What does the Faith Covenant do?

Connecting, exploring, taking action together

Faith communities play a positive role in their neighbourhood to support people most in need, strengthening resilience, reinforcing local identity and helping to connect communities.

The Essex Faith Covenant, the first county-wide Faith Covenant in the UK, was launched on 14^th October 2017. It continues to drive the partnership between faith communities and public services through a set of principles that guide engagement, aims to remove some of the mistrust that exists and promotes open, practical working on all levels. 

Since the launch, eleven local authorities have signed up to the Covenant (Basildon, Braintree, Brentwood, Castle Point, Chelmsford, Colchester, Epping Forest, Harlow, Maldon, Rochford, Uttlesford). Active Essex, Essex Police, Essex Fire, Office of the Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner and the local  mental trust are also signatories. A growing number of faith groups are also becoming involved bringing the total number of signatories to over 30.

By promoting tolerance and understanding of different faiths and working collaboratively, the Essex Faith Covenant aims to make a real difference and build more resilient and inclusive communities. In signing up to the Essex Faith Covenant, faith communities and public service partners pledge to follow a joint vision, a set of principles that unify us, and focus our attention on helping others. The overriding sentiment of that vision is that together we are stronger. Together, we can proactively build trust between faith groups and public services, we can create opportunities to learn from each other and share best practice, and we can come together to serve the community, particularly the most disadvantaged.

The priority for 2024/25 is supporting positive mental health outcomes This will be achieved by working collectively on the following actions:

1. Strengthen links with Neighbourhood Alliances

• Encourage Neighbourhood Alliances to become signatories to create closer links with faith communities
• Work with Neighbourhood Alliances to support faith communities understand where to go for local help and support, which will help to avoid health crises and hospital admittance.

2. Support Healthwatch Essex to help shape the future of the Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Services

• Encourage faith communities to get involved in volunteering opportunities linked to the Health Watch Ambassador Programmes, to ensure that people of faith are having their voices heard in decisions being made within local mental health services.
• Equip HWE staff to have a greater understanding of how faith groups support their community who may be experiencing mental health conditions. This would lead to more targeted support for people of faith by signposting them to groups which their local community are facilitating.

3. Promote access to mental health training

• Promote Mental Health First Aid training to faith communities

4. Convene events, promote positive mental health messages and increasing understanding of faith communities in Essex

• Hold a ‘Human Library’ in July in Chelmsford
• Hold an Inter Faith week event in November in Basildon