU’s church planting archive with the Bede Centre to ensure its reports can continue to be accessed and used by church planting practitioners and theologians. A wider collection of CARU reports and publications on various topics can currently still be found at www.churcharmy.org/research .

 

The Day of Small Things

This report was commissioned by the Church of England and published in 2016. It was one of the most extensive pieces of research on the growth of Fresh Expressions of Church. There were also a number of related pieces of research attached to the report itself.

2016

The Day of Small Things Report

Encountering the Day of the Small Things

Who’s there?

Sustaining Young Churches

What happens after research?

Seeing the bigger picture

Individual Diocese Reports

 

Messy Church Research

CARU conducted two pieces of research on Messy Church, one of the most widely replicated models of Fresh Expressions.

2019

Playfully Serious – Investigating the effectiveness of Messy Church

Portfolio of Research Documents

2021 A Voyage of Discovery – Deepening discipleship in Messy Churches and beyond

 

Paid Pioneers

The Paid Pioneers report (2022) sought to investigate the impact of the financial investment into pioneering across the Church of England and other denominations.

2022

Paid Pioneers – From the margins to the mainstream?

Paid Pioneers Summary Report

 

On Church Planting and Pioneering in Scotland and Ireland

2025 Pioneering in Ireland 
2024 Seeing the Shoots (Scottish Church Planting Network)
2020

Pioneering Pieces (Church of Scotland)

 

 

Diocesan reports and evaluations

2023 Evaluation of the Mission Areas and Resourcing Churches Programmes (Diocese of Bristol)
2021 New Communities Pioneer Pilot Projects (Diocese of Oxford)
2021 Pioneering in Portsmouth (Diocese of Portsmouth)
2019 God at Work: Fresh Expressions of Church (Diocese of Leicester)
2017 Fresh Expressions of Church (Diocese of Litchfield)
2017 Fresh Expressions of Church (Diocese of Bath and Wells)

 

Snapshots: Stories from the Edge

Between 2014-15, CARU published a series of reflections on specific contexts engaging in pioneering

2014-15 Snapshots – Stories from the Edge
Encounters on the Edge
Between 1999-2012, CARU published Encounters on the Edge, a regular publication highlighting pioneering in the UK