Essentials
To Stay or Go?
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- Written by: Paul Hunt
To Stay or To Go?
A maelstrom of political, social and religious factors, mixed with theological divisions and zeal for God were tearing the Anglican Church apart.
Sinful or godly motivations were hard to discern as clergy and lay people faced hard choices about whether they would stay in the Anglican Church or leave.
People agonized over their options and at what point their threshold of faithfulness to the word of God meant they should leave and shake off the limitations of the church structures. Some with the same commitment to faithfulness led them intentionally to stay, and seek to reform the church from the inside.
Some ministers started independent churches, some stayed, but quietly “broke the rules”. Still others left, but felt torn by the decision and the damage to congregations they had left behind. Some criticised those who left, some criticised those who stayed.
A present day scenario?
Well, yes, but the description above refers to a defining year in the Church of England. It was 1662 and the Act of Uniformity required ministers to assent to its declarations and restrictions and to only use the 1662 Book of Common Prayer in their public worship.
In a short but extremely illuminating book, Gospel Trials in 1662: To Stay or to Go? [82 pages The Latimer Trust, 2012, ISBN 978-1906327132.]Dr. Peter Adam (former Principal of Ridley College, Melbourne) outlines the pain and struggle over the years before and after that had a profound effect on the Church of England, such influences that carry over into today's challenges. This is a timely, readable and relevant book, from an “elder statesman” of the evangelical wing of the Anglican Church in Australia.
Between 1660 and 1662 an astounding 1,760 of its clergy, 20%, left the Anglican Church, unable, for various reasons to stay.
In analysing the historical context and causes of the divisions, theological foundations and assumptions, the political and social factors that precipitated such changes, Peter Adam raises some helpful questions and indeed gives some direct advice for our current context, and the basis on which some might choose to remain within the Anglican Church in their context, or choose to leave.
He doesn't gloss over the complexities1 nor give a definitive answer as to why people left in such numbers, rather he suggests that there was no one issue and hence no single answer as to why people left, such were the assortment of factors at play. He reminds us of the difficulties at this distance to comprehend the intentions of the people involved, and in a helpful pastoral comment amidst the historical analysis, notes that human sinfulness rarely allows us to be completely honest about our motivations, no matter how self reflective we seek to be.
Nevertheless some motivations can be discerned, and you will find in this book a striking number of parallels with our present day.
Some did not want to accept the role of Bishops, or to have Bishops' powers changed. Some, though they found the Book of Common Prayer generally to their liking, were offended that no other prayers could be used except those authorised. This excluded extempore prayer, which offended the sensibilities of those who felt there needed be more reliance on the work of the Holy Spirit.
Quakers saw no room for them under the strictures of The Act of Uniformity nor did a number of pastors of Puritan persuasion. Some, like Richard Baxter while acting as a Puritan pastor, stayed in the Church of England as a parishioner but not as a minister, so as to “to separate from them no further than they separate from God”.2
These “non conformists” started independent churches (sound familiar?) or held private meetings for teaching people the faith. But unlike today, these public or private meetings were under sanction from the government, as well as the Church of England, and persecution, fines, loss of property or imprisonment could result from rebellion against the Act of Uniformity.
Various acts of parliament in the years that followed turned the screws tighter against those who would not conform – “This was a persecution of Protestants by Protestants unique in Europe in its intensity and bitterness: another major question mark against the complacent English boast of a national history of tolerance”.3 Nonconformists were not allowed to graduate from Universities until the 19th Century!
While we in Australia do not yet feel such extreme pressures (although no doubt there are some who do indeed face hostility from liberal Bishops), some of our fellow Anglicans in the USA and Canada have faced persecution from The Episcopal Churches. They have lost their church properties, and through secular courts have been threatened with legal action including the threat of suing individuals who have sought, through convinced biblical reasons, to separate their churches or dioceses away from the liberal philosophies of a heterodox church.
In trying to identify some factors as to why the division in the Church of England occurred and so many ministers left, Peter Adam gives us reason to reflect on our own church context and practice.
Some of it was due to the political agenda pursued by the Puritans, some to the failure of Puritanism to actually bring about the change in the hearts of people that should be expected of those who were committed to listening to faithful preaching from the Scriptures.
While skepticism of scholastic preaching – that is detailed academic and intellectual ways of doing theology and paying close attention to the text - would likely not be a weakness of current-day evangelical Anglicanism (although it might be in other parts of the Australian church), the Puritan commitment to the medieval style of preaching – taking a short text of scripture and analysing and dissecting it, seemed to be too far above the minds (and hearts?) of ordinary people so that it “became increasingly culturally inappropriate and unacceptable”.4
While those who are preachers today lament that many in our congregations seem to think that most sermons, no matter how long, are “too long”, Puritan sermons were routinely an hour or so in length, and became unpopular in being caught up in the minutia of the text.
One Puritan, Joseph Carryl, in thinking Job would be an appropriate book for a suffering church, began as Peter Adam sagely says a “perhaps pastorally unwise” decision to preach on it for 29 years!
There were class divisions undermining the Reformed movement (not such an issue in egalitarian Australia?), and a weakness within reformed theology that led to Arianism, Deism and Unitarianism creeping into the church, whilst Calvinist ministers fought over the extent of Christ's atonement – “only for the elect or for the whole world?” These theologically founded fights, though different in emphasis, are evident amongst Australian Anglican churches today.
The Preface to the Book of Common Prayer” says
Christ's Gospel is not Ceremonial Law, (as much as Moses' Law was) but it is a Religion to serve God, not in the bondage of the figure or shadow, but in the freedom of the Spirit…
Adam says, “While the rhetoric of the Church of England appeared to promise liberty, the practice was very different… The Act of Uniformity felt like bondage,not liberty”.5
Clergy in Australia today who work under liberal bishops can find similarly that their “liberal” bishops do not tolerate questioning or dissent, and sometimes work actively against the practice and placement of evangelical clergy in parishes as well as seek to micro manage the practice of their ministries. “Liberalism” can tolerate great diversity, but sometimes be very intolerant of evangelicals with little “liberty” offered to them.
Despite all the ructions and divisions that surrounded it, Peter Adam also says the Church of England in 1662 is rightly described as “Reformed Anglicanism” and 1662 a key to Anglican identity even today. He argues that its formularies and emphasis on Scripture as the final place of authority above church councils helps its reformed flavour, even if it did over time become broader in practice and lose some of its cutting gospel edge.
Peter Adam finishes his book with some helpful lessons and wise advice as the Anglican Church of Australia faces its own internal tensions over numerous issues – from the role of women in ordained or bishop's roles to the sexuality debate that has continued for decades. These issues in some cases divide evangelicals from evangelicals, in some cases evangelicals and liberals.
The Anglican Church worldwide faces great strains with the rise of the African initiated GAFCON movement, who no longer see the link with “Canterbury” as necessary to have an authentic Anglican identity.
Orthodox Anglican clergy, congregations and even dioceses are leaving the Episcopal Church in both North and South America. Some have suffered much in these circumstances, and some clergy in trying to work for the good of the Gospel and in seeking to be godly have seen their health broken and their ministries taken away.
The Church of England in England seems set for ongoing fights over numerous issues. Many of these are seen as battles for orthodoxy and it seems almost inevitable that more clergy, members of churches and congregations will need to decide whether “to stay or to go”.
Peter Adam identifies a lack of grace towards those who stay or those who go a major failure of Christian charity. In 1662, the Bishop of Exeter, a Reformed Anglican, described some of those who left as “enemies of the church”. “Those whom he should have loved as brothers in the gospel he dismissed because of their lack of Anglican order. Valuing conformity to church practice over gospel partnership is a great sin”.6
I was challenged by his comments - “it is difficult to think of a Biblical instruction to leave a church or to leave ministry in a church because it has fallen away from the Gospel. Jeremiah had to continue his ministry, and face the consequent persecution. Timothy seems to be the only minster in Ephesus… who was still faithful to Paul’s gospel, but he was instructed to stay, teach and reform”.7
He warns to not to be too quick to judge the motives of those who choose a different path, to be careful of being so critical that we focus on secondary matters and make them primary. That issue of course depends on your definitions of “primary” and “secondary”! He suggests that the Puritan problem – that their theological rigor led often to division and intolerance – may be true of some evangelical movements today.
Referencing the call to love and the fruit of the Spirit (1 Cor 13:4; Gal 5:22) he urges those of us who are pastors to be patient in ministry even though we are urgent for godly change and God's glory – “We need patience with individuals, much more patience with a congregation, and even more patience with a denomination or nation.”8 Aim to win people, not arguments he says. God is patient with our sin so we should show God's patience towards others.
In a caution to those who think leaving will solve many problems he notes “If you look from the perspective of the 21st Century, it could be argued that staying within the Church of England had as much gospel impact on the nation as leaving”.
If you are planning to leave he says, do not leave for trivial reasons, for “unnecessary schism is a sin”. He recognises that different people with different temperaments might be more likely to stay or to leave, one to reform within, another to offer through a new ministry something that the existing structures won't or can't.
He warns about thinking the pasture is greener on the side of leaving when you may not be in a good position to know the real cost to gospel-founded relationships if you leave.
For those who stay he encourages reforming your church by the Bible, making godly, appropriate changes. He even draws our attention to the strategy of the liberal part of the Anglican Church. They made their theological and ministry changes despite the objections of the orthodox, and those changes are now accepted as normal Anglican practice. His advice? – “Make changes, and suffer the consequences, and eventually the Church of England will change too”.9 On the certainty of outcome of that piece of advice I am more skeptical, although maybe I need a more historical perspective on our current day church!
Gospel trials are not unexpected; indeed they come upon those who seek to be the true church in every age. And while we need to plan long term – training future gospel leaders especially – he reminds the impatient amongst us that we must trust in the providential care of God and his accomplishment of his gospel plan for the world. It is a call to humility and recognition of the limits of our wisdom as we put into place our plans.
Of those 20% who left in 1662 he asks - “was it right to leave or to stay? It is not for us to say: each of us is accountable to God, not to each other.” (Romans 14:12).
“This booklet is dedicated to those who for the sake of Christ and the gospel, and to those who left, for the sake of Christ and the gospel. They honoured God by patiently enduring gospel trials, and by their lives and ministries. May their examples encourage us to fight the good fight, keep the faith and run the race, so that we, with them, may receive the crown”.
To that I say – Amen.
Paul Hunt is Rector of St Georges Anglican Church, Magill, Adelaide and Chair of EFAC-SA.
Secularism
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- Written by: Ben Underwood
Ungodless: Being Christian in a Secular Australia
There are always cultural challenges facing Christian believers. One set of challenges for our discipleship comes from living in our secular age, where the gospel is felt to be yesterday's discredited news. How can we face this cultural situation and make progress as Christians?
A statistic: Norman Morris Roy Morgan Research, wrote in April of this year, “By Easter next year, it could well be the first time that the majority of Australians don't affiliate with Christianity.” Morgan polls from late 2011 to early 2014 had Christian affiliation in Australia dropping from 60.9% of the population to 52.6% and trending down towards 50% and under.
A story: the decidedly godless journalist Paul Toohey recounts talking to Muslim women from Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan in Indonesia:
“Over tea served in glass cups the women were asking about Australia. […] They wanted to know about jobs, the cost of living and their level of acceptance as Muslims, should they make it. I told them that the greatest freedom Australia offered was the freedom not to believe in God. We'd more or less got rid of him; he was not required. One woman buried her face in her hands, appalled. They all looked slightly alarmed. But this was one bit of useful information I could provide. Their acceptance in Australia, if they made it and were not to disappear into strict cultural enclaves, would require them first to accept us. Then one of the women said something that started them all laughing. Maybe it didn't seem such a bad idea, living somewhere godless.”
Toohey casually and unapologetically presents godlessness as the foremost cultural conviction that Australians share, a source of the freedom we cherish together. If the downward trend in Christian affiliation continues, and if Toohey's view that being Australian means being godless increasingly shape our national psyche, how will we Christians approach being in a shrinking minority of ungodless Australians? Here are four kinds of response that I perceive amongst us.
Surrender
One response is to agree with the critics of Christianity and seek to remake Christianity to be a new thing that lines up with the new spirit of the age. I suggest this happens in liberal Christianity. People find it implausible that Jesus is the only mediator between God and human beings? Well, they are right! We Christians have to drop this myth of Christ’s uniqueness and learn to see God at work in all the religions of the world. People find it implausible that there is a personal God who made the world and hears our prayers and will judge the living and the dead? Well they are right! We Christians have to drop the literal interpretations of our theology and learn to see our doctrines simply as stories which help us live lives of love, which is the real point of Christianity, not being saved from death and hell. People find it implausible that we should take the sexual ethic of the Bible seriously today? Well they are right! We Christians have to drop our backward and repressed view of sex and have the compassion to let people do what comes naturally. In this way Christians abandon Christianity and become assimilated to the secular age, preaching the convictions of a secular age in the churches, in a kind of reverse evangelism.
I suggest that you also see the same thing in churches which preach the health and prosperity gospel. People want power to step up to a new level of material wealth, or to remake themselves as leaner, more disciplined, more successful individuals and so to reap the rewards our society bestows on the successful. Well, we Christians can help! God wants to bless people after all, and he wants to change and transform people and bring them into a better future, and his Spirit empowers us to do great things and fulfil our potential. So just believe in him and start living your best life now. In this way, too, Christians abandon Christianity, and become assimilated to the secular age, preaching the convictions of a secular age in the churches, in a kind of reverse evangelism. The first kind of alignment with the spirit of the age – liberalism – empties churches, but the second one – the prosperity gospel – fills them. Christians must attend to the spirit of our age, to be sure, but in order to commend the one gospel intelligibly to our age, not to remake the gospel in the spirit of our age. Let’s not surrender.
Fight
Another response to de-Christianisation is to fight tooth and nail to defend and preserve Christian truths and values against any erosion or marginalisation. This fight might involve political organisation aimed to keep a distinctively Christian voice articulating Christian concerns in the halls of power, and working political leverage to get legislation that reflects Christian convictions. So, for example, the Australian Christian Lobby introduce themselves on their website saying, “The vision of the Australian Christian Lobby is to see Christian principles and ethics accepted and influencing the way we are governed, do business and relate to each other as a community.” They and others use the tools of political and social activism – mobilising a base of supporters, keeping them informed, running public meetings, organising rallies, briefing politicians, writing social and political commentary, raising funds, presenting petitions, encouraging people to write to their local members. They do this to contest any legislation which might reflect values not compatible with Christian faith, and commend legislation that reflects Christian aspirations. Many Christians wish to encourage others to be active as Christian citizens and to be engaged and active politically, so that a Christian witness is preserved and we don’t lose a precious Christian social heritage without a fight.
Unlike the response of surrender there is something to be said for fighting, or, put less pugilistically, for Christians being engaged as citizens, expressing our preferences to our elected representatives in the various channels that operate in our society. It seems to me that there is an art to getting this right. Although we believe that Christ is Lord of everything including Australia, others do not share this conviction, and will not feel the Christian outlook has any inherently privileged place in shaping the laws and policies of our nation. We will be expected to make our contribution to the national discourse as citizens among our fellow citizens, rather than as natural chaplains to the nation assuming we have a special right to speak arising from cultural precedent or divine appointment. Commending Christ to all in that situation is where the art (and the need for good character) comes in.
Flight
Some do not think fight is the way ahead, perhaps because it will never be anything more than a doomed rearguard action. Instead of fight there is flight – a bunkering down into Christian enclaves of various kinds, leaving the mainstream culture and living apart, building a whole parallel structure of social institutions, where our counter culture can survive. In "Thoughts after Lambeth" T. S. Eliot wrote, "The World is trying the experiment of attempting to form a civilized but non-Christian mentality. The experiment will fail; but we must be very patient in awaiting its collapse; meanwhile redeeming the time: so that the Faith may be preserved alive through the dark ages before us; to renew and rebuild civilization, and save the World from suicide." This gets expressed in many ways. Take education for example. The state schools are lost, we say. If our children are to escape the black hole of secularism we need to take their education back and do it ourselves. Maybe taking our kids’ education means home schooling, maybe it means Christian schooling, but we need to preserve the faith while we await the collapse of the non-Christian experiment in education. Here’s another example: popular music is the tool of the devil. We must delete all our secular mp3s and listen to Christian bands only. Others would say that even that’s not enough. The very form of popular music is corrupt, and a properly Christian music sounds like Bach, or Handel. We need to hold onto the beauty and goodness and truth of God, and flee the culture of death surrounding us.
Like fight, there is something to be said for flight, that is leaving cultural forms and institutions that stifle, undermine or even persecute Christian aspirations in favour of alternative forms and institutions that express Christian convictions and aspirations more faithfully. Perhaps the traps this response can fall into are fear and contempt. The fear is fear that the world will overcome Christ. But ‘he that is in you is greater than he that is in the world.’ We should not flee in fear. The contempt is contempt of the world: let them all go to hell. But God so loved the world that he gave his only Son. We are still to love our neighbours, believers or not, and not to despise them or withdraw entirely from them. So our alternative forms and institutions should remain in touch with the wider society for the sake of that society.
Change the world (again)?
Another response is to say, well Christendom is dead, but that’s a mercy, because we are now back to purity of first century Christianity, and we can ditch the Constantinian baggage and start all over again to win the culture through authentic Christian living. The job is not a political fight nor a cultural flight, but grassroots movements with fresh expressions of church. No more denominations and parishes, it’s time to learn again how to plant churches and make disciples in a post-modern, post-Christian, secular, hedonistic and individualistic age. If we are on the margins now instead of in the centre, that’s ok, because Christianity works best from the margins. If the culture has turned away from God, that’s no reason for us to turn away from them, but rather to engage the culture again at every level – not in a defensive stance to preserve our ancient privilege, but as people who love our culture and want to reach it and renew it. Christian ministers need initiative, they need to be innovative and entrepreneurial and to empower the people of God, who in turn need to think through how their work and gifts and opportunities can bless and influence and beautify the world and see lives and whole societies transformed again. We need networks of culture-makers, supported by patrons in the great cities of the world, sparking new cultural movements in which Christians are leading figures and the Spirit is the animating genius.
This is also rousing stuff, and has much to commend it. Perhaps the dangers here lie in despising our inherited forms, and putting too much confidence in our projects of sociological re-engineering. It is a good moment to go back to the New Testament and scrutinise our traditions, practices, aims and expectations in light of a renewed careful study of the apostles’ teaching. But it would be passing strange if we decided to neglect or de-emphasise the most ancient and basic of Christian disciple-making structures and practices such as instruction in the scriptures, common prayer and praise, sacraments and designated leadership in local congregations which also maintain a fellowship of mutual recognition and help. It is also good to think carefully and creatively about how cultures are influenced and changed, but if we lay out a plan for how to change the world (based of course on the latest research and the most original and insightful analysis) we should do it with a good dash of humility. Maybe the world won’t change according to the theories of expert cultural analysts or the hunches of disillusioned mavericks.
Who will save us?
Who will save us and where does our power lie if we ungodless are become a dwindling minority? Will it be in the fighters, the flighters, the culture-makers, or someone else? As soon as you put it like that this answer suggests itself; God will save us and all his people, and the gospel is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes – Jew or Gentile. So our trust must be in God to preserve, transform and bless us who believe in Christ, and our confidence must be in the gospel as the power of God to bring salvation to the people around us and address the culture we live in.
If we do take seriously the idea that the gospel is the power of God for salvation, then we should take a moment to think through how the gospel goes to work amongst human beings. As the gospel is told, God brings human beings to a new birth by his Holy Spirit; he humbles sinners and lifts them up too as his forgiven children in Christ. They repent and confess their faith in him and he binds them together as members of one another in the fellowship of his church, and as his church gathers in local congregations he gives gifts to his people so that they can serve one another in love and grow up into Christ’s likeness together. In churches we brothers and sisters are taught and nourished with the word of God and in the world we walk in good deeds and speak the word of God. There is a new humanity in Christ; this new humanity has a counterculture, the word of God is its fountainhead and the church is its home. It is a counterculture that can also be carried everywhere we go, work, speak, write, play and rest, whether we go alone or with others. God’s basic programme – whether we are in the early church, or high Christendom or the ruins of Christendom – is laid out in the New Testament, and it does not change because the culture is not as receptive to it as it may once have been. Our hope is in the old, and long, and patient work of making disciples of Jesus, through the inculcation of the truths of the gospel of grace and the disciplines of faith and repentance in the fellowship of other Christians. Political activism, Christian counter-cultural institutions and culturally engaged new Christian endeavours must cluster around and flow out of what is central: gospel ministry, church, repentance and discipleship. Rising godlessness shapes our lives and churches and the deliberations of coming synods will be shaped by it too. Will our response to that godlessness, as we contribute to those deliberations, express confidence in God and his gospel, so that our activism, our institutions and our cultural engagement as Australian Anglican churches are shaped more and more by that confidence, and less and less by any surrender to the spirit of the age?
Ben Underwood oversees the 5pm congregation at St Matthew's Shenton Park in Perth.
Making it work in the parish - Caulfield
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- Written by: Mark Durie
Essentials asked Mark Durie how they went about combining three parishes into a team and how it worked out.
1. Which parishes did you combine and why?
St Catharine's South Caulfield, St Clement's Elsternwick, and St Mary's Caulfield partnered together for three years from 2012-2014. The three parishes are located next to each other in the inner southeast region of Melbourne. We partnered together in order to help launch a new young adult congregation at St Clement's and renew the parish of St Catharine's.
2. Can you give us a simple overview of the process that led to the parishes agreeing to combine?
At the start of the partnership the three churches, although next to each other, were in very different situations.
St Mary's had previously declined through the 1970's and 80's, and for a time its future had been in doubt. However the launch of a contemporary service in the early 1990's led to the development of a thriving congregation which today totals around 160 people, including many young families. For the past decade this community has been growing steadily.
St Catharine's was a small suburban church with a good site and a strong community with a wide variety of ages, but its congregation was small and for decades it had been a struggle to keep the church open.
St Clement's site is well located on a busy main road, but during a long incumbency it had gradually declined to a congregation of around a dozen mostly elderly regulars. Like St Catharine's, St Clement's was being sustained financially by a property lease, but its human resources had reached the point where it was unable to renew itself.
The Diocese, through our local Archdeacon, Brad Billings, invited three neighbouring parishes to consider partnering with St Clement's to assist it to find a new direction. St Mary's proposal was to plant a young adult congregation in the evening at St Clement's: the church site is in a prominent position at the end of a busy shopping strip which attracts many young adults. St Mary's proposal was received favourably by our regional Bishop, Paul White, who invited us to include St Catharine's in the relationship.
It so happened that the incumbencies of St Catharine's and St Clement's were vacant at the same time. The outcome of all this was that the three churches came together to partner for a three year period.
3. What does the new entity look like?
The partnership was created by two mechanisms, as laid out in a memorandum of understanding.
One was the appointment of a common incumbent. I was already serving as the incumbent of St Mary's, and was appointed as Priest-in-Charge of St Clement's and St Catharine's.
The other mechanism was a shared clergy team of four people who worked together across the three sites. I and RF, who were at St Mary's before the partnership joined up with Adam and Heather Cetrangolo, who came in from outside to focus on the church renewal and planting projects. The clergy took on evolving roles across the three churches as circumstances changed during the three years.
To simplify administration the clergy were paid through St Mary's, and the other two churches made contributions for staff costs according to the services they received. The three churches were in other respects formally distinct, each with their own vestry and wardens. Each church functioned separately, while sharing a staff team. However the congregations of the three churches came together for special events a few times a year, such as a Maundy Thursday passover meal.
4. What team (paid and volunteer) do you have and what do they do?
Each church's story is different. At St Catharine's the goal was congregational renewal. A small enthusiastic lay team led by a capable group of wardens welcomed change. Heather Cetrangolo took responsibility for worship, pastoral care, discipleship and developing a new vision - in short everything needed to grow the congregation - while I as priest-in-charge worked in the background with the wardens, looking after governance, budgeting, and property. There was much work to be done, changing service styles, discontinuing the organist's appointment - which the parish could no longer afford - and launching a new vision. Evangelism and discipleship programs led some on the fringes to come to faith and become committed members. A band emerged to support the launch of a new contemporary service. Exciting new programs such as a monthly community dinner proved a great success and helped bring new people into the church.
At St Clement's RF took on the task of assisting the existing congregation to grow in acceptance and support for the partnership. Under his experienced care they warmly embraced change, and the existing evening service was discontinued to make way for a new service. At the same time, while working at St Mary's for a year, Adam Cetrangolo was gathering a team of young adults to plant the new service at St Clement's. The new SALT service was launched in the middle of the second year of the partnership, and has drawn local young adults into the church. With a contemporary feel the SALT community has had the freedom to connect with young adults using forms of worship and discipling which appeal to its focus generation.
St Mary's community has continued to grow during the partnership. There are paid staff and a large team of volunteers involved in family programs such as Sunday School and playgroup. For the first two years Heather Cetrangolo, in addition to her duties at St Catharine's, also led a combined youth group based at St Mary's which drew young people from both St Mary's and St Catharine's. After a year of growth this work was taken over by a dedicated youth worker.
An unexpected parallel development during the partnership was the launch of a thriving Iranian congregation under the auspices of St Mary's. This arose from the work of an evangelist who became connected with St Mary's, and my interest in outreach to Muslims.
5. In what ways has it turned out to be a good idea? Has it been successful in stimulating evangelism and growth?
At this point the partnership is about to conclude.
From 1 October St Mary's and St Clement's are merging to form one parish, and St Catharine's will be standing on its own two feet with Adam Cetrangolo as the interim locum, while it continues its program of renewal, reaching out to unchurched people in its neighbourhood. The three church partnership gave St Catharine's new hope, and helped establish a base for the future. A good deal of enthusiasm exists in the parish to continue their efforts to grow the community.
A new service – SALT – has been established at St Clements, which is reading out to the young adults in our very secular and unchurched environment. An older dying congregation at St Clement's has been renewed in hope for the future as they have warmly embraced the emergence of SALT. Meanwhile St Mary's community has continued to grow and thrive, and has been blessed and enriched by a diverse staff team, with its varying and complementary talents.
St Mary's and St Clement's have merged into a multi-site parish in order to minister to all ages from the base of their complementary sites.
The partnership has been a fruitful training environment for two younger clergy, and enabled us to pool the gifts and experience of a team to achieve things which we would not have been able to do if we were working independently.
The final proof of what we have done will be apparent in the years ahead, as the many initiatives begun over the past three years continue to grow and bear fruit.
Dr Mark Durie, the Senior Pastor, and Pastor for the 10.30 am service at St Mary's, is a theologian, human rights activist, and Adjunct Research Fellow of the Centre for the Study of Islam and Other Faiths at Melbourne School of Theology.
http://www.smac.org.au/
http://www.markdurie.com/
Living in a Cross-Over Era
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- Written by: Stephen Hale
An outline of Stephen Hale's talk at the EFAC Emerging Leaders Conference 22nd September 2014
1. Three Stages of Human History
• Ancient World
Problem – fact of death
Solution – resurrection and new life
• Medieval World
Problem – forgiveness and satisfaction
Solution – grace by faith
• Modern/Post Modern World
Problem – is there any purpose to the universe
Solution – maximise choice – any solution is okay as long as it works for you
2. The Five Eras of Church History
a. 0-500 – Foundation to Christendom
b. 500-1000 – Holy Roman Empire to Great Schism – East and West split
c. 1000-1500 – Dark Ages up until the Great Reformation combined with Communication Revolution (Printing Press)
d. 1500-2000 – Spread of Church by Empire/Migration
e. 2000 - ? – Post Christendom/New Mission Era/Communication Revolution (Internet)
3. Where we are now?
A Cross Over Era
One way of being Church is coming to an end
A New Way of Church is emerging
An Era of Great opportunity – Church Planting/Re-planting
An Era of Significant Tension – Theologically/Ecclesially
An Era with a perplexing number of ideas on the way forward
4. Possible Responses to Where We Are Now?
i. Orthodoxy of Theology or Orthodoxy of Practice
Big ‘R’ Reformed and small ‘a’ Anglican or Big ‘A’ Anglican and small ‘r’ reformed
Many Australian Anglicans are in one of these places in their Diocese
ii. The Quest for Certainty
Endlessly pursuing reformed thinking
Endlessly pursuing Anglican thinking
iii. Denial and do nothing – the standard institutional response
‘nothing worse than doing the same thing again and again when you know it’s not working.’ (Borden)
Definition of insanity – ‘doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.’ (Einstein)
iv. Embracing Change and the many opportunities
eg. Network Churches – Adelaide, Kew
v. Mono Method Mania – everyone doing the same as everyone else
vi. Finding your own way/views/running with your hunches in a context where there is a perplexing array of opinions/movements/gurus
vii. Church Planting / Replanting
eg. Diocese of London
viii. Mission is everywhere and everywhere
-Local and Global
-Through church gathered and church scattered
5. St Paul’s Threefold Mission Vision/Purpose
2 Corinthians 10:15b-16a
Our hope is that, as your faith continues to grow, our sphere of activity among you will greatly expand, so that we can preach the gospel in the regions beyond you.
i. Ongoing growth in faith (maturing as disciples)
ii. Expanding gospel work locally
iii. Preaching to people by planting new congregations/churches
Every church needs to work through:
What is our purpose?
Why are we here?
What are we particularly seeking to contribute to the kingdom of God?
Mission (Why are we here?/What is our purpose?)
Vision (Where do we hope to end up?)
Values (Who are we?)
Strategic Directions (How will we get there?)
Essentials Summer 2014
- Details
- Written by: Dale Appleby
Essentials Summer 2014
Book Review: Sisters of Sinai: How Two Lady Adventurers Found The Hidden Gospels
- Details
- Written by: Dale Appleby
Sisters of Sinai: How Two Lady Adventurers Found The Hidden Gospels. Janet Soskice. Vintage Books 2010. ISBN 9780099546542.
Janet Soskice is Professor of Philosophical Theology in the University of Cambridge. She is the first Roman Catholic woman to be a Professor of Theology at one of the ancient British Universities. She has written a ripping story of two Presbyterian Scottish sisters who were awarded Honorary Doctorates by European Universities before Cambridge was awarding any kind of degrees to women.
Agnes and Margaret Smith were twins. Their mother died two weeks after their birth in 1843. Their father, a lawyer, brought them up in the tradition of strict Scots Calvinism, and encouraged their education, independence and foreign travel. He promised to take them to each country whose language they learnt. So they mastered French, German and Italian while still young. He died while they were still single and left them an enormous fortune. So they decided to travel down the Nile.
Read more: Book Review: Sisters of Sinai: How Two Lady Adventurers Found The Hidden Gospels
Book Review: Codex Sinaiticus: The Story of the World's Oldest Bible
- Details
- Written by: Dale Appleby
Codex Sinaiticus: The Story of the World's Oldest Bible. DC Parker. The British Library/Hendrickson 2010. ISBN 9780712358033
One of the moving experiences I remember well is seeing Codex Sinaiticus in the British Library some years ago. What it is, why it is important, and how it got to the Library is told in this very interesting book.
In one way the book is the report and promotion of the collaboration of four groups in the research, and making available to the world, of Codex Sinaiticus. The project came together in 2005 when the Archbishop of Sinai, the British Library, the Leipzig Library and the National Library of Russia, St Petersburg agreed to collaborate in making their different portions of the Codex available to the world.
This book is a report of the collaboration and an introduction to the Digital Project which now has the whole of the Codex viewable by anyone with access the World Wide Web [codexsinaiticus.org].
Read more: Book Review: Codex Sinaiticus: The Story of the World's Oldest Bible