Chaplain’s Blog Stardate
Last month I fell for the advertising of a fee month of audible subscription for audio books and it has been great for my couple of hours of dog walking each day! When my first ‘credit’ ran out I looked for some free texts and found Timothy West reading “Barchester Towers” – 24 hours plus of glorious story telling about the ecclesiastical goings-on of the fictional Diocese of Barchester in the 1850s where miscommunication (amongst other things) causes a myriad of problems. It has made me laugh and to the think about the parallels and differences with the church today and our own diocese.
I had occasion to pop into the Old Cathedral School, where the church offices are now, last week and was given the warmest of greetings by all which was in in sharp contrast to the frosty political manoeuvrings of the Barchester Bishop’s Palace! My purpose that day was to chat to our new head of Ministry, Isaac, about Lay ministry in general and we were joined by Bob Moffet a reader from North Cornwall who had replied at length to my previous blogs on the subject.
The question posed was,” What does the kingdom of God, the congregations and wider community, require of Licensed Lay ministers and lay leaders and what is the best way to provide capacity? “
Thoughts:
When I took my first services as a reader back in the late 1980s, matins and evensong were the order of the day in several benefice churches with only St Andrews having a eucharist every week and it had an additional 8am ‘said’ communion service. These days, Redruth is a united single parish of five church buildings with regular lay-led services. In all of them and communion services interspersed where capacity allows. For part of the congregations, the lack of Sunday communion in their particular church building is a sad loss. They could, of course, go to one of the other churches to receive communion but for the most part they do not.
Around the diocese the situation is much worse in some places, according to Readers who have spoken to me about their situation, especially where parishes are in vacancy. The service of Holy Communion by Extension has been mooted as an answer but the rules around it which involve taking the already consecrated host from another church that morning and not held over from a previous mid-week or the previous Sunday make life very difficult especially where travel between churches down narrow country lanes is involved. I understand that in some places the rules are used merely as a guideline to actual practice!
There is a difference between need and want. Congregations say they want many things from a priest in every church, to young people who like old services or change as long as they can sit in the same pew and sing the hymns they like. What they need and what their church in the wider sense of the word, needs could well be different altogether.
But without a priest there are no proper communion services, and if there are no Readers either then there is nobody theologically trained to help guide and lead. Worship leaders can be wonderful but is an 8 week x 2 hours course enough not to be accused of dumbing down and to ensure that the theology holds true to Anglican belief?”
My feeling is that we need to find a way of training more readers by offering a variety of training pathways from the current model with ‘Spiritus’ (the old SWMTC) and apprenticeship and local training. If a degree is important to someone then there is always the Open University!
More controversially, should the transfer of vocation from Reader to Priest be made simpler and less onerous? Would it provide more priests more quickly and satisfy parish wants for communion services?
I offer no answers, merely questions for debate, and just because I pose the question does not mean I think I have the answer.
Happy new year…
Jim