How should we organise our property assets if our number one mission priority is saving souls? That’s the question driving Sydney Anglican Property and its Diocese-wide Regional Buildings and Property Strategies.
Rebalancing assets for the gospel
Over the next 20 years, 1.8 million people are expected to move into Sydney, reshaping both new land release communities and established suburbs. Yet while more than half of this future growth will be west of Parramatta, the majority of our church properties remain to the east. Unless we rebalance how our assets are located and used, we risk missing some of the most significant gospel opportunities of the coming decades.
As Ross Jones, CEO of Sydney Anglican Property (SAP), reminds us, “Our properties are only truly serving their purpose if they are being used to facilitate ministry and evangelism.”
Rebalancing the location of our church assets is all about having a Christian presence where the people are so that we can make Jesus known across Sydney and the Illawarra.
As Mr Jones notes, “The real question is whether our buildings and properties will be enablers for this vital work. Godly decisions were made by past generations of Christians that have provided this generation with an abundance of church assets. We need to be good stewards of this abundance and strategically plan how to optimise the gospel reach we can have across this growing Diocese.”
The opportunity
To fail to put these assets to work for the kingdom represents a significant missed opportunity at a critical juncture in our city’s history, as people arrive in their droves.
Bishop Peter Lin captures the urgency, “We must be proactive, not reactive. We’ve talked a lot about the need in Sydney’s new land release areas, but it’s not just the greenfields where there is a significant need.
“We know that there are dozens of suburbs in Western Sydney and even closer to the CBD around places like Macquarie Park, that will grow by tens if not hundreds of thousands of people in the coming years. We don’t currently have the capacity in our existing churches in these areas to cater for the expected population growth.
“The reality is we are woefully under-resourced to do effective ministry in these areas. Meanwhile we have resources gathering paper value in some areas not earmarked for significant growth and already well-serviced by Anglican churches.
“We want to turn assets into impact, paper value into people saved.”
The numbers tell the story starkly. The table below shows the top five parishes by expected population size in 2056. The current benchmark in order to facilitate effective gospel ministry is 1 parish for every 30,000 people.
| Parish | Current Population | 2056 Population | # of Church Buildings |
| Camden Valley | 45,000 | 168,280 | 0 |
| Parramatta | 25,300 | 122,800 | 1 |
| St John’s Park | 74,303 | 95,600 | 1 |
| Kellyville | 50,400 | 94,400 | 1 |
| Hoxton Park | 76,000 | 93,980 | 1 |
In other areas of the city where the NSW Government is prioritising the delivery of new housing around transport hubs, such as Crows Nest, Homebush, Macquarie Park and Hornsby, the expectation is that these changes will create capacity for 60,000 new homes in the next 15 years alone. Clearly we need to ensure we are ready for this dramatic growth.
Of course, delivering new churches in areas where the need is highest doesn’t come cheap. Significant investment will be needed. However, the news isn’t all bad. The enormous blessing our Diocese has experienced over many generations means that, while some areas are in need of investment, there is plenty to go around.
For example, the Diocese currently has around $20 million worth of property that is not being used for gospel ministry of any kind, nor are these properties needed for future ministry, according to parish ministry plans. On top of that, there are hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of property in areas where we have more churches than are needed to effectively reach out to the current and future populations.
As Bishop Lin reflects, “The challenge for our generation is ‘How will we steward these assets for the good of the gospel and the growth of God’s kingdom right across our city?’ now, and for generations to come.
“How would we arrange our property assets if we were sacrificially serious about the saving of souls right across the Diocese?”
Diocese-wide Regional Buildings and Property Strategies
The ongoing development of the Diocese-wide Regional Buildings and Property Strategies are one way the Diocese is looking to work with parishes to optimise our gospel reach across Sydney and the Illawarra. We see property not just as an asset to hold, but as a gospel tool to multiply.
The strategies are being rolled out on a region-by-region basis, with each one acting as a shared planning tool for rectors, wardens, bishops and diocesan organisations by providing an evidence-based, ministry-focused framework for buildings and property.
Each regional strategy estimates parish needs over the next thirty years, based on the population growth of an area, and makes recommendations to provide the right number and type of buildings in the right locations to support long-term ministry.
Through this process, recommendations may include:
- Multiplication – recognising that a parish population may be too large (now or in the future) for effective gospel reach and, as a result, encourages the planting of additional congregations or churches and the formation of additional parishes.
- Partnerships or amalgamations – not driven by decline, but by missional benefit, reducing duplication and focusing resources.
- Upgrades – ensuring facilities are fit for purpose to support existing and future ministries.
- Urban renewal and redevelopment – considering new built forms such as childcare, affordable housing, or disability accommodation alongside upgraded ministry spaces.
As Tim Green, SAP’s Senior Manager, Strategy and Development, explains, “Our role is not to antagonise or place any great burden on parishes, but simply to help facilitate necessary conversations as we consider our role as active stewards of the resources we have.
“By planning together and thinking strategically across regions, we can better support local, parish-led ministry and evangelism in a city where 95% of people do not yet know Jesus.”
Putting it all into action
Encouragingly, conversations are not the only things taking place across our Diocese. Strategic action and wonderful acts of generosity and partnership are also being displayed.
In Sydney’s fast-growing greenfields areas, land has recently been secured in Appin and Orchard Hills. As Jonathan Kerr, SAP’s Manager of Greenfields, explains, “We believe the gospel must be present where people are. But buying land is only the first step. Getting a church building up and running before the neighbourhood is fully built, that’s what changes everything.”
This proactive approach ensures that new communities don’t have to wait for ministry to happen. Instead, new residents are able to encounter a thriving local Anglican church from the moment they move into their homes. But doing so relies upon the generosity of the Diocese as a whole.
At the same time, parishes in more established areas of the city are modelling how property can be used not just to maintain, but to multiply ministry. Church Hill Anglican, for example, chose to release $3.5 million from its commercial property holdings, not for itself, but to fund new ministry at Marsden Park and to support the Shoalhaven Aboriginal Community Church in purchasing a permanent site.
As Senior Minister Justin Moffatt puts it, “With such a resource comes the responsibility to steward it well. Our church is keen to see gospel ministry funded throughout the Diocese in the decades to come.”
Together, these examples highlight the heart of rebalancing our property assets: to see them not merely as holdings to preserve, but as resources to release and multiply for the sake of the gospel.
In God’s kindness, the choices we make today about where and how our properties are used will determine whether we are ready to meet the millions moving into our city with the good news of Jesus. Wise stewardship now can shape gospel impact for generations to come.
This is the third in a three-part series of articles. You can read articles 1 and 2 below: