By Peter Corney
Australian churches stand at the threshold of a great evangelistic and church growth opportunity. The challenge is to evangelise and plant churches among the large number of new immigrant groups in Australia. As a result of increased immigration and the receiving of refugees and asylum seekers many local congregations now find themselves [...]

By Peter Corney
(This was originally delivered as an address to the teaching staff chapel service at Trinity Grammar School Kew in Melbourne in 2010)
During the American civil war and the battle to emancipate the slaves, the then U.S President Abraham Lincoln said he “often felt like a man standing on a burning platform.”
Many [...]

By Peter Corney
The main stream Protestant churches in Australia are in serious decline and have been for some time. To give but one example: attendance at worship on an average Sunday in the Anglican Church in Melbourne has dropped from an estimated 50,000 in 1981 to 21,000 in 2006. How did we get to this [...]

by Peter Corney
(Delivered at SHAC Commnity on 14th March 2010)

This weekend Melbourne has hosted an internationally publicized conference entitled “The Rise of Atheism”. The headline speaker is Richard Dawkins, biologist, author of “The God Delusion” and well known promoter of Atheism. Also the widely read English writer A C Grayling will be present, and the [...]

by Peter Corney
There is no effective leadership without power. By power I mean the ability to influence people organizations and structures, the ability to effect change. I will call this ‘real power.’ Such power can be acquired and used legitimately or illegitimately. Formal authority and power are connected but power can be exercised without formal [...]

by Peter Corney
The recent tragic events in Haiti (13/1/10) raise this question acutely for us once again, but the question is always with us because we all experience suffering in some form or other in our lives and the lives of those we love.
There are no simple or glib answers to this question, but [...]

By Peter Corney
Summary: Artists, writers, film makers and playwrights in the 20th C often reflected in their work a sense of alienation, of being alone in a hostile and dystopian world. There was a feeling of bleakness about the present and frequently an apocalyptic vision of the future like Orwell’s “1984”. Other examples are Colin [...]

By Peter Corney
When English Christians in the late 18th and early 19th C. began the process of sensitizing their nation’s conscience to it’s involvement in the Trans Atlantic slave trade they chose a very significant campaign logo. The logo was a picture of an African slave in chains, his hands raised in pleading, surrounded with [...]

An exercise for a church staff retreat or training day.
 If you lead a church with a staff team the following could be a very useful basis for a staff retreat or training day.
 One of the problems that can develop when staff are appointed to develop particular areas of ministry like youth or children’s ministry is [...]

Chapter Eight:  Leaders and Teams
By Peter Corney
(This is a free chapter from the new book A Passion for Leadership, Insights from Arrow Australia Leadership Team, edited by Peter Corney and Evonne Paddison. Coauthors include: Karl Faase, Stephen Hale, Evonne Paddison, Ian Harper, Sandy Jones, Graham Johnston and Stephen Abbott. It is published here under the [...]