Terms and conditions

Pastoral care organisational membership

Terms and conditions

A pastoral care organisational member needs to have a Christian foundation and accept ACC’s Statement of Faith.

A pastoral care organisational members (church) needs to have a recognised Christian tradition that can identify with Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox churches’ beliefs and faith expressions and accept ACC’s Statement of Faith.

The organisation will:

Be aware and supportive of ACC’s vision.
Hold the Guidelines for Good Practice in Pastoral Care for their pastoral workers.
Be accountable for their pastoral work and organisational practices to their denomination or central organisation (where applicable) and refrain from any activity that brings ACC or the wider ministry of pastoral care into disrepute. Please note ACC reserve the right to remove Pastoral Care Organisations from membership if they do not uphold the Guidelines for Good Practice on Pastoral Care or bring ACC into disrepute.
Uphold the principle and practice of equipping pastoral workers through training.
Uphold the principle and practice of supporting its pastoral workers through clear systems, caring for one another and establishing practices of self-reflection and self-care.
When offering services to the public, ensure the organisation has the ability to deliver these safely and competently. Adhere to good practice standards by:

offering a safe place for employed, contracted and voluntary staff and members of the public to work from and/or receive services from.
offering services to members of the public without unlawful discrimination. The Equality Act 2010 defines and describes various forms of discrimination in relation to nine protected characteristics. Good equality practice encourages consideration of other groups of people who may be marginalised or disadvantaged.
having open and fair recruitment policies which follow the letter and the spirit of the law in relation to protected characteristics (see above) for staff, contractors and volunteers.
having open and fair means of responding appropriately when a service user needs to raise a concern or a complaint.
having good governance processes and procedures which ensure that the affiliate operates within the UK and relevant devolved government legislations, maintains appropriate insurance cover for its areas of work, has appropriate financial management in place, treats employed, contractor and voluntary staff fairly in line with standard HR processes, and provides means of redress for employed and voluntary staff if they want to raise a grievance.
when advertising services, refrain from misleading members of the public about the services on offer.
where applicable, supporting staff and volunteers, encouraging ongoing training and development and selfcare activities.
where possible, gathering outcome measures and/or feedback and actively monitoring the effectiveness of the service on offer.

Nominate a named individual as the contact person who will circulate communications from ACC to others in the organisation.
Keep their membership record and contact details up to date.

¹ACC is an ecumenical Christian charity which recognises membership from those who identify with Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox churches’ beliefs and faith expressions.