Uniform at Synod

At the General Synod I wore my Sea Cadet Uniform for one day to draw attention to the great work done by lots of clergy and licensed lay ministers in uniformed youth organizations, especially the Cadets.

The Church Times printed a picture of me speaking.

Many Cadet Organizations seek Chaplains and it is a rewarding and enjoyable ministry which touches the lives of many young people in amazingly positive ways. In the Sea Cadets we say that we are #NeverOrdinary and that is certainly true.

I was speaking on the new Church Representation Rules and welcoming the provision being made for  congregations of church plants to have representation in Synodical structures. You can see my speech here  starting at 22:42, and the text I spoke from is below. Of course what one wrote down is never quite what one says!

It fell to me with the support of our indefatigable synodical secretary to steer through the London Diocesan Synod synodical representation for those worshipping in our BMO churches.

We understood that we were trail blazing and under the existing rules it was immensely complicated. I therefore welcome the explicit provision in these new rules.

I have three things to ask the Steering Committee to consider and possibly find some route to deal with.

How is the roll drawn up

First one of the problems with this is the establishment of an electoral roll where one is starting something new, without a previous roll on which to build. Our old rules allow for amalgamation but not for proliferation. These rules state in various places that the members shall be those who are declared to be so by the Leader of the Mission Initiative. The problem with this is that it potentially undermines trust; I believe it would be better to time limit the minster’s say-so to the first six months after which a roll composed of habitual worshippers should be maintained.

The principle of the Amendment

Second, under these rules 24 (3) a the diocesan synod makes the scheme and gives the Mission Initiative a scale of representation it chooses, ‘making due provision for the representation of the worshipping community’ . Does this mean that it might have more or less representation than a parish or guild church at the determination of the diocesan synod? I hope the principle must be that all worshippers should benefit from the same scale of representation? And so support the principle of Cliev Scowena amendment applied also to BMOs

Welcome another aspect of equity in the new rules

Finally, I think what we called the synodical bus stop has now been abolished, which if I am correct in how I have read these rules is much to be welcomed. Under the current rules, because scales of representation are determined on a triennial basis you can only add a unit to the structure once every three years, when the synodical bus arrives at the bus stop. If you don’t get on then, you miss it till next time. I hope I have read correctly that it is now possible to add a new unit by means of a scheme at any point in the cycle.

The legalisms seem horribly dry and as you can probably see I have struggled with it. I am grateful for Mr Scowen and others who have wrestled more effectively than I have with the detail. But the point is that we are allowing our synodical structures to include those in new worshipping communities which, as we grow, are increasingly normal; in the diocese of London we aspire by 2020 to have 1/5 of our churches worshipping in these structures. As we approach the centenary of the enabling act getting this right will prevent the Synod from slipping into irrelevance for many of our churches and bring the voice of many who are active in mission to our deliberations alongside those who are active in mission in our traditional churches.