No discussion of Synod as of yet, so I thought I’d re-post my daily blog reports.

Synod - Day 1

Synod commenced at 4pm today with the Presidential address, given by the Archbishop. I really wanted to be there for that, but a last minute emergency kept me back at work for a couple of hours. Fortunately, it is all available online.

I arrived in time for the evening session, 7pm. We had an hour long presentation on Connect09, given by Russell Powell and Andrew Nixon. It focused on what a number of pro-active parishes are already doing to gear up for the outreach. It was very encouraging. Kudos to Andrew especially - a year ago Connect09 was a hazy mess, and the vibe in parish land was pretty cynical. But there is a feeling now that the whole thing is gathering a lot of momentum.

About 8pm we had a liturgical service, including a sermon and communion. It was good to worship together. I guess about 800 people were present, just about every seat was taken in the Wesley Centre on Pitt St, where Synod is held every year.

And that was Synod day 1. Tomorrow we get down to business with a number of motions being debated and voted on.

Synod - Day 2

I arrived at Synod at about 4:45pm. The auditorium was packed, and it was difficult to find a seat. There were quite a few legislative motions to pass, including next years budget. Necessary stuff, but not thrilling. There were, however, two very interesting debates, bookending the more mundane stuff.

Women’s Ordination

A motion was put forward asking the Synod to recognise that some within the diocese believed in ordaining female priests, and asked for the Archbishop to look for “creative” ways to allow them to practice their beliefs while living side-by-side with the conservative majority. After about 50 minutes of debate, the motion was put to Synod and defeated. I imagine this battle will keep coming up. It’s a pain, but it’s also a good opportunity for Synod to affirm it’s commitment to the biblical teaching.

The Diocesan Mission Mid-Point Report

We were also given a presentation on the Diocesan Mission Mid-Point Report, and spent some time afterward in discussion and questions. It was an encouraging time. Lots of interesting stuff was said, but I’ll highlight three points that stood out for me.

Missional

Everyone is using the term missional now - the Archbishop, the Dean, the bishops, the reports, etc. It’s an acceptable piece of new vocabularly in the diocese. I believe it is equivalent to what we used to call “mission-minded” back in the old days. But missional is a much better word.

Church Planting

With regards to our progress in church planting, the Dean made a very good point. Between 1950 and 2000, Sydney diocese (like all other denominations) was closing congregations, as Australia de-Christianised. Since about 2000 we’ve stopped closing congregations, and have actually added about 140. Much more needs to be done, clearly - but we’ve actually turned around a pretty disasterous trend. It’s something to be encouraged by.

Missional Church Leaders

The issue of so-called entrepeneurial, missional church leaders came up. The Dean commented that we desperately needed such men, and they seem to be in short supply. Warwick DeJersey, Centenial Park, suggested that AFES was doing a much better job than the diocese at recruiting such men, and that we needed to look at ways to compete.

The Archbishop then said something that surprised me with it’s his frankness. He said that AFES was a much more attractive option for missional leaders than ordained ministry. AFES allowed such leaders to immediately start planting and leading right after college, and it gave them the freedom to do whatever was necessary. In contrast, ordained ministry requires the candidate to spend 3 or 4 years as an assistant immediately out of college. After that, he will likely be given a small church, with a dysfunctional building and about 50 people who will do everything in their power to stop him from making changes. Such a path was not very attractive to energetic, missional, entrepeneurial church leaders.

Everyone knows this is true, I was just surprised to hear it articulated in public. No solution was offered to the problem, but I have no doubt that our senior clergy are grappling with it behind closed doors. That’s encouraging in itself.

Synod finished at 9:30.

Hi Craig,

Thanks for putting the rest of us “in the picture”.

However, for the ABP to say :

The Archbishop then said something that surprised me with it’s his frankness..........In contrast, ordained ministry requires the candidate to spend 3 or 4 years as an assistant immediately out of college. After that, he will likely be given a small church, with a dysfunctional building and about 50 people who will do everything in their power to stop him from making changes. Such a path was not very attractive to energetic, missional, entrepeneurial church leaders”

is not very encouraging at all. Did you hear him right ? What a put-down !

If it is true, then what hope is there ?

I was encouraged to see a real problem acknowledged with honesty.

Then how do we move on ?

I’ve also been blogging the Synod.

Of course AFES ministry is attractive and is a great way to serve Jesus. It brings different challenges to parish ministry. I wouldn’t be in parish ministry if it wasn’t for the Moore grads who went into AFES ministry. They wouldn’t have been in AFES ministry if it wasn’t for the Sydney Anglican Chaplain that recruited them

Just to clarify Craig’s post #1 and in response to Kevin’s queries:

1) Some of the specifics Craig attributed to the Archbishop were actually articulated by the Dean.  But they were in agreement on the general ‘attractiveness’ of Anglican parish ministry issue.

2) They were not commenting, as I understood them, on the value of parish ministry, nor even their own views on how attractive it was or wasn’t.  Rather, they were making what I took to be a very reasonable observation: that for many young guys looking at vocational ministry from the beginning point, an AFES style option which allows them to get into it quickly and with far fewer constraints is likely to seem more enticing than 4 years theological college + 4 years assistant minister posting and then potentially a first posting as senior minister in a small, struggling parish.

Bob

...then potentially a first posting as senior minister in a small, struggling parish.

Agreed Bob. But I think the “sting” is not so much that the parish will be small and struggling, but that it is likely to be unwilling to change.

A friend has commented to me that some of our talented young men spend all their youthful enthusiasm and energy trying to move the immovable. By the time they inevitably leave the parish, they are jaded and exhausted.

Better by far if they could start from scratch...but that has a set of associated challenges too.

Michael Kellahan - 15 October 2008 12:47 AM

I’ve also been blogging the Synod.

Thanks for your comments on blog, Mike (and you too, Craig).

One thing I haven’t heard of as being addressed is the gospel according to Driscoll ;-) chapter 2 verse 16:

16. There’s a lot of number 2 guys in number one slots.

Number 2 guys are not bad guys, they are just not good number one guys. Number one guys are teachers, leaders, innovators; but because of the system of tenure, number 2 guys stay in number 1 slots. Number 2 guys in number 1 slots need to step back like John the Baptist with Jesus. It requires humility, a devotion to see all things, all means, for the salvation of some. When a number 2 guy is in a number 1 slot, a church will survive but it will not multiply, and so there is no sense of necessity to do anything with any haste.

(From Driscoll’s talk at St Andrew’s Cathedral).

Now, I specifically exclude good friends like Mike K from this generalized Driscoll blast. But I would also want to say that as far as blasts go, this one is very kind. I have heard some absolute horror stories in recent months of how faithful assistants have been treated by their senior ministers; situations which if we were governed by secular law rather than church law would in some cases have ended in the courts under unfair dismissal laws. The sheer number of such stories convinces me that we have a serious systemic problem here in the Anglican church in Sydney.

But assistant ministers are not represented at Synod, and the very people most directly responsible for their employment conditions (that is, the rectors) are the ones who are at Synod, voting.

The point being that we ought not simply to assume that the problem lies with 50 obstructionist individuals sitting in the pews. There are some great leaders amongst our rectors in Sydney churches, don’t get me wrong. But there are also some rectors who are, as Driscoll gently put it, number 2 guys in number 1 positions.

The flip-side of this problem is that there are currently some number 1 guys serving in number 2 positions under rectors of the sort Driscoll describes. And if the rector feels too threatened by the competence of his assistant, that assistant (after 4 years of theological training and numerous personal sacrifices) finds themselves out of a job and looking to organizations like the Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students (AFES) for better opportunities.

As a non-Anglican, Archbishop Jensen’s address struck me as a sincere Christian gentleman with a genuine love for souls. However I disagree with his view of what constitutes a pure Gospel, and I can’t believe female ordiantion is not as important as the gay issue. You see I see the Apostolic injunction against it, as coming from Jesus..He that hears you , hears me....and Jeus enjoins us all to obey all his commandments.

Gordon, I have not thought of Driscoll’s #16 as applying to Rectors. I will have to think more about that.

One concern I have had for many years is that we put the less experienced men into very struggling parishes, and the more experienced men into parishes that could almost run themselves… surely there is an anomaly there. I have made moves to parishes which were more challenging (for me) than the previous ones.

I was heartened by the recognition that as a diocese we have stopped closing churches and instead we are planting more, & more than heartened by the recent moves to work in the very hard and challenging parishes, now attracting the title “deserts"… does that mean other places, the “oases”, are more like “the desserts” than the “deserts”?

Gordon

‘a serious systemic problem’…mmmm I have been thinking this for many years now.

I call it ‘emotional abuse’.

Thanks for raising the matter.

Di

I’ve also heard about a LOT of poisonous Rector - Asst Minister relationships. Something is clearly not right…

Robert Denham - 15 October 2008 09:00 AM

One concern I have had for many years is that we put the less experienced men into very struggling parishes

I wonder if the diocese could send in management consultants to these parishes to assess the likelihood of their survival. If they are likely to survive and thrive then give them all the short term assistance that’s needed (financial, manpower etc). If they’re unlikely to survive, encourage the parish council to amalgamate the congregation with an adjacent parish by offering inducements to that outcome (eg by providing some of the money from the sale of buildings to go towards improving facilities at the adjacent parish who may need to take on extra staff).

Where I live out east, there are (in my opinion) too many struggling churches in close proximity with too few parishioners to keep parishes viable. There are 3 or 4 Anglican churches within a 5 minute drive from my home, each of them with congregations that are well under 200 members. One of these churches has just had a church plant. My fear is that this will simply perpetuate the problem and possibly further strain the other churches where members consider relocating to the church plant. The diocese has to seriously consider the wisdom of single minister parishes. The minister has to be almost super-human to manage well all the responsibilities of a modern parish without assistants (even with a reasonably able parish council).

My concern is that there’s a reluctance to close parishes on a diocesan level because no one wants to say we closed X churches this year, especially when our plan is for church growth. I would argue that every healthy institution self-prunes, freeing up assets (money from sale of buildings, personnel etc) to enhance growth in other areas. Is it possible we as a diocese are well overdue for a good pruning and this is hampering growth?

Angus Johnson - 15 October 2008 10:42 AM

I wonder if the diocese could send in management consultants to these parishes …

Angus,

I certainly hope that that bit was tongue in cheek!

Cheers,
Andrew

Policy 4 of the Mission is about making the necessary changes.
One concern I have with comments like

There are 3 Anglican churches within a 5 minute drive from my home, each of them with congregations that are well under 200 members.

I want to ensure that in the changes of attitude and then practice that is occuring & being discussed in synod, that we do not fail in caring for the people in struggling places. Our Archbishop wants us to identify the deserts and lost tribes, and then focus on reaching them, but at the same time there is the push for doing “successful” ministry which tends to mean quick responses & rewards for effort put in. (For those with synod papers, look at the Midpoint Report p16, which will be discussed tonight. “Strategic thinking” now appears to yearn for “quickest return in terms of increased resources and so should be given first priority”. That is not bad in itself, as it means building up our resources so we can then reach the more difficult areas, & we want to see more people in the kingdom, but who knows where the Spirit is blowing? How do we know where revival may break out? We are yearning for the middle Australia patches growing on the outskirts of the city (& they are important), but what about TAFE ministry… what about the middle eastern areas, what about the Korean ministries, what about the support of hurting clergy who feel marginalised or depressed, ... (the list can go on & on).

It is easier to wipe the slate clean & start fresh in a place to build a congregation, even though that is hard work. It is much harder to begin with the people God has already in a place, with their local tradition & history & relationship difficulties, and to enthuse them to want to pray, connect and expect in a way which helps them to grow and mature as the church grows. But that is the task which faces more of our trained and ordained people than seeking to plant where no man has yet ventured.

I want our diocese to grow in the way it shows practical care in supporting all ministries, not just glorying in the ones which seem to be able to build rapidly, otherwise we really won’t be growing in our love for our neighbours instead we will be coveting the few neighbours who seem to “succeed”.