Welcome to Portsmouth Cathedral's Season of Generosity. As we embark on this annual tradition, we are reminded of the profound impact our collective efforts have on our community. Your unwavering support enables us to continue our mission, from our daily worship and music to our transformative work within the Diocese, the City, and local schools.

Despite the challenges we face, your generosity ensures we can serve our community and preserve our Cathedral for future generations. Join us in reaffirming our commitment to one another and to the gospel we serve, and consider making a contribution to support our vital work.

Together, we can continue to write the next chapter of Portsmouth Cathedral's story to the glory of God.

Thank you for your steadfast commitment and support.

The Very Reverend Dr Anthony Cane 
Dean of Portsmouth

The Season of Generosity is a time to explore what it means to be generous as individuals and a community. Alongside giving our time and talents, financial generosity is part of our response to God's overflowing generosity to us, and so will be inviting our community to consider their donations to the Cathedral.

In 2024 the Season of Generosity runs across a 'Focus Fortnight' between 11th and 27th June during which time we aim to have conversations with all of our giving community about their support.

Supporters will receive updates on our work as well as a letter from Dean Anthony and an edition of our new Supporter Newsletter, keeping them informed on the impact of their donations

Our congregations and worshipping communities can also expect to hear more about the Season of Generosity as it relates to Christian teachings of giving and generosity.

There will also be the chance to speak with our new Head of Fundraising, CP Robinson who joined the Cathedral Staff in January 2024 from a background in charity fundraising. He will be at a range of services throughout the 'Focus Fortnight' and very happy to discuss giving to Portsmouth Cathedral's mission, building, and work.

We will invite 'pledges' to the Season of Generosity to be returned to the Cathedral in order to be dedicated at services on Sunday 7th July where we will collectively give thanks to our communities and to God for the continued support of all who donate to us.

Congregational Regular Donations – the planned, regular financial support from our Cathedral community who give by Direct Debit, Standing Orders, through Planned Envelopes and more.

Commercial – income from trading such as our shop, events and venue hire, and rental income from our offices and properties

Cathedral Sustainability Fund – grants to pay the salaries of several staff members which we started receiving after Covid. These grants are time-limited and funding has already begun to expire or decrease for these gradually

Gifts in Wills - we have been truly touched by the recent gifts made in the wills of those close to our Cathedral who have recently passed. We invest much of the money left to us as a 'legacy' to ensure that the impact of such generosity is seen for many, many years.

Church Commissioners – we receive a significant grant from the central church every year in recognition of the fact that Portsmouth Cathedral is a smaller Cathedral with fewer resources and a much smaller estate than others

Individual Giving - from the small, cash donations left in our donation boxes, to the contactless giving terminals used by many of our tourist groups, up to the large gifts made by our most generous supporters for specific programmes or areas of our work

Grants & Partnerships – we are continually applying for grant funding to support much of our work, and building new relationships with family trusts, foundations, and corporate partners who may look to support larger projects and new areas of work in the future.

In recent years, this gap (also called financial deficit) has been plugged by the Cathedral drawing down on our savings and investments (also called reserves). This is an unsustainable way to run the Cathedral as our savings are intended to help us pay for major fabric works to the Cathedral building in the future, and to act as a buffer in case of financial uncertainty. Instead, we have been using some of them for our day-to-day running costs. 

Through effective management of our accounts, we have been able to ensure that this issue does not get any worse, even while we invest in building our staff team and maintaining our work and mission. We currently anticipate a gap of £104,000 this year and do expect this gap to grow in the future as grant funding for key staff begins to conclude. 

We need your help to fill this gap in our income.

This includes things like insurance, utilities, essential maintenance and clergy housing. These costs do not include the stipends of our clergy team, as these are paid directly by the central church.

The rest of our income is spent on our music and ministry work, our learning & engagement programmes, the costs of our staff and the costs of raising money, developing engaging events for our visitors, and ensuring that the heritage of our Grade I listed building is conserved for the future.

Since 2019 we have cut expenditure by 47% to help us weather the financial effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. Any further cuts to our expenditure would risk our ability to fulfil our obligations as a Cathedral.

We have made particular savings in our utilities by advancing our programme of carbon net-zero works which have reduced both our reliance on fossil fuel energy supplies, and the increasing costs of using them.

• Growing the number of visitors substantially through better marketing and more events and things for people to do at the Cathedral who aren't already part of our community. We're increasing the ways in which local, national, and international visitors can support our work.
• Increasing income from our shop with new bespoke merchandise lines. Initially these were funded from Government support, but have been well received and we have launched new lines annually, with more planned for 2024 and 2025
• Making the most of our buildings, whether through more hiring of our spaces for events or through ensuring the limited properties we own and let are run commercially

• Increasing our fundraising income, diversifying the range of our income streams and becoming more innovative with our fundraising methods. We are working to refresh our legacies programme and relaunching our Sing Joyfully campaign to support the work of our music teams. We are also building new relationships with individuals, charitable trusts and foundations to support key projects, building advance support for future developments to the Cathedrals
• Keeping our spending low, whilst investing our limited income to grow the revenue streams described above, ensuring we have skilled professionals with sector specific experience leading this work.