News and Updates

We’ve just finished 2 days of interviewing for new volunteer Street Pastors. We will have 13 new volunteers starting training in 11 days time. This will bring us up to 60 volunteers, and will allow us to start doing regular Saturday nights in Ryde from April, as well as Friday nights in Ryde, Newport and Ventnor. I want to wish all our new volunteers all the best in this awesome ministry of love and care out on our streets.

Isle of Wight Street Pastors are supporting “Reclaim the Night” again this year.

We have a series of exciting events coming up where you can find out more about what Street Pastors do and be one of the first to hear tracks from our new CD “Perfect Sense of Worship”.

We now have fifty Street Pastors and many more people support us in a whole range of ways.  Come and find out why.

You can hear about what a Street Pastor does, how they are trained and the difference it makes to our streets having Street Pastors out and about.  We’ll update you on progress so far with expanding the scheme from Ryde into Newport and recently Ventnor.  There will be information on what’s next for Isle of Wight Street Pastors, and we’ll set out how you could be involved, from becoming a Street Pastor or prayer pastor to becoming one of our regular financial supporters.

We’ll have live music with Street Pastor co-ordinator David Ouston playing tracks from the new album “Perfect Sense of Worship” and you can be among the very first to buy the new CD which will (hopefully!!) arrive just days before the first event. David will also explain why he wrote the songs and how he has been inspired by the people he has met on the streets of the Isle of Wight.  All income from the sale of CDs will go towards the work of Isle of Wight Street Pastors.

Whatever your interests in Street Pastors these should be great evenings, so whether you already know you want to apply to be a Street Pastor or you’d just like to find out what Street Pastors is all about, come along to:

Castlehold Baptist Church, Newport – Sunday 6th November 2012 (map)

The Apex Church, Cowes – Sunday 13th November 2011 (map)

St John’s Church, Ryde – Sunday 20th November 2011 (map)

St Catherine’s Church, Ventnor – Sunday 27th November 2011 (map)

It’s been a while since I’ve updated the blog as we’ve been so busy!

Our third commissioning service was held in Ventnor on June 3^rd to celebrate the commissioning of 15 new Street Pastors, and the graduation of 15 street pastors who had completed a year’s service. There were also about 20 prayer pastors commissioned on that night too.  It was a fantastic evening, and great to see the new recruits starting out on their exciting journey as Street Pastors on the Island.

We now have 52 street pastors from 28 different churches, and approximately 50 prayer pastors. This means we can now have a team out every Friday night in Newport and Ryde, and a team every fortnight in Ventnor, plus we have a team going out once a month on a Saturday night in various locations.   This expansion means we will be helping a lot more people across the Island, and working in communities who haven’t benefitted from Street Pastors before.  This is great news, and big thanks must go to all the dedicated volunteer Street Pastors and Prayer Pastors for all their hard work, as well as to our many funders.  We are planning more expansion of Street Pastors just as soon as finances and supply of willing volunteers allow.

We also were on patrol for all 3 of the Isle of Wight Festival  nights, the opening night of the Island games and Ryde regatta.  We’ll also be out during Cowes week again this year.

If you are interested in becoming a Street Pastor, there will be another round of training early in 2012, and it’s certainly not too early to express your interest in joining us.  We are also actively looking for more Prayer Pastors to support us.  Just get in touch if you want to know more.

We also still need more support financially.  Regular givers are crucial to keeping Isle of Wight Street Pastors going.  If you can give each month you will help us get more Street Pastors out providing help and support to people where and when they need it.  You can download a form to complete and return here.

On February 12^th 2011, we were once again invited by the Isle of Wight  Community Safety Partnership to have a stall at the Partners against Crime road show, which was held at Medina High School.

There was a real diversity of stall holders there. The police, Fire Service, Environmental Health, Prison Service right through to Victim Support, The Gay Lesbian and Bi-Sexual support group, Domestic Abuse team, Neighbourhood watch and even the Community Chef. It was a wonderful day really showcasing how many people on the Isle of Wight really care about their local community and how they are trying to make it a safer, more supported place to live.

They estimate about 700 people came on the day, although it felt like many more than that to me. We had many fantastic conversations with the public, some who knew all about us, and many that had never heard of us. Lots of people did make a point of coming up to me and thanking us for our presence on the streets and wishing us well for the future. Indeed quite a few people came up and thanked us because we had helped them personally. It was real confirmation that we are being very well accepted by the people in our towns.