During October 2025 we conducted a survey within CCC. Cognisant of the sizeable change in church life that has just taken place, planting North and becoming One Church in Three Congregations, we felt a survey would help us with two things;
- Alignment (a pulse-check) – are we becoming the kind of church we aspire to be? Does Christ City Church align with our values – mission, discipleship, community and leadership? Are we increasingly fulfilling our vision to make a positive difference for Christ, spiritually, culturally and socially, to the city of Dublin?
- Planning – both short-term, as we seek to focus more on evangelism in 2026; and long-term, as we plan for our fourth congregation in Wicklow. We want to ensure that the church remains healthy and strong as we grow, and that the right resources are put in the right places. And to fuel our prayers as we seek God for the future. We want to take time together to listen and discern what God is saying to us as a church.
We did a similar survey in 2016 and 2021.
After receiving the results, the elders and leadership team reviewed the One Church results and the congregation teams (Central, South and North) reviewed the specific answers and results from their congregation. Each person who added their name was (or is being) followed up individually, and if anyone wants to speak to us then please don’t hesitate to get in touch – particularly if you responded to the survey with something that is important to you that hasn’t been addressed.
This blog brings together the results of the survey and the reflections of the leadership and congregation teams, displayed below in five sections
- General reflections
- Comparison with 2021 survey
- One church reflections
- Congregation-specific reflections – Central, South, North
- The survey results (in graph form)
For those who prefer something more visual, here is the slideshow that we presented to the wider leaders in January 2026, or you can listen to the 15 minute summary at the 2026 AGM here – CCC Central (18:24mins), CCC South (18:18mins), CCC North (9:31mins)
1. General reflections
Thank you
Firstly a big thank you to those who filled in the survey. We had 95 responses in total (44 Central, 35 South, 16 North). CCC (in October 2025) had 135 members and 225 who came regularly/semi-regularly on Sundays. We’re grateful for the time given and honesty of answers that were shared – this shows that people really care and take ownership of CCC. For this we praise God.
Overwhelmingly encouraging
If each category is given an average out of 5, then here is how we’re doing against our values;
- Mission – 3.70
- Community – 4.18
- Discipleship – 4.17
- Leadership – 4.17
On the whole, people in CCC feel like they meaningfully belong, are growing in their faith, are equipped to share the gospel and can see opportunities for leadership growth and use of gifts. For this we praise God.
Discerning trends and principles
One of the joys of doing a survey is to hear the vast and diverse feedback from the church. One of the things this reveals (as to be expected!) is that people have different perspectives and preferences in church life – sometimes the feedback given contradicts what someone else has said. As we have read the many comments and analysed the results, we wanted to discern:
- Trends – principles not preferences
- Priorities – what is urgent and what is important, what is for now and what is for later?
- Capacity – the need and opportunity is always greater than the ability
We’re thankful for your support and trust – if decisions are not to your preference, hopes or expectations.
There is a cost to church planting
This is not a surprise, but worth acknowledging. Pastoral care and mature disciples/leaders can be stretched. Existing ministries are put on hold and other potential new ministries are delayed (eg. CAP, Youth, Counselling Central, Internship, 6.30 leadership)
There is a great appreciation of what Central and South have ‘given away’ – especially Central who have ‘sent’ church planters on two occasions, firstly to South back in 2022 and now North in 2025.
To note – overall there are positive sentiments towards the Wicklow plant, with some concern of what this will mean for South/Central.
Unity in diversity – opportunity for us to grow
Different congregations have differing needs, desires and capacity. We are learning to be ‘One church, three congregations’. A key principle in the New Testament to help maintain unity in diversity is preferring others, being humble and serving others (John 13, Philippians 2 and Romans 12) – which is what Christ has done for us.
Going forward we need to hold the tensions of “appreciating the ‘whole’ whilst investing in ‘the local.’”
Danger of over-stretching – too much, too soon
There is so much passion and so many good ideas within CCC (for which we praise God), but we want to recognise that many people are already ‘at capacity’ in life and ministry and therefore we cannot just ‘add’ without ‘subtracting’ or ‘adding resource’ – we want to avoid overstretching, burnout, crowding out time for non-Christian friends / other activities.
2. Comparisons from 2021 survey
Mission (trending down). This was for two reasons – firstly the ‘helping the poor and marginalised’ question, with 59% either not sure or disagreeing1. Secondly, fewer people agree or strongly agree that they are confident to invite their non-Christian friends to church (63% down from 77%).
Community (trending up). There’s a great sense of belonging and being known in CCC. This section has the highest number of ‘strongly agree’ answers (average 43.8%).
Discipleship (trending up). A lot of people feel they are growing in their faith and how this relates to everyday life, they have someone to help them grow as a Christian and they appreciate the Sunday preaching. It is encouraging that 85.2% answered ‘agree’ or ‘strongly agree’ to say they would feel comfortable praying with the person next to them after a Sunday service.
Leadership (the same). In terms of training leaders, making decisions and handling finances, things were roughly the same with the vast majority saying agree or strongly agree (there were more ‘agrees’ in 2025 rather than ‘strongly agrees’ from 2021).
1 It is worth noting that we changed the wording to add “in Dublin” this time, so it doesn’t reflect our support of Vinjeru in Zambia
3. One Church Reflections (CCC as a whole)
There are four areas that became clear areas of focus from the survey results:
- The poor
- Evangelism
- Discipleship/Life Groups
- Church structures
The poor – champions and signposting (+ pick up CAP in due course)
Two introductory comments. Firstly, the way this question was worded potentially created too high a bar2. But it seemed to be the least understood of all our values (Do we do this? How do we do this?), and there was a consistent encouragement that we could/should do more. Secondly, it is worth bearing in mind the difference between ‘the church as an institution’ and ‘the church made up of individuals’ – in other words, CCC already does a lot (through its members) in the way of serving the poor and engaging with social needs in Dublin. However, as an institution – aside from two banquets and our financial giving – we are not actively pursuing any partnership, projects or events that specifically help the poor, and want to be careful we don’t try to commit to something we cannot sustain (see above about over-stretching). In time, as capacity increases in church life, we will pick up our partnership with Christians Against Poverty – to help those in financial distress. Steve has just stepped down from being the founding chair of CAP, with the hope to give his time in the future to our partnership with CAP.
One thing we can do better at is shining a light and supporting the existing CCC members who already are engaged with different social action projects in the city and beyond. We want to create ‘champions’ in church life who can champion the cause of different projects in the city and signpost church members who have passion and time to get involved.
We have created a webpage to help us in this aim, which we will develop over time – https://www.christcitychurch.ie/social-action-ministries/. We specifically think there could be seasonal efforts from City Groups to help in certain areas, as we have already done – IPAS Collection (South), Great Big Giveaway (One Church), Team Hope Shoeboxes (individuals and CGs). We want to give ‘oxygen’ and ‘rope’ to City Groups to pursue this. If you know of other projects CCCers are involved with that we could ‘champion and signpost’ to please get in touch.
Finally we want to celebrate and continue to invest in the banquets, and support Central as they run those twice a year. They are a great blessing to many in the city and a good example of social action and evangelism going hand-in-hand.
2 The question was – is CCC regularly and effectively helping the poor and marginalised of Dublin?
Evangelism – equip members, run 321 course
It is very striking from the survey that people are (a) equipped to share the gospel, on the whole have non-Christian friends, but (b) don’t have regular opportunities to share the gospel. We hope the 321 Course will help with that – we’ll run this in City Groups in May, and then as three congregations (so three separate courses) in October.
Additionally, it was striking to see that 36% of the church are either not sure, or disagree/strongly disagree regarding confidence to invite their friends to church/ We want to consider changes we can make to church services (eg. length of services and sermons), especially when it’s a special service (child thanksgiving, baptism, Easter, Christmas etc) to ensure no unnecessary barriers get in the way of non-Christians hearing the gospel.
During February and March we are running some training on ‘sharing your faith’ – all the details are here.
Finally, following Sam Chan’s excellent idea we want to consider ways to ‘merge our universes’ (where non-Christian friends and church friends have natural spaces to be together); or as Dan Strange calls it, create Magnetic Spaces (places where non-Christians and Christians engage in something meaningful together). Social action projects could be a help here.
Discipleship/Life Groups – clarify and provide options
Regarding discipleship and life groups we want to clarify the different discipleship pathways (taking away anything that seems ‘secretive’). There are three avenues for discipleship in CCC (on top of regular attendance of Sunday worship and midweek City Group)
- Existing Discipleship Life Groups – not intended to be ‘secretive’ – it’s a capacity and fit question (eg. one criteria to join is a 3 year commitment). There are plans to multiply groups as we grow more leaders within the existing groups, and as people with ability and desire to join a new group
- Accountability Discipleship (and Christian friendship) – we aim to provide more encouragement, training and support (yearly seminar)
- Provide group discipleship options – within congregations, as needs and opportunities arise
You can read and listen to more about life groups from our seminar on accountability life groups.
Church Structures – review and simplify, gradually adapt, improve communication
We are not a simple church. We are one church in three congregations, soon to be four. We are learning and adapting to this, and it is not always clear how decisions are made or who has governance over which area, and how different leadership and governance teams operate together.
We have tried to outline this in a leadership matrix, and separate documents on our church polity page
Firstly, we do need to accept some of the changes that come from bigger and multi-congregation churches. Bigger and more complex churches have different dynamics. There is increasing complexity, and a change in relational connectivity and understanding and differences on the informality / formality and spontaneity / planned scales. This isn’t necessarily good or bad, but it is a change, and that takes time to adapt to.
Steve will have (summer 2026) a sabbatical study project through Crosslands, which will include visiting similar churches to ours in the UK, to learn and reflect on how best to structure and ensure CCC remains healthy and strong as we grow. Additionally there will be a bigger review after we plant the Wicklow congregation (Sept 2028).
In the short term we want to strengthen the overall leadership team and Central congregation in particular. In the longer term, as North grows and Wicklow is sent, we want to appoint more elders and deacons, and strengthen each congregation team – Central, South, North, Wicklow.
4. Congregation specific reflections – Central, South, North
To see specific reflections from each congregation please see slides 11-13 from the wider leaders gathering, or these 1-pagers written by Neil (Central), Emma (South) and Maffy (North).
5. The survey results (in graph form)
As mentioned at the start, if you would like to speak to anyone on the leadership or congregation team about the survey, or what you inputted, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
Thank you again for the time and care you have shown by engaging with this survey. We trust God as we look to the future – that He will guide us and give us wisdom and courage as we seek to reach the lost with the gospel, and serve the peace and prosperity of Dublin and beyond.