All Hallows — the future
Following on from last year’s AGM
Last May at the All Hallows AGM, Ray introduced a discussion on the future of All Hallows, which he called ‘The Vanishing Vicar’. This was partly prompted by a process in the diocese (in the wider Anglican church) where parishes were told that due to a lack of priests and a lack of funding, not every parish could expect a full-time paid vicar. But it was more inspired by a sense that the role of ‘Vicar’ was perhaps a thing of the past that needed to be let go of in order to both rediscover the calling of a priest and liberate the space for real lay-led ministry.
Ray pointed out that All Hallows has been promised a full-time stipendiary clergy post until 2011. But rather than wait for a default solution of sharing a stipendiary clergy post with another parish or a group of other parishes after that time, we could start to explore possibilities and find a more creative way forward for All Hallows which is more in keeping with who we are and how we want to witness to our faith.
A group from the PCC and ministry team
Since then a group was formed from members of the PCC and ministry team (Alison T; Ray; Steve; James J; Jan B; Sarah F; Rachel P; Andrew P) to prepare a process for All Hallows as a church to discuss how we might take this forward.
The vicar really is vanishing now!
And then, injecting a sense of urgency into the proceedings, Ray felt a vocation to move on to other things, possibly as soon as April 2007, which makes it sensible to think sooner rather than later what we need in the way of a priest/ministry. It’s important to note that while this will mean a decision on if/what sort of/priest to recruit now, we are still exploring the longer-term future of ministry at All Hallows.
What the group has explored up till now
The group has met several times and had extensive discussions centring round:
- What All Hallows is to us — what makes us the church we are and what must we sustain, whatever changes occur, and how can any changes in our pattern of priestly ministry ensure we hold firm to our central values? Some examples of what we thought about this: A theological space for holding things loosely; a gathered community but also a dispersed community; commitment to the locality even though we don’t all live there; deep engagement and radicalism worn (mostly) quite lightly; building community but ready to fight together on issues; a passionate church; space for lesbian and gay Christians; a history — continuity of All Hallows over many years; women’s ministry; creative liturgy; reflective space; freedom from stultifying hierarchy; a church of friendship where we treasure people.
- What is the priestly role and are there other things the church would want a priest to do? (most of these functions are not unique to a priest’s role) — a priest for the locality; sacramental ministry; ministry of the word and a prophetic voice; pastoral care; spiritual guidance; praying the offices. Perhaps fundamentally a ‘holding’ of the church in prayer and vision.
- What other roles have been taken on by the vicar which could be taken on by a future vicar or by others? — Community project management; peace witness; interfaith work; support for gay and lesbian Christians, etc.
- What are our ‘assets’ within the congregation? — e.g. fab preachers from within the congregation and people who are gifted and experienced in many ways — teaching, worship, singing, listening, praying, befriending. A priest (David) who has taken on some ministry within the parish. Katharine Salmon’s sense of calling to priestly ministry at All Hallows (yet to be tested by the wider church).
- Where are our fragile areas? — what needs nurture, where do we need to develop, and what might crumble if not properly sustained? We didn’t think of any specific examples here (it was the end of a meeting!) but important to think further on this one.
- The vicarage — within any decision on a paid priest for the parish we must also consider the vicarage and the people who are currently living there — Enid, Natasha and Becky.
Where from here?
There will be two sessions to which we would love as many people as possible to come.
Saturday 10th February 10am — 1pm followed by lunch (provided and free!!)
This session will focus on who we want to be as a church. What is important to us and what must we not lose whatever practical options we decide on for ministry? Please think about this and come with all your hopes, and — very importantly — fears, for the future.
Monday 19th February 7.30 — 9.30pm
This session will look at the practical options for the future and how we take this process further.
The group’s thinking on the options for the future is that there are four different paths which we should discuss. Please note that not all of these will be automatically acceptable (and some in the end may not be acceptable at all) to the diocesan hierarchy, so any decision we come to will be dependent on negotiation with the diocese, but we felt it important not to close down debate at this stage but to get a feeling for what the church as a whole feels the way forward should be.
Option 1A full-time paid priest with a remit to help us through a transition to becoming more lay-led over the next five years Option 2A paid priest using half her/his time in the parish and half to be used for a diocese-wide function (the one we discussed being an asylum-seeker chaplain) Option 3A priest paid half-time and the parish using the other half of the stipend (priest’s pay) to pay lay people to fulfil roles within the parish Option 4Using the whole stipend to pay lay people to fulfil roles in the church (i.e. no paid priest) |
NB the above options are not intended to be seen as the only possible ones, they are just the ones which we felt gave a clear idea of the range to be discussed, so any further ideas/combinations please bring them along to the discussions.
The Ministry Team were keen to let folk know that they are already looking at ways to manage the time immediately after Ray leaves so that these meetings are freed up to look at the future ‘big picture’ rather than getting bogged down in concerns about how we manage in the immediate future.
If you can’t come to one or both of the sessions, please take the time to have a chat with one of the members of the group so that your thoughts can be passed on. Otherwise, see you there!