Letters to the editor September 2008

AMS Staff | 1 September 2008

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Beyond the Communion drought

Perhaps John Sandeman’s “drought” of Holy Communion is bound up in legislation (SC, July). I did not see Jesus putting limitations on the Lord’s Supper and who was to administer it. He simply said to “do this in remembrance of me”.
Perhaps we as Anglicans need to re-think what the instruction means and not confine the Lord’s Supper to those occasions where a limited number of authorised people are present to preside.
Surely, deacons and suitably qualified lay readers could preside at this part of our services of worship and in homes and retirement villages, where Christians need to take bread and wine as part of their “communion” with our Lord and fellow believers.

Ian Vickery
Aged Care chaplain,
Southern Highlands, NSW

John Sandeman has highlighted a problem with the move to only ordain men as presbyters when they are on their way to being rectors. As he provocatively puts it, prepare for a drought in Holy Communion. However, there are two deeper issues at stake.
The first is political. The fact is, lay presidency of the Lord’s Supper is unthinkable for leaders of Global South Anglican churches, and so to continue the joint work of promoting Bible-based global Anglicanism, opening up the leadership of the Lord’s Supper to lay people and deacons will move to the back-burner.
But the real issue at stake here is the nature of pastoral leadership in the congregation. Leaders exercise a spiritual role in the life of the church – as the author of the letter to the Hebrews puts it, they ‘keep watch over your souls and will give an account’. The exercise of that spiritual role includes preaching, as well as presiding at the Lord’s Supper (which is best understood as a ‘visible word’ and therefore visible preaching). The fact is that this role is often exercised by more than one person, especially in a larger church, or a multi-site church. We formalise that role in ordaining men to the presbyterate. There is no reason to restrict that to one person per parish, and every reason to make sure that the roles reflect the spiritual reality.
Underneath this is an important goal – promoting the option of long-term assistant ministers. But the way to do it is not to pretend they don’t exercise a similar kind of spiritual role in the congregation to the rector, and therefore not ordain them as presbyters. Ironically, it could have precisely the opposite effect than the intended one, and make it less likely that people will remain long-term assistant ministers. This would be significant, since one of the reasons we Sydney Anglicans seem incapable of growing genuinely large churches (say, more than 1000 people) is that we struggle to keep long-term senior assistant ministers.

The Rev Andrew Katay
Ashfield, NSW

Despair at Driscoll mini-mes

I’ve just received yet another letter from an ex-congregation family, broken-hearted by our local Reformissional Rev. No, I haven’t read the book, even though my own ‘mini-Driscoll’ demanded Parish Council read a chapter at every meeting. Driscoll may be a fine man of God, and there may even be a need for shock tactics in breaking through to the lost. But I’m not sure people need to be told God hates them – when enough people already hate themselves. It seems hard enough to convince them that God “so loved” them.
My church is full of bruised reeds. Will the Driscoll ideology care for them? Or should they simply be weeded out to make room for blokey “pig-shooters”? It’s one thing to call a Pharisee a hypocrite – quite another to tell a leper he’s unclean.
I applaud at least Driscoll’s despair at those who seek to imitate him rather than Christ.

Name and address supplied

I’ve been listening to Mark Driscoll for a few years now, and so I was really pleased to hear he was coming to Australia. Back then he was a bit of an underground figure, still very raw and controversial.
It’s a bit strange to see how mainstream he has become, sharing the platform with the Packers, Carsons and Pipers of the world. Mark has grown up a bit and so has his audience. God willing, the grunge and the controversy will soon be forgotten, and he will be known primarily for being a passionate and faithful preacher of the gospel.

Craig Schwarze
Annandale, NSW

Developers make us poor

Two other forces diminish modern play, apart from those mentioned by Mark Hadley in his article ‘State of Play’ (SC, Aug).
The first is the lack of nearby open and wild spaces for many urban dwellers. This combined with ‘stranger danger’ promotes the insular passive leisure approach.
The other is the loss of the night sky to blazing lights. Both diminish children’s exposure to the wildness and wonder of God and his world. They reduce the opportunities to pit oneself against real physical danger and fear.
Local councils are “rationalising” parks as they are “too expensive”. The pursuit of riches by a few developers, impoverishes many.

Ken Davis
via email

Convert to good coffee

Earlier this year John Sandeman in his ‘View From the Pews’ column wrote a provocative article about the importance of good quality coffee in our churches. In it, he mentioned our investigation of the issue at St Luke’s, Liverpool.
Can I update readers?
We are greatly enjoying our big coffee percolator. It is used a number of times a week at various meetings.
Percolated coffee has become much looked forward to for many of us – especially during winter. The smell is alluring as one enters the hall and makes one feel, ‘Yes, I want to stay to drink and chat’. Great for fellowship and great for outreach.
May I encourage others to consider ‘converting’ also.

Heather McKay
via email

Sad at tertiary failure

As a father of one of the students enrolled at MCSI, I am deeply saddened by its effective closure as it has sought to help students to understand the world from a Christian perspective.
As a principal of a Christian school, I long for the time where Christians will see the enormous need for a stronger Christian voice in tertiary education. The push for this is both fragmented, parochial and lacking in the required urgency, as different Christian groups compete rather than cooperate in seeking to honour Christ in this area of life.
Wouldn’t it be great if different Christian groups could set aside their own kingdom building and truly reflect the values of the Kingdom to which we all belong?

Bill Rusin
Belrose, NSW

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