Category: Blog Entry

I know there are things in the Anglican Communion which clamour for our attention but .. and only two weeks after the entire Bogstead sanitation system had been replaced.

I knew we were in trouble when I cast an eye out the window at around 7 am this morning and saw my Chaplain hoisting his cassock and wading across [well – let’s not say what he was wading across]  the Samuel Seabury croquet lawn.  Certainly a major issue which required immediate episcopal attention.  The brown tide was inexorably rising and already lapping at the doorstep of the Bishop Bell Conservatory when Jock and his men arrived with the elbow length rubber gloves and various rods and jets.  Manhole covers were lifted.  Rodding eyes were uncovered.  Baths were filled and loos flushed.  Jock was clearly waiting for that satisfying ‘Schlurpf’ sound which would tell him that all was well – but it never came.  More a gradual sense – more I think of trust than of firm conviction – that order had been restored.

Dave suggests that I must have been ‘busy doing what bishops do’.  Actually, I couldn’t elbow my way into the Synod wifi and was reduced to my data card – which, in cost terms, is the blogging equivalent of driving a 4 by 4.  But while others talked about how the church must embrace the eco-agenda, I commuted steadily on the Brompton [in which I do not have shares] wearing my Bear Scotland yellow waistcoat.

One never approaches Synod with over-high expectations … but actually there was some good stuff.  The worship for example – particularly the opening Eucharist and particularly its music.  Our diocesan representatives seemed to be very visible and most of them spoke and spoke well.  The dinner was as convivial as ever with a wonderful speech from the Minister of St Giles Cathedral who, in the course of a wide-ranging address, introduced us to potential of the rural phone box as a place of sexual assignation and potential.

I spent some time trying to explain to the Scotsman that, although Synod appeared to have been hesitant about the Anglican Covenant, we were still in there.  We just don’t like Covenants.   Some Synod members had a short, sharp introduction to the practice of Voting by Orders when the proposed canonical revision of the definition of Membership was voted down by the Bishops – not guilty, I assure you.

I was particularly interested in the way Ian Paton gently challenged the idea of ‘inclusive’ as a self-evident good.  It’s the invitation which is for all ….   It seemed to me that his contribution took the issue out of the area of rights and entitlement and placed it in the area of discipleship and undeserved acceptance.

Finally, I came away having been elected as Convenor of the Mission and Ministry Board.  It embraces everything from training to ministry and many more besides – many things that I feel passionately about.  It’s full of remarkable people doing wonderful things.  It’s a great opportunity and, almost certainly, a poisoned chalice.  But that’s what it’s all about.

Still travelling the diocese with the policy … I was reminded last night of my old friend Tom Keightley – a great man for the pithy comment expressed in the patois of Upperlands, Co Derry.  ‘All superstructure and no infrastructure,’ said Tom.  He meant, I assume, that we could have lots of bright ideas but nobody to put them into practice.  And I learnt a bit of that last night.  In shaping the policy, we haven’t said enough about how good practice might be shared from one congregation to another.  We’ve said a lot about organisation and not enough about prayer.  Interesting this stuff of asking people what they think ….

I’m doing a series of meetings around the diocese at the moment – reception process for our new Diocesan Policy.  It’s the outcome of two years work and much involvement of clergy and laity.  If you’re interested, you’ll find it to download from our diocesan website.   I  think what I’ve found interesting so far is  the way in which the underlying challenge becomes clear as we talk about it.  The SEC is a small church.  It has survived by developing a strong sense of its independence – the shadow side of that is a church which is made up of ‘people like us’ and doesn’t seek a strong involvement in the wider community.  The challenge is to turn outwards and engage .. in mission and service.  The question is whether we dare to believe that a church which does that may grow stronger – while a church which lives to itself will inevitably grow weaker.

Poppy is very much enjoying the fine weather – indeed she was missing yesterday for at least five minutes.  We thought she had probably gone to visit the Guide House across the road from Blogstead but she had just moved her bird-watching activities a bit further down the back hedge.

Meanwhile, as with all Burmese cats, her fondness for ritual action grows daily.  I did a bit of surfing to try and find some research about it – but it doesn’t seem to be there.  Under the spare room bed – some minor shouting – some pawing of the ground – some almost allowing herself to be caught and then not – and finally she plays dead cat at my feet and graciously allows herself to be picked up.

But I suppose she’s a bit preoccupied, what with preparing for Lambeth and all that.  If she shares her thoughts on that subject with me, I’ll let you know.

You may have picked up the silly season spat on Thinking Anglicans highlighting bishops’ concerns about the ability of clergy to do the job.  It all started with a report in the Daily Telegraph which was in turn based on a report of the Ministry Division in the Church of England.  Bishop Alan of Buckingham does a bit of helpful debunking and I don’t think it’s true either.

A number of other things seem to me to be worth saying.  I think the job is immeasurably more difficult than it used to be.  I think clergy aspiration to do it well and encourage growth is higher than it has ever been.  I think the confusion of expectations about what the task is is greater than it has ever been.  I think the diversity of backgrounds and life experience from which clergy come is greater than it has ever been – a richness but also a challenge for formation.

And what do clergy think about the competence of bishops?  I do my best but I have had no training for what I do other than 30 years of sometimes jaundiced episcopal spectating from the parochial trenches.  And then there is that wonderful and ever sharpening clarity about the role and function of clergy which you acquire when you don’t have to do it yourself.  I maintain a cheery [and occasional] e mail correspondence with Terence,  my successor in the parish.  He’s sent me one or two lately which seemed to be saying, ‘David, in the 19 years you spent here, were you aware ……?’  Well actually – no I wasn’t.

Since today seems to be the day for Barack Obama, I thought I might mention his book, ‘The Audacity of Hope’ into which I’ve been dipping my toe. It’s described [rather surprisingly] by the Daily Telegraph as ‘aiming a missile of decency at the White House.’

I don’t expect much from this kind of book at this kind of moment. He begins by describing just that cynicism: ‘a cynicism not simply with politics but with the very notion of a public life …. nourished by a generation of broken promises.’ He’s a very able person – the book is well-written, clear. And he’s obviously done a lot of listening.

The interesting thing, of course, is the point in all of us where that cynicism risks being turned into hope – hope that this might rekindle the dream of what we thought Kennedy represented – hope that the dreadful Bush years might fade into unlamented history. In its way, the hope is as unrelated to reality as the cynicism.

Still – I’m hoping. And if you want to read what an Obama-supporting member of TEC thinks, have a look at Miss Dagurreotype

The other American – I’ve been reading Bishop Gene Robinson’s ‘In the Eye of the Storm’ – of which more another day.

Standing waiting to visit a Nursing Home today and found myself reading a notice for families of residents.  They’ve set up a Skype facility – pictures included – so that families and have a chat to their elderly relative and see how they are.  Sensible and costs nothing use of the internet.

We’re having our pre-Synod meeting tomorrow.  You may be interested to see what Kelvin thought of the same exercise in Glasgow.  I sat down this afternoon and read my way through all the papers.  It was a bit difficult because I am in sole charge of Poppy at present and she kept getting between me and the excitements of Congregational Status.

There’s a lot there but I’m not sure ..  Like Kelvin, I wonder a bit about the Congregational Status material.  Obviously it’s really important that we deal with the issue of multiple Vestries which most of our clergy have to deal with.  It absorbs time and kills initiative.  But I’m not sure that canonical change is the primary way in which that change should come about.

For the rest, I think there’s a disappointing amount of uncertainty – at a time when I think we are actually growing in confidence as a church.  We’re not sure about administrative structures and dioceses or the definition of membership.   The Review of Journey of the Baptised and New Century New Directions gives us a new point of departure in the development of mission and ministry – but there’s a lot of work to do.  And that’s before we look outside ourselves and ask if we have a helpful contribution to make to world Anglicanism pre [and I suspect even more importantly] post-Lambeth

Always interesting to live through a moment of real change – and I think this is one of them.  Usually wrong when you make a statement like that – but …  The oil price may dip a bit from its peak – whenever that may come.  But the fundamental problem is that demand is increasing and there is no more supply to be had.  So that means changes of behaviour for all of us.  Blogstead is of course a rural idyll – but we have all the car-dependency problems of people who live in the countryside.  I am starting to read the bus timetables.  I am beginning to obsess about slow broadband which limits our ability to use e-conferencing.  Soon everybody will have a Brompton Folding Bicycle and I shall have to find another way of asserting my individuality.

The other really interesting thing of course is how fragile our society appears in a moment like this.  Of course the haulage industry is in trouble – but so is everybody else.   Oil is a world market and there is next to nothing that an individual government can do about the price – other than with vastly expensive and un-green subsidies.  But suddenly the potential for chaos looms ..  Fragile indeed.