Category: Blog Entry

This is the Scottish African Gospel Choir at the closing service of the Edinburgh 2010 Service in the Church of Scotland General Assembly this afternoon. At something over three hours, it nearly lasted into this evening and next year as well – described by John Bell, who was attempting some ‘on screen’ editing, as ‘possibly the longest service in Scottish history. But I doubt that.

Archbishop John Sentamu talked about mission. But the most striking moment was probably when we are asked to sit down by categories – people from Africa, Roman Catholics, women … And the relatively few left standing were told that they were the only ones who were present at the 1910 Conference. We do make progress.

I’ve been doing some broadcasting from Belfast – all recorded from Dundee – for BBC Thought for the Day.

I’m afraid that some of it is a bit self-indulgent .. but you might be interested in successive Tuesdays – one, two, three and four

The week has moved on .. to the opening of the Edinburgh 2010 World Missionary Conference which marks the centenary of the great conference of 1910. That conference is generally held to have marked the start of the modern ecumenical movement.

Earlier in the day, I met the Anglican delegates and we had an interesting conversation about mission today – they came from everywhere including Brazil, Hong Kong, Canada, Uganda. Later I went to the opening ceremonies and found I was sitting at the meal beside Mano Rumalshah, recently-retired Bishop of Peshawar. His wife Benita was the leader of Alison’s Bible Study Group at the Lambeth Conference. The world church is both a big place and a small place.

We had much John Bell-led singing, greeting and praying. It’s been 10 years in the planning and there have been many ups and downs along the way. A great event and a credit to the organisers.

I suppose it sounds a little ungrateful – but I spent three hours today at Scone Palace waiting to greet Prince Charles at a Reception for the 800th Anniversary of Perth. Still the chat and the networking were good and I met all sorts of people that I wouldn’t have encountered without that. So.

But before that I had another of my ‘I hope I’m not getting out of touch’ meetings with a group of our clergy in Bridge of Allan. We talked of many things and they made me think hard about Anglican Communion issues – which I welcomed. And then a Casting the Net meeting with the Vestry in our congregation in Kirkcaldy – I’m meeting the Vestries when congregations decide to take part in the congregational development bit of the programme.

I’m still thinking about Invictus – the Mandela film which I watched on the way home. It’s all the stuff about his involvement with the Springboks – and their captain Francois Pienaar. There’s much debate about whether it was all as pre-meditated as the film suggests. But it reminded me again about the power of symbol – probably more often seen in its negative potential. But Mandela put on the Springbok jersey and the rest is history as it were. Part of the lostness of Ireland was that we never seemed to have people who could make that leap of heart and mind and use symbol creatively.

Time to be home. We have about ten days now before General Synod and lots of things happening between now and then – not least the Edinburgh 2010 Conference. I’m looking forward to meeting the Anglican delegates in Edinburgh next week.

It’s been a good experience here – three days of intensive training with a group of about 30 bishops. They are mainly American but also Canadian and Irish. We got a rerun of the ‘hat and stick’ session – can’t do that often enough – and I sat in the corner of the Year 1 Media Training which I did last year. In my view, it’s the best – how to sit, how to look, how to stay ‘on message’, how to disarm. And there was much more besides – like the 360 degree appraisal and Vocational Profile.

But I am more than ever grateful for the contacts and the chance of exploring where people are in a nuanced way. We didn’t happen to be at the same conference together – rather we’re having the same experiences together on equal terms so that creates a sense of belonging together. Meeting the same people again for a second year was a great help in deepening relationships.

Day Two of the bishop training here in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Last year’s session for beginners on the management of hat ‘n stick has been followed by sessions on the Bishop in the Liturgy. I’ve been realising for myself how significant are the liturgies where the bishop is in the center – ordinations, institutions, consecrations. They are powerful dramas and in that sense accessible – as they need to be when many in the congregations at such services are there to support a person rather than because of their own faith commitment. We’ve been looking at the theology which the liturgy expresses – and which shapes how it should be done.

We’ve had a go at the BVP – Bishop’s Vocational Profile – 360 degree appraisal. That’s been fascinating – an opportunity to take a walk on one’s shadow side. I’m going to practise doing anodyne when I get home.

And finally the contacts – which are priceless. It’s not like being at a conference – we’re actually working together. So the Class of 2009 is a pretty close-knit group. It reminds me of something that I learnt in my past – one always assumes that other groups are more coherent, united, stronger, etc., than one’s own. The reality of course is somewhat different – no matter what the context in parish, diocese or province, we are all dealing with stresses and strains as we work out how to cohere in difficult times.

In my time as a Parish Priest, I worked with seven curates. Great variety and good company when times were difficult.

Friday night saw the Institution and Installation of Katharine Poulton as Dean of Ossory – which means the very fine Cathedral in Kilkenny. It’s probably the most senior appointment of a woman in ministry in the Church of Ireland to date – thinks have moved perhaps rather more slowly than some of us might have expected. Katharine was the first woman ordained in the Church of Ireland 23 years ago. This is what I said

Here’s something you ought to read if you have a moment. The Bishop of Gloucester, Michael Perham, writes to his clergy about Anglican Communion relationships in the light of the consecration of Canon Mary Glasspool as an Assistant Bishop of Los Angeles.

Just to make it easier, you can download it here

I hope to meet Bishop Mary Glasspool at the training for bishops in the US next week.

More Casting the Net …. I can’t find an acceptable way of describing ‘getting to the next stage’ without an unacceptable mixing of metaphors.

Anyway yesterday we gathered a great crowd of people – probably well over half the congregations in the diocese represented – and set up a series of workshops and other things all over the Cathedral. What did we do? Well there was drumming and Godly Play for children and workshops on mission and drama. I did three sessions in the baptistry – one on reading the bible in church, one on ‘To believe or not to believe’ and one on ‘What really happens at Communion?’ I remain completely astonished by the appetite which there is for talking/exploring sessions of that kind. I need to do more. In the Lady Chapel, our Spirituality Group was giving people some guided meditation. We ended with a Eucharist ‘in the round’ with African chant and all sorts of other excitements.

So where does all this fit in? Two things, it seems to me. One is that an event like this gives people a chance to ‘taste’ all sorts of things without needing to ask ‘Will it work?’ or ‘Is it a good idea?’ The other is that, as congregations gradually develop mission plans, they will begin looking for some of these resources – so this is a way of encouraging people to believe that we can provide what is needed when the time comes.

It was great though. Organised in quite a hurry. I found myself with people many of whom I didn’t know. Even some of the people running it were people I didn’t know. In a small church like the SEC, that is both unusual and healthy!

Sometimes the juxtpositions of things are just a bit hard to cope with.

If you’ll forgive a namedrop … I was about to process into St Paul’s on Tuesday evening when one of the Aldermen of the City of London said to me, ‘Your church seems to be growing very quickly. Everybody I know north of the border belongs to the Scottish Episcopal Church’ Which somewhat begs a question about how many people he knows north of the border. But it is highly likely that they are indeed members of the Scottish Episcopal Church.

Anyway, I thought back to the previous evening and the meeting which John Ferguson-Smith and I had with the Vestries of Glenrothes, Lochgelly and Leven as we try to find the money to appoint a Rector. We all try our very best and we’ll get there – but it’s a struggle. And I thought forward to my meeting today with the Electoral Synod for the Diocese of Argyll and The Isles in Oban and the challenge of sustaining congregational life in small numbers across big geography.

Along the way, I read a cheering book about the decline of Welsh Churches – ‘Against the Tide’ by DP Davies. They’ve all declined. Chapel in the Valley most of all – and especially those which were entirely Welsh-speaking. His conclusion seemed to be that only conservative expressions of church would survive. I know that there is strong evidence for that – but I also think that conservative expressions of church risk being ever more out of tune with people in the kind of secular society which is developing around us.