02.05.2012
First Diocesan Growth Forum Encourages Fresh Expressions of Church
There are no new ways to follow Jesus but existing ways can be refreshed with new thinking and new initiatives, clergy from Dublin and Glendalough heard at the Diocesan Growth Forum. The inspiring and provocative day exploring fresh ways of doing things within the church was organised by the Diocesan Growth Committee. In the words of Archbishop Michael Jackson in his opening comments, the conference was an “instant sell out” with demand for places far outstripping supply.
The conference took place in the Church of Ireland Theological Institute on April 26. The main speaker was George Lings, director of the Church Army’s research unit, the Sheffield Centre. A number of Irish based clergy also told their stories of how they have affected dramatic change in their parishes. Canon Neil McEndoo and Revd Rob Jones spoke of their all–age worship and outreach work in Rathmines, Revd Ruth Jackson talked about her experience in Blarney and her research work while Revd Roly Heaney detailed his efforts in Redcross.
In his work with Church Army, George Lings visits pioneers to see what they are doing. He said he hoped the conference would facilitate new thinking and new initiatives. Mr Lings said that the word ‘new’ was a “popular but slippery misnomer”. “In a consumerist society, new disempowers the old,” he said suggesting that there were no new ways to follow Jesus, rather there were “fresh expressions of church”.
There were two virtues of the term ‘fresh expressions’, Mr Lings stated. Firstly the term explicitly recognised that there are only expressions of church and that no single church or full denomination fully recognised what Christ is. This, he said, opened the door to diversity. Secondly, he said, the term reflected a ‘newism’. “A fresh cup of coffee is neither new nor novel. It is just refreshing. But it also reminds us that it is in danger of becoming stale,” he commented.
He said: “We are tempted to believe that we are the only expression needed, or that is valid, and the nature of mission is to draw others to us as we are… However, Christendom is dissolving and the church is being shifted from the centre of life to its margins. Its attendance numbers are moving from a working majority to a minority… This has thrust more of us outside our comfort zones and is making us more aware of people who are not adequately described as ‘lapsed’”.
Mr Lings suggested there were four groups: the regulars, the fringed, the de–churched and the non–churched. He said the four groups were profoundly different and could be described as: our people, those who think they are our people, those who were once our people and those who were never our people. Different approaches were needed for each group, he stated adding that there was little to draw all four of them. He said the groups that were growing were the de–churched and the non–churched. “The majority of the population is that which we know least about and are least well equipped to reach,” he said.
Mr Ling said it was not difficult to find lay and ordained “pioneers” to reach the de–churched and non–churched people. However, it was difficult to train and deploy them in the best way. He said the results of deploying pioneers to gee up the existing church were not pretty for the pioneers or the church. “However, if we cease thinking in solely territorial terms and start thinking in terms of networks and cultures [the results improved],” he said. He said the pioneers must be protected by their bishops but they do best away from the existing forms of church – outside the control of the church. He suggested that the resulting fresh expressions of church would be like children. They have inherited the DNA of both parents “but they are not us… They have a shared surname but a distinctive first name”.
Citing research carried out by Church Army in Liverpool, he said that of 203 churches in the diocese, 78 were fresh expressions of church – the young children of the diocesan family. The fresh expressions were a varied bunch with the majority designed to reach all ages, some messy church and some designed to reach adults. Some were congregation sized, some domestic sized, many did not meet in churches and many did not meet on Sundays. They occurred in a social context and were led by a variety of people including curates, rectors, readers and ordinary people. A quarter of the new congregations were made up of Christians, over a third were de–churched people and 41 percent were non–churched. “We’re not saying they are all now Christians. But they are around Christians where they used not to be,” Mr Lings said. Most of the fresh starts had a “discipling process”, he added.
Local Stories Reveal Positive Changes
Canon Neill McEndoo has spent 30 years in his present parish of Rathmines with Harold’s Cross. When he went to Harold’s Cross in 1982, he said it was on the verge of closure. He managed to keep it going for 20 more years. However, there were 40 people attending a church which could accommodate 1,100. Canon McEndoo said he agonised over the future of Harold’s Cross for years but eventually the select vestry decided to close it.
In redeveloping Rathmines, the rector said he took inspiration from a student he met in the Swan Centre. On being asked what he would be doing for the evening, the student replied that he was going back to his bedsit to stare at the walls. The seed of change was planted and then Rob Jones came on placement to the parish from Core. Canon McEndoo recalled: “I wondered ‘Am I here to watch the decline of this parish and sit out my time watching that happen?’ I was attending a lot of 90th birthday parties which reflected the age of the congregation. I did get something going for kids but they started rugby on Sunday mornings and we lost them and their parents. I was out of my comfort zone with a ‘coffee bar church’ but I talked to Rob and we developed an idea.”
The pair went to the select vestry and asked them to raise €350,000 to fund a post for five years. They were unclear where the project was going. Their target audience was the 18 to 35 year olds and they hoped to establish a presence in Lower Rathmines. Now there is an office and drop in centre there and it is hoped that the project will become self–funding. The traditional church services draw 60 people on a good Sunday but Rob is welcoming 100 to 150 young people. They still meet in the church.
Revd Rob Jones said he was blending old and new ideas. He spent time talking to people in Rathmines to see what they wanted. They launched at Easter 2011 with the aim of being outwardly focused, part of the community and a place of faith. Over the year they have run start your own business courses, have begun a Mainly Music group, are getting involved with the local schools, have facilitated faith discussion and there are nine or 10 small groups. They engage in a lot of outreach work and bring their message out to the streets. “Our Sundays are different to what is happening at the 10.30 service. It has been very difficult for the parish. We have come in like paratroopers and blown the place apart. But Neill has been very open,” he said.
Revd Ruth Jackson outlined her research on ‘Mission Shaped Church in Ireland’ examining how people are doing things differently in the Church of Ireland, Methodist and Presbyterian churches. Of the churches she looked at, 10 were new starts, nine were restarts and four were immigrant churches. The churches that had grown dramatically, she found, were the immigrant churches. Some of the restart churches had grown dramatically but others hadn’t grown. The big issue, Ms Jackson said, was leadership and the congregations’ willingness to change. “If your church can survive, it is less likely to want to change. It is only when you get down to three families that you start to want change,” she commented.
The new start churches adopted a different worship style but the challenge there was to get a structure. She said the new start independent churches followed exactly the same pattern as the traditional church. However, she said the difference was that over 40 percent of the congregation considered themselves to come from a Catholic background. The churches identified as evangelical had a greater outreach, more under 18s, more Irish people and more people from a Catholic background. They targeted outreach, had flexible worship style and denominational support.
Ms Jackson said that targeted outreach was important and said that new people came to the church because they were asked. “If you have a thought in your head of who you would like to be coming… the challenge is to go and get motivated and invite them to come,” she stated. “Many young people in Ireland are unchurched. They are a great opportunity for fresh expressions.”
Revd Roly Heaney of the Dunganstown Union, which includes Redcross, said he moved to the parish in 1990 with the intention of staying for five years. He was still there in 2000 when there were 150 families in the three parishes. “In 2000 I was ready to leave. But I would have been sad to leave because I would have failed and I was worried that they wouldn’t get another rector,” he recalled. He identified two problems. Firstly no families were attending on Sunday mornings and secondly there was no sense of community.
He went to the select vestry and pointed out that they had a good attendance at the family services and proposed a three year trial for all age worship at Redcross. “A new person coming in hadn’t a clue what was going on. We were using music that people weren’t used to. We were dressed up and used language that people didn’t understand. I took it apart and repackaged it to become a lot friendlier. I used Powerpoint and gave an all age talk and provided coffee afterwards to create a sense of community,” he explained.
“In January 2001 we had a congregation of 75 now we have 175. We moved out of the small church and into a large portacabin which can accommodate 250. If you ask many of the people there they will say they are Roman Catholic. We wanted to play down denomination and open the door to anyone who wants to come. We have put a lot of emphasis on lay people doing things. We have new concepts and new outreach and Redcross can happen without me actually being there. People are looking for a church that is spiritual. We try to water it down because we think it is what people want but people want to learn how to pray,” Mr Heaney added. In the other two church in the Union he wears robes. Some people come from a Catholic background find Redcross too charismatic and go to Dunganstown instead. “Variety is important so that people can come and find their spiritual home,” he said.
Following the conference, Archbishop Michael Jackson described the day as “a very positive, encouraging and helpful exploration of how the church might address some of the challenges facing us”. He said it was clear that clergy who had attended felt that a valuable dialogue had begun and that they did not want to lose the momentum. A full report of the event will be delivered at the next Diocesan Council meeting and a similar event will take place in the autumn for clergy and laity of the diocese. The forum will also be discussed at the Diocesan Synod in October.
George Lings powerpoint presentation can be read in full at:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/32046570/Dublin2012%7ENew%20thinking%20Initiatives%202.ppt
The full text of the Presentation can be found here:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/32046570/Dublin201204%7ENew%20Thinking%20Initiatives.doc
Pictured are Archbishop Michael Jackson and George Lings of Church Army at the Diocesan Growth Forum in CITI
And
Andrew McNeile with Canon Neil McEndoo, Revd Roly Heaney, Revd Ruth Jackson and Revd Rob Jones.