Bishop Martyn Snow shares his vision for the future.
[This article is from our Winter 2019 back issue. To read back issues dating back to 2015, please activate your subscription]
We all have a picture in our mind of what we think the Church should be. And we all have a picture of our own ideal ministry within that Church. However, most of us find out early in our ministry that the Church is far from what we hoped it would be, and our ministry is anything but ‘ideal’.
So the question comes, what do we do when we discover the gap between the ideal and the reality? There are of course, a number of options: we can quietly withdraw and do only the minimum necessary to maintain a semblance of still being in role; we can spend our time complaining, being resentful and blaming those we think are holding us back; or alternatively, we can learn to live with the dissonance and at the same time commit ourselves to the task of reform, of finding those small, one degree changes which over the course of a lifetime make a huge difference.
The Renewed Vision of CRC
The Central Readers’ Council (CRC) is committed to the task of reform. The changes may be small and, in some cases, quite subtle but we are convinced that ten or twenty years from now, we will look back and say the changes were significant.
We started to outline some of those changes in the booklet Resourcing Sunday to Saturday Faith. This has been warmly received and we want to thank those of you who have offered feedback. We hope many more will use the booklet to facilitate discussions between Readers / LLMs, clergy and other ministers.
The next step on our journey is a new title for our magazine – Transforming Ministry – and a new website. We hope that both will convey a sense of movement and dynamism. See also Ruth Haldane’s article on page 7. My aim in this article is to give some context for the changes within CRC and place them in the wider landscape of ‘reimagining ministry’ in the Church of England.
Ministry for a Christian Presence in Every Community
Earlier this year, the Ministry Council of the Church of England agreed a new vision statement titled Ministry for a Christian Presence in every Community. It starts with a wonderfully succinct statement about the purpose of the Church:
We are called to participate in and be transfigured by the dynamic being of the Triune God. Through God’s work of creation, Jesus’ incarnation and the gift of the Spirit we know God as relating and sending to realise God’s Kingdom. This relating and sending is God’s mission into which the Church is called to be wholeheartedly as witness and agent. Ministers serve God’s mission by enabling the Church’s participation, through the energising power of the Spirit.
The document then goes on to speak of the ministry of the whole people of God. This is hugely significant. It does not start with ordination (as in some previous documents), but neither does it play down the importance of ordained ministry:
It is from the Body, where everyone is called by God to worship, witness and service, that some are called to particular ministries to build up the Body and to represent and enable the ministry of the whole Church. This pattern is rooted in Scripture and expressed in the liturgies of ordination.
And there is a significant section on lay ministers:
Lay ministers exercise these gifts in particular ways to equip the saints for ministry in their communities and contexts. They are authorised by the bishop or others acting on the bishop’s behalf. This may involve licensing, authorising or commissioning depending upon the ministry. The range of lay ministries is constantly developing in response to God’s gift and call, and includes Reader and Licensed Lay Ministers, Church Wardens, youth and family workers, evangelists, pioneers, administrators, children’s workers.
Each lay ministry will involve discernment, equipping and continued support, and it is for bishops to ensure that this is undertaken in ways appropriate for the form of ministry.
Perhaps most significant of all is the document’s outlining of the shape of ministry needed at this moment in our history. There are four areas which are particularly highlighted:
- Ministry is relational, with God, the Church and the world – which implies the need for lifelong formation such that we grow in relationship with God, church and world.
- Ministry is missional, called to proclaim the gospel afresh in every generation – which emphasises the need for ministers who can equip others to proclaim the gospel in work and deed.
- Ministry is collaborative, given to build up the body of Christ – so all ministers need to know how to work in teams.
- Ministry is diverse and adaptive, as one body fosters many ministries – highlighting the need to discern the gifts of every baptised Christian and be open to new approaches to ministry.
Increasingly, these four characteristics will shape not just the work of Ministry Council but also the work of the whole Church in terms of discernment, training and support for all ministers. The change in emphasis may be subtle, but again it is all about changing course one degree so that over time we end up in a different place.
A new discernment framework and formation criteria for all ministers
Alongside this vision statement, a sub-group of ministry council chaired by the Bishop of Berwick has been conducting a ‘future clergy review’. Central to this review is the proposal for a new ‘discernment framework’ for those exploring ordination. Following agreement in principle from Ministry Council and the House of Bishops, I have now begun discussions with the Bishop of Berwick about how this new discernment framework might also apply to lay ministries. These discussions are at an early stage and we recognise the need for wide consultations before anything is agreed, but in summary the framework proposed involves a grid with six broad criteria each applied in four areas.
The criteria are:
- The call of God
- Love for God
- Love for people
- Wisdom
- Fruitfulness
- Potential
And each will be explored in terms of a candidate’s relationship to the Church, the World, God, and the Self.
I believe this provides a helpful framework for discernment and if applied well, carries the potential for a far more healthy approach to ministry which has less to do with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to ordained ministry or to a particular form of lay ministry, and much more to do with establishing where, on the wide spectrum of different ministries, someone is called to be.
It is also worth stating that a key driver in these changes is our learning about safeguarding. This will be much more explicit within the discernment work for all ministers and there will be much higher expectations of all ministers to be able to articulate a clear theology of safeguarding and know how to practice the Church’s new policies and procedures.
A new Lay Ministries Advisory Group
Readers of this magazine will know that Carrie Myers has been appointed to a new national role in the Church of England – Lay Ministry Officer. It has been a real joy to start working with Carrie and one of our first steps has been to establish a new sub-group of Ministry Council called the Lay Ministries Advisory Group. I’m also delighted that Canon Paula Gooder has agreed to act as Co-Chair of this group with me (hopefully modelling good clergy – lay collaboration!) We have high hopes that the group will raise the profile of lay ministry generally, enabling us to truly celebrate all that God is doing across the church. We will also be looking to address specific challenges e.g. the barriers experienced by people of certain backgrounds to entering authorised or licensed lay ministry. In time, we will be looking at the Bishops’ Regulations for Reader Ministry and possibly even the Canons – but we won’t rush these! Similarly, I don’t think that I am alone in not liking some of the terminology and titles we use – in my own diocese we are exploring calling all lay ministers ‘Associate Ministers’ as a title which will mean something to those outside Church, while also encouraging collaboration within the Church.
We will also be liaising with the Research and Statistics department at Church House Westminster who have started a major new research project into lay ministry. This is intended to give a much clearer picture of where we are now (and the diversity across dioceses) such that we can celebrate, grow and support lay ministry across the Church.
So where does this leave CRC?
I hope you will agree that all this constitutes an exciting new landscape for ministry generally, and lay ministry in particular. For some the changes may not be radical enough. For others, they will be too much. For me, they are ‘one-degree shifts’ which will have a long-term effect.
As I continue to visit Readers and LLMs in different dioceses (and you may be interested to know that our links with the Church in Wales are growing – they are busy translating the CRC booklet into Welsh, and next year I will be speaking at a Scottish Episcopal Church event), I am continually struck by the extraordinary commitment and energy of Readers. And I am also struck that the question: ‘What is distinctive about Reader / LLM ministry?’ never seems to go away (witness recent letters in this magazine). But this is not a question which worries me. I don’t believe something needs to be distinctive to be valued. What matters is that the ministry is offered as an act of service to God and to God’s people, that it is offered in collaboration with the whole variety of other ministries, and that our primary aim is to build up the Body of Christ (even though that Body, in its expression here on earth, is far from the ideal we might picture in our mind).
Increasingly, we hope that lay ministers will respond to the three pressing needs of the Church which we have discerned – teaching the faith to those new to the faith, enabling mission in the everyday, and leading in Church and society. This is where CRC will be focusing its energies in the years to come as we seek to support dioceses and individual Readers. In this way, we hope to play our part in ‘transforming ministry’.
The Right Reverend Martyn Snow is Bishop of Leicester and Chair of the Central Readers’ Council.
[This article is from our Winter 2019 back issue. To read back issues dating back to 2015, please activate your subscription]