Press release from the Church of England
The draft report referred to below is available for download here.
New ideas to secure England’s cathedrals for the future
17/01/2018
England’s historic cathedrals are one of the real success stories of the Church in the 21st Century, but should make changes to secure them for the future, a report published today finds.
The paper from the Church of England’s Cathedrals Working Group sets out new ideas on how cathedrals could be governed and funded.
The proposals, emerging from seven months of meetings and discussions, aim to recognise and enhance the vital role that cathedrals play while building a robust framework for the future.
A consultation on the recommendations opens today, seeking views from interested groups.
They range from recommendations on how the structure of Chapter – a cathedral’s traditional governing body – could be reformed to new financial auditing processes.
The Working Group was set up by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York after a small number of cathedrals highlighted challenges in governance and management.
The working group consulted with people from all parts of the cathedral sector and elsewhere, including charities and wider civil society, to develop the proposals.
At the heart of the recommendations is the retention of Chapter as the governing body of a cathedral, but with a clearer emphasis on its governance role. There would be a separate management function provided by a Senior Executive Team who will oversee day- to-day cathedral operations.
The report also makes proposals on key areas of leadership, financial control, safeguarding, oversight of building projects and stresses the urgency of opening a dialogue with Government about state funding for cathedrals.
Adrian Newman, Bishop of Stepney and Chair of the Cathedrals Working Group, said: “Cathedrals buck the trends of numerical decline, exert a growing influence in civil society, and demonstrate an effective way of engaging with contemporary culture.
“They are inspirational in their impact on our national life and on the lives of millions of worshippers and visitors each year.
“We hope that the recommendations in our report will encourage a much closer collaboration between cathedral and diocese, dean and bishop and point towards good practice in a cathedral’s wider relationships with the diocese and the national church. The mutuality of these relationships is vital.
“In proposing changes to governance structures and aspects of cathedral operations, we do not wish to inhibit the entrepreneurial flair that has characterised so much that is good about the world of cathedrals nor impose unnecessary red tape.
“However, we are committed to ensure that cathedrals do not get into situations which prevent them from thriving in their role as pioneers in mission and ministry.
“England’s cathedrals are an immense gift to Church and nation, and we hope that our report can help to form a better understanding of how this gift can be nurtured and protected, celebrated and safeguarded long in to the future.”
Adrian Dorber, chair of the Association of English Cathedrals, and Dean of Lichfield, said: “Cathedrals are the nation’s treasures – from protecting invaluable heritage such as Magna Carta and ancient shrines to supporting social enterprises helping the homeless and the vulnerable and offering inspirational daily worship to lift the spirits and providing a place for the nation to come to be healed at times of mourning or national crisis.
“Surely no-one would argue with a fresh look at the way we are run and financed, so we are excited about where this report may take us and look forward to the responses the consultation may bring and the final report.
“Our cathedrals have been here for hundreds of years, vibrant seats of mission, of learning, of heritage and of love, let’s ensure they are here for hundreds more.”
Notes for editors:
A lot of management speak,but little mention worship or the glory of God. But what does one expect from the C of E?
I was expecting a cynical reaction from one of your commentators. Paul Waddington did not disappoint. Had he read the report instead of just the Press Release, he would have seen several references to neutralise his criticism. Here’s one: “In the final analysis, the primary task of a cathedral is something that transcends regulation and scrutiny. It is the worship of Almighty God.”
John Barton’s quotation from the report is interesting in itself, because of course “the worship of Almighty God” does not, in fact, “transcend…regulation and scrutiny.” Every time a rubric occurs in a rite of the Established Church, it does so with some of the force of regulation. In relatively recent history, the Public Worship Regulation Act, the Lincoln Judgement, the advent of Series I, II and III and the liturgical changes which came about as a consequence, were all matters of legislation arising from scrutiny which had given rise to questions of good practice. When a report such as this… Read more »
@Paul Waddington: I read the article with interest and was taken aback by your negative remark, which not only criticized the report, but took a swipe at the Church of England. Your issues may be deeper, but reading this report did not make me feel the absence of a spiritual emphasis. One wou;d just assume those things. This article re the report would be immense if it dealt with all matters spiritual, pastoral, and liturgical. Not everything needs an explicit mention when the overall issue assumes that the reader understands these things.
Love Liam’s use of the word “hamartia”. I am now praying for the appointment of really distinguished theologians as our bishops, because I believe it’s what the CofE could genuinely benefit from now. 30 years ago I might not have felt that because I might have felt frustrated by a lack of parochial experience in our bishops, but that academic discipline is now what we need.
I think the Bishop of Stepney and his team have done an excellent job. There are tensions in some cathedrals and, as well as publishing a well-reasoned, positive draft report, I think they have steered as well they might between an episcopal Scylla and decanal Charybdis.
[decanal is a new word for me – I hope my usage is accurate]
Richard Grant’s point about ‘assuming’ the spiritualities reminds me of a piece in the June 2003 issue of ‘Evangelicals Now’. I am sure that august organ is daily reading for Thinking Anglicans readers, but in case anyone has forgotten the item in question, David Gibson wrote about ‘Assumed Evangelicalism’, and made the point that Evangelicalism would be asserted in the first generation, assumed by the second, and lost by the third. You don’t need to assent to David Gibson’s doctrinal commitments to see the sense in that. I also remember a POT day in the diocese in which I served… Read more »
It would be easy to snipe at this, and it’s tempting given that one of my churches is about the size of a small cathedral, such as Derby, Birmingham, Carlisle, but is staffed not by several paid clergy, paid musicians, paid administrators, paid finance directors, paid fabric managers etc—none of these—but by one third of a Vicar (only a third of me because I have two other churches, one almost as big). It has a regular congregation of about 35 and is situated in an increasingly Islamic area. But snipe I shall not. I don’t begrudge the cathedrals their worldly… Read more »
Not content with packing the bench of bishops with managers, to the exclusion of serious theologians and scholars, it seems deans must now go the same way. Robert Willis will be the last serious hymn writer to be Dean of Canterbury – or any other cathedral for that matter. It seems that residentiary canons are to be reduced to the status of glorified curates.
@Liam Beadle and others: the issue of “management” versus “spirituality” is the classic “secular and sacred” dichotomy that so much preoccupies those of a certain point of view. The question “Do Cathedrals exist for the worship of God or not?” Is certainly overwrought and unnecessary. It is, of course, rhetorical, since the answer is implied, so it is really a statement. The answer could not be “not”. The need for theology and theologians is asserted, yet there is poor theology in this question. Our Incarnational faith does not set the world and our God who came into the world against… Read more »
If these recommendations are accepted en bloc (no risk of the Archbhishops doing a ‘Carlile’ on this report, I suspect!), there will be several inevitable outcomes. First, we will have seen the last of the theologically adroit Deans (think of recent names like Michael Sadgrove, Wesley Carr, John Arnold, Michael Mayne, Nicholas Frayling and Frances Ward). Instead, we will be generally swamped by management junkies and, more particularly, HR gurus. That will be the death-knell, because what draws people to cathedrals is the quality of the spiritual leadership, the theological insightfulness – especially the preaching – and (to tweak Auden)… Read more »
Three comments: Since it was problems with some Deans that triggered this report I am puzzled that the report proposes increasing the power of Deans. The proposal for an annual MDR for Deans led by the bishop and lay person and requiring reports from the great and the good across city or county has surely not been time costed. Though it may be where concerns about Deans is still surfacing. The insistence that Deans line manages residentiary canons who report to him ignores the fact that in many cathedrals the residential canons often have other jobs. In my diocese one… Read more »
David Runcorn has hit the nail on the head. Like the drive for more ordinands, and the pressure for the CofE to blaze a trail on safeguarding, who is going to pay for all that this report recommends?
It surprises me that someone like Welby, supposed to be possessed of a business brain, is building a lot of houses on sand (or soundbites).
There needs to be a robust debate after detailed scrutiny of this report, otherwise we are going to see that good that cathedrals are contributing to the CofE going up in smoke.