A Snapshot:

Churches, Sight Loss and Reaching Out

The Torch Trust National Church Survey 2011

About the survey

During summer 2011, Torch conducted a nationwide survey of church leaders. This survey sought to learn from church leaders about:

sight loss within their congregations
interest in mission and ministry opportunities with people with visual impairment
awareness of Torch and its work

The survey was sent throughout the UK to around 5,000 churches of all denominations. Encouragingly, 277 replies were received – a great response rate of 5.5%. We warmly thank every person who completed the questionnaire for their time and the valuable insights given by their answers. We are currently writing to everyone who gave us contact details and also plan to update people as we progress with delivering our plans.

We are using the findings to help guide our internal thinking, namely our approach to implementation of our 5-year strategic plan. The survey has confirmed that we are on the right road – a real help to our team. This will help us to provide improved support to churches as they seek to more fully include and involve people with sight loss.

We also hope that the findings will stimulate and encourage interested churches, so here you'll find a summary of the results. As you read, you'll see prompts for more information and ways to connect with Torch that can help your church be truly accessible for all people.

If you have any questions or want help regarding this survey, please contact: charlottet@torchtrust.org or by post at:

Charlotte Temple
Torch Trust
Torch House, Torch Way
Market Harborough
LE16 9HL
U.K.

If you have any general enquiries, you can contact info@torchtrust.org or call +44(0)1858 438260.

There were a number of people highly interested in what the survey raised who didn't leave us their details – if you're one of these people, and you're willing, please get in touch through one of the ways given above.

Sight loss in the congregation

Churches of all sizes from all denominations responded to the survey. 37% of all churches indicated that over half their congregation was 65 years or older.

80% of responding churches indicated that they had people with sight loss in their congregation. This was regardless of the age profile of the congregation i.e. people with sight loss were not just in churches with a lot of elderly people.

44% of responding churches said the survey had drawn their attention to issues they haven't considered before. As 40% of these churches also said they have a champion for disability issues or someone passionate about the subject, the survey may have helped provoke thoughts amongst churches that are already proactive about disability.

Active participation in church life

Among churches with people with sight loss, 49% have at least someone with a clear responsibility for particular work. For 15% of that 49%, that was the role of clergy or leader. Most respondents listed multiple areas where people with sight loss are in leadership – although at times this relates to an individual doing many activities. The top 3 areas of particular responsibility were:

Small groups
Prayer / healing
Worship

In 50% of churches with a champion for disability issues, people with sight loss hold specific roles, in contrast to those churches without a champion, where 37% have someone with sight loss in particular roles.

Accessibility of churches

85% of all churches had formally considered their accessibility for disabled people. This rose slightly to 86% for churches with people with sight loss. All churches with a disability champion had done so.

For all churches, the top reasons for considering accessibility were firstly the needs of disabled people within the congregation, closely followed by it being part of the church's mission and ministry. Legislation was a much lesser motivation.

41% of all churches have someone in the church who acts as a champion for disabled people, or have somebody passionate about the subject. This rose to 53% for those churches with people with sight loss.

71% of all churches considered sight loss when looking at disability issues. This rose to 79% for those churches with people with sight loss.

Clearly having a member of the congregation with a disability raises awareness of the issues involved.

Of the churches that said they have not looked at disability issues, 33% expressed interest in Torch evaluating the accessibilty of their church.

Click here to contact Torch if you are interested in a similar kind of assistance for your own church.

Mission and ministry opportunities

The possibility of mission and ministry to people with sight loss had not been raised in 30% of churches. It's great to hear that 56% of these churches were highly interested in the opportunities highlighted by the survey.

The biggest advocates by far for mission and ministry opportunities to people in the UK with sight loss are people with sight loss within the congregation. Within 49% of churches with someone with sight loss, blind and partially sighted people raised awareness of these opportunities. Also, 61% of churches without congregation members with sight loss reported that they hadn't heard of such opportunities, in contrast to 30% of churches overall within the survey.

However, 34% of all churches that replied to the survey feel they haven't got capacity to take on new areas of mission. 16% of those who answered the question don't see this area of mission as relevant to their own community. But among both these groups were churches that said if they experienced a clear sense of calling, they would respond to it.

It was positive to see that 43% of all respondents, and 36% of churches without congregation members with sight loss were highly interested in some form of community involvement.

Torch knows first hand that sight loss is an issue within our communities. 1 in 4 people over the age of 70 will suffer significant sight loss, and every day 100 people hear the news that no medical intervention can prevent them from going blind.

We want more churches to feel inspired and equipped to participate in the many different ways to support people with sight loss. It was therefore encouraging that 25% of all survey respondents were interested in the training that Torch can provide – such as sight loss awareness, or hearing more about the work of Torch.

If you'd be interested in something similar for your church, contact: info@torchtrust.org

Torch also provides a wide range of accessible literature that effectively supports their members with sight loss, and offers a means of reaching out to others with sight loss. 38% of all respondents were interested in these resources, including some churches that don't currently have blind and partially sighted members. In fact, out of all the things that the church can do to support people with sight loss, providing large print materials was the item of greatest interest amongst survey respondents.

If you are interested in finding out more about Torch resources, go to this web page: literature

Learning from shared experience: your encouragements and challenges

People already working with individuals with sight loss kindly shared with us their thoughts about their greatest challenges and encouragements. Here are the themes that emerged, along with some of the comments made.

The encouragements...

The spiritual contribution and commitment people with sight loss make to their church communities, and genuine inclusion despite challenges.

"That people who are deafblind actually want to come to church even though it is a struggle!"

The privilege of supporting the needs of blind and partially sighted people and helping them to engage with church life.

"Walking a person with sight loss around the church, enabling them to touch key places in the church and explaining what happens at certain points in the service."

The particular sense of community, relationship and friendship experienced with people with sight loss.

"The togetherness of the group; plus the ideas for when my eyesight gets worse."

The learning journey of understanding visual impairment, and what people are able to do.

"Realising how much folk can do in spite of 'sight loss'."

The challenges...

Being aware of, and responsive to, people's particular needs.

"Getting everyone to realise that you can't just say "Look at this!" when explaining something! Takes time to remind people to produce things in the right format or explain what 'this' is.

The Torch Foursight for the Church scheme aims to help churches to become as accessible as possible. You can register at: Foursight registration

Making church activities accessible – frequent use of visual media and the book based culture were particular issues.

"Being consistent in making our materials and resources accessible without people having to make special requests."

Torch can help with making church literature accessible. For information about all the different bibles available in various accessible formats, visit: accessible bibles

Drawing people in to church life – making people aware of the church, the church being aware of those around them with sight loss, and getting the church to become engaged.

"Enabling people to hear about our church – and its welcome."

Torch has a network of Fellowship Groups around the country that complement church life and give companionship to those with sight loss. Find out more at: Torch Fellowship Groups

Helping you to be equipped for mission and ministry to people with sight loss

In order to become more deeply engaged with mission and ministry to people with sight loss, churches told us that the following four routes of engagement were of most interest:

Torch providing large print materials for worship and / or study
Your church befriending people losing their sight
Torch providing audio materials for study
Your church offering practical assistance to people with sight loss e.g. volunteer drivers

The survey raised 11 different opportunities for mission and ministry to people with sight loss. 55% of all respondents were highly interested in one or more of these 11 areas.

We are hugely encouraged by the particular interest in the top 4 areas. Torch has a clear vision for the present, and the future. Our strategic plan is aimed at all these issues, and we'll be keeping in touch with our supporters and survey respondents about our work on them.

Already, we've begun broadening the range of our various groups and holiday programmes to reach new audiences – including people who are just starting to lose their sight. We're looking to work with more churches nationally to help us provide better support to people who need it.

We plan to continue delivering accessible literature – including large print and audio, of course, for blind and partially sighted people all over the world, but in future we'll exploit the potential offered by web-based systems so that we can be even more personalised and responsive.

35% of all the survey respondents hadn't heard of Torch, and only 13% were already involved with a sight loss organisation. We see great potential to reach out to new churches – and carrying out the survey has already helped us to do this.

Even though the survey is closed, we welcome views and contact from you about it. You can give us your details by emailing: charlottet@torchtrust.org