Thinking Anglicans

Opinion – 11 January 2025

Rupert Shortt UnHerd How Justin Welby hollowed out the Church

Bosco Peters Liturgy Preaching 101

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Froghole
Froghole
4 hours ago

Per Rupert Shortt, the ‘hollowing out’ was already very well advanced in many places prior to Welby. By the mid-2000s dioceses like Canterbury, Chelmsford or Winchester had already re-formed into very large benefices in which incumbents had become de facto area deans. The transformation of Exeter and Carlisle dioceses into mission communities began, respectively, in 2003 and 2011. Over a decade ago Whittam Smith remarked that the Commissioners risked becoming a large fund with a dead Church attached. What happened under Welby was the development of a formula which would reduce political pressure on the Commissioners for a return to… Read more »

Last edited 4 hours ago by Froghole
Pax
Pax
Reply to  Froghole
4 hours ago

Perfectly expressed, thank you.

Too old to genuflect
Too old to genuflect
Reply to  Froghole
4 hours ago

I do wonder how much general parish visiting and pastoral care of parishioners, as opposed to gathered congregation, is done by the parish clergy of the shiny evangelical HTB/church plant clergy. In my experience, even 50 plus years ago, the evangelical parish clergy in South London were big on the gathered congregation but had not been ‘moved by God’ to visit ‘the parish’. In my experience the parish church can come to life if the people of the parish are cared for and served. Perhaps I am naive in thinking that it was those in particular that we were charged… Read more »

Janet Fife
Janet Fife
Reply to  Too old to genuflect
2 hours ago

When working I considered pastoral care to be an essential part of ministry. However, I increasingly found that unannounced visits weren’t welcome, except sometimes among the elderly, committed, and more traditional members of the congregation. People of working age are usually far too busy, and many people regard cold callers as an intrusion. What did work was going to people’s homes, by appointment, to discuss weddings, baptisms, or funerals. Home communions, also by appointment, were usually welcomed by the sick and elderly. The other factor is that clergy nowadays have far more to do than the clergy of 50 years… Read more »

Froghole
Froghole
Reply to  Too old to genuflect
1 hour ago

I have asked this very question about visiting many times during my travels across the country (now >7,000 churches), and I think that the answer is now ‘almost never’. If it is undertaken at all, then it is often done by lay pastoral assistants or volunteers, or by clergy (often retirees) taking the eucharist to the housebound. Too often it isn’t done. Many clergy seem to believe that the limited payoff in increased attendance does not warrant the effort of house to house visiting. This may well be true, but – honestly – how do many of them actually know,… Read more »

Lorenzo
Lorenzo
Reply to  Froghole
1 hour ago

Cold calling or any visiting without purpose (besides trying to bring peeps back to church) in a parish where only. a fraction of the population would consider themselves Anglican is pastoral suicide. I can relate, I really love it when the Witnesses see the vicarage as a challenge. Not.

Allan Sheath
Allan Sheath
Reply to  Froghole
3 hours ago

In a relatively well-off market town, the tactic I used to persuade the faithful to pay their parish share was to look on it as helping to fund Christian ministry in a deprived inner-city parish at the other end of the diocese. It worked very well, but I am left with the feeling that I sold the people of God a false prospectus.

Nigel Ashworth
Nigel Ashworth
2 hours ago

For a different overview of ++Justin’s ministry – and with some comment back to the archiepiscopate of ++Rowan – please see this thoughtful analysis by the Revd Dr Yazid Said under the William Temple Foundation imprimatur. It creatively references the thought of the 5th Century theologian Mark the Ascetic:
https://williamtemplefoundation.org.uk/church-and-state-in-a-post-welby-era/

Ruairidh (Rod) Gillis
Ruairidh (Rod) Gillis
Reply to  Nigel Ashworth
1 hour ago

Yes that is linked by TA on the previous January 8th Thread. Very Interesting. I commented there so i shan’t here.

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