Diocesan News
Bishop Jackson's Presidential Address to the Clogher Diocesan Synod
CLOGHER DIOCESAN SYNOD
FRIDAY 30TH SEPTEMBER 2005
MAGHERACULMONEY PARISH CENTRE, KESH
PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS BY THE BISHOP OF CLOGHER
THE RT REVD DR MICHAEL JACKSON
SHAPING OUR LIVES IN THE SPIRIT OF GOD
INTRODUCTION
You do not need me, ladies and gentlemen Members of Synod, to tell you that the use of what are referred to as liturgical colours is not widespread in the Clogher Diocese of today. Be that as it may, the colour prescribed for use at a Service of Holy Communion with which a Synod properly begins is red. The clear and obvious reason for this is that red is the colour which we associate primarily with Pentecost and the Gift of the Holy Spirit. And today I want us to keep before us the theme of Shaping our Lives in the Spirit of God. The colour itself carries the hope, for as Synods General and Diocesan become more politicised and adversarial it can only be a hope ? but one fervently held by me as bishop of the diocese ? hope that the Spirit of God, living, liberating and unpredictable; healing, sanctifying and re-creating ? will live in the world and in the church, and therefore in us. This expectation of life in the Spirit of God carries through to synodical life too.
I say what I say because we who are self-conscious church-people come from the world and return to it. The Spirit of God lives in both realms and shapes our lives in both realms. And somehow, despite all our religious rhetoric and pious posturing from time to time, we are rather fond of the world. But we are also deeply committed to the church and play our part in it, in our particular coming ?all together in one place? (Acts 2.1) to this synod today, like those of the first Christian Pentecost. I trust that this spirit of goodness will breathe through our Diocesan Synod, meeting in Ardess Parish for the first time and happy to be here.
THE SPIRIT OF GOD AND THE SPIRIT OF PENTECOST
If I may for a moment take us back liturgically to the Day of Pentecost this year, in a way which is accessible to us all, that is through the Scriptures of the Day, there are some aspects, some features of Pentecost which we could easily forget. Indeed it would be all too attractive for us to see ourselves (because this really is the generation of myself) in the crowd in Jerusalem, raised to wonderful new heights by the coming of God?s Spirit and hailed now as those fluent in many languages, diminished no longer by the sophisticated as mere Galileans. But we would be like Ronald Weasley in the Harry Potter stories standing in wonderment at himself before the Mirror of Erized.
I ask you also to recall some of the other Scriptures of the Day of Pentecost:
Numbers 11 Eldad and Medad, remembered in Scripture by name, but diminished, indeed rejected by the mighty Joshua. These two had not gone with The Seventy, nor had they received the spirit that was resting on Moses from the Lord. But let us take note and take heart that the Lord lives beyond the confines of the self-absorption, the self-congratulation and the self-righteousness of the jealously religious. For the reply comes loud and clear from Moses to Joshua: ?Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord?s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!?
What is more, St Paul?s First Letter to the Corinthians 12 hammers home again and again the mutualities of gifts, services, activities without, we should note, ever using that over-used word: ministry. What I mean is the ways in which things work together, complement and fulfil one another through the people who lie at the heart of them. Membership of the body of Christ has to do with the allotment and choosing by the Spirit of the Christ and not with the pre-judgement of human self-righteousness. We still have a lot to learn about our place in what is called the economy of salvation. We need to learn it year in, year out. And mercifully God meets us and greets us in our immaturity.
Once again, as so often in Holy Scripture, we see that the Spirit is free ? neither a self-serving human individual (Joshua) not a self-policing human institution can snuff the Spirit of God: ?For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into the one body ? Jews and Greeks, slaves or free ? and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.? (1 Corinthians 12.13) But again look at one of the Gospel Readings for Whitsunday, St John 7. At the culmination of the Festival in Jerusalem, the place which stood out as the abode of the holy and as the destination of the pilgrim, Jesus cries out: ?Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink.? The focus has changed to the Person of God-made-human. There is no longer a predictable geography for either the Christ or the Spirit.
The phrases which resonate loud and far in all of this are:
? all the Lord?s people Numbers 11
? one and the same Spirit ? just as the Spirit chooses 1 Corinthians 12
? anyone who is thirsty John 7.
I say this first of all because it is there in Holy Scripture. If Scripture is to live once again in every generation, indeed in our generation, it will do so in the generosity of spirit of those to whom the Spirit of God has been given and through whom that Spirit is generous. Throughout the year past I have had the pleasure of dedicating for use gifts generously given by members of the parishes which constitute our diocese. Many of them have been copies of The Prayer Book now universally in use in the diocese. On each occasion I draw to the active attention of those present the reality and the realization that under God a gift shared is not a gift halved but a gift doubled. And this holds for the gift of life in the Spirit.
I say what I have said above because I would be concerned were the Church of Ireland for any reason, or reasons, to shut its window on the world. We are an island church with all the heritage behind us of tending the flame of Christianity in what are referred to as the Dark Ages which followed the collapse of the Roman Empire. But the word: insularity, please be reminded, comes from the word: island. I should be alarmed and saddened were we to cease to communicate with the world and the church outside our confines, were we to select on confessional criteria what we like rather than continue to embrace others who are fellow-members in Christ with us. It was the incoming archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, who quoting John of the Cross when first interviewed in June of this year said: ?mission is putting love where love isn?t.? This remains a vital perspective on what is of the very being of the church and an important piece in the jigsaw of shaping our lives in the Spirit of God.
CEASE FIRE, PARAMILITARISM AND HOPES FOR THE POLITICAL PROCESS
At a time when the challenge and invitation has gone out from the archbishop of Armagh through a seed which he sowed at the General Synod to ?decode the culture? we need to think of ways of responding to that which enable us together to ?construct the community.? In Northern Ireland today, I sense that normality now has a momentum. We live in a period during which the good faith of the IRA Cease Fire ? itself a significant event and a momentous statement of intent ? is being tested both with caution and with hope. Both reactions are appropriate and realistic in a cross-border community such as ours. Here in Fermanagh, Tyrone and Monaghan the violence and death suffered by individuals and families over decades presents a challenge to honest simplicity in a spiral of words because such experiences cannot be forgotten. Can perpetrators of violence relinquish violence, talk straight and contribute to a new life for all? Like many, many others I hope that the very recent Decommissioning and Putting Arms Beyond Use heralds the answer: Yes to my question.
We live also in an era where the camera which, we are told, never lies provides us with the most disturbing and distressing of footage of attacks on regular PSNI Officers by those who lay particular claim to the name: Protestant. Such activity I roundly condemn and urge any and all tempted to go down that route to disassociate themselves from it. I have no desire to see wanton arson, arrant thuggery or sectarian outrage spread to the West of the Province. I do not wish to see it set up shop in our diocese in any way or by any means. It does not point a way to a future which is either ennobling or wholesome. Neither, ladies and gentlemen Members of Synod, do I want to hear the language of Albanian-style economies and the cantonization of Northern Ireland. Because this language heralds nothing other than defeat for the policy of A Shared Future.
We seek and we need a willingness on the part of political figures to go beyond the dug-outs of party politics. The essential and urgent service which they can give to all the people whom they represent in each level of government is to fill the social vacuum with a sustained and sincere attempt to develop community life. They after all inhabit the corridors of power and control access to those who make decisions and dispense money on our behalf. This community life has to be co-operative, concerted and cohesive if we are to restore hope in a shared future and if political, social and religious life are to challenge and enhance a shared present. We all need to see clear and unambiguous action for the good of all members of the community of Northern Ireland coming out of this Statement of Cease Fire and at the same time an end to the highly contrived next stage of sectarian outrage in the hands of paramilitaries.
Seven years after The Belfast Agreement of Good Friday 1998 we all still await an active peace in our country. I imagine that we are all tired of being effectively disenfranchised in a political stalemate which increasingly resembles an arctic winter. I also imagine that we are weary of being told why good things cannot happen rather than being guided to better things happening for us and for our children. For many years politicians have seen to it that the ball is firmly at their feet. We, the citizens, do not want to be spectators of their penalty shoot-out. As I have said above, ?normality now has a momentum? and like everyone else I rejoice to see it because this ?spirit of today for tomorrow? is something which we all really want and need. We seek eagerly to shape our lives in the Spirit of God.
SIGNS OF HOPE
Nobody will dispute that the road is long. Nobody will dispute that in this part of the country in which our diocese is placed, the road is hard. Whether we call it the road of reconciliation, the road of restoration or the road of reconstruction of our fractured society, it is the road which now lies before us. We have today been given encouragements and opportunities which simply were not there thirty years ago. It would be naïve and irresponsible of us as church people to leave all of this to the politicians. They too are the creation and the result of a full generation of The Troubles which have so distorted our grasp of what makes a society grow and live that we suffer daily a painful and plaintive crisis of hope. The possession of power, particularly when it is forged and fashioned in a time of violence and social dismantling, does not of itself bring a capacity or develop an instinct to offer resolution, vision or direction. And yet, harsh words, oft repeated, do not bring back broken lives. Threatening gestures, no matter how triumphantly made, do not restore shattered families. We need to be positive.
We need to co-operate with those with whom we have not co-operated before. We need to be properly and repeatedly demanding of our politicians, we need to engage with them and they with us if the connections with those on the ground and those in the departure lounge are to be maintained, developed and enhanced. Edinburgh and Live 8 during the summer past have shown us that people internationally and locally can have a voice and can contribute to the political process. But the recent UN Summit in New York has revealed again the need for politicians to keep abreast of changing contexts and not to let real action slip away as they move from one Agenda to another. They too are subject to media-forces and well they know it!
Let us not forget that there are signs of encouragement and signs of hope. There are signs within our own diocese that people are returning and that new people are coming. Bricks and mortar bring a challenge to the church, particularly when there is new building. This is something which we should welcome parochially and to which we should respond locally. Even in my own area of the Clogher Valley alone, new developments of residential housing are under way and more are being planned. The face of that charming triad of towns, beloved of the days of the Clogher Valley Railway: Augher, Clogher, Fivemiletown is changing. The same can be said of Monaghan, Castleblayney and Carrickmacross and of many, many other parts of our diocese. And all of this is exciting and heralds an exciting future. Are we able as members of the Church of Ireland willing to contribute to the shaping of our lives along with the shaping of the lives of such new people in the Spirit of God?
If we are prepared to take this new growth and development as an opportunity, all of these people who will come to live among us will have needs for their new life and they will also have something to contribute to the localities of which they will become part. Is it not a glorious opportunity for all the churches on a wide front and in a united spirit to extend a real sense of welcome to people who are new to us and to whom we, well known to ourselves, are new in turn? Because it is from us and from what we do and how we do it that they will get a sense of the church: whether we are a closed body or an open house. I ask again, ladies and gentlemen Members of Synod, a question which I have often asked before: Have we in too many of our parishes given up on the expectation of new and different people coming and visiting us? I repeat the words of Bishop Sentamu: ?mission is putting love where love isn?t.?
I return to my opening remarks on the colour: red. As I suggested, red is appropriate for the opening of a Synod particularly because of the hope of the coming of the Spirit of the Christ. But red has two further associations: a specific link with those who are Evangelists and with those who are Martyrs. The road to the future is indeed arduous, it is costly and it is a very specific living out of the Gospel. It is painful and we shall suffer. I suggest that many of us do not know where to begin to begin. We need to co-operate as a diocese in this if we are to flourish.
THE HARD GOSPEL
Some years back we had a presentation and discussion of the Hard Gospel Scoping Study in this Synod. Some of our then Members spoke eloquently of ?Kingdom Values.? Of these, as something lived out from day to day and presumably as values of the Kingdom of God, I am indeed happy and excited to hear more. The establishment of The Hard Gospel Project with significant funding secured nationally, internationally and from within the Church of Ireland will soon give us every opportunity locally to refute that harsh term: sectarian if indeed we can. It has been my privilege to be associated with The Hard Gospel personally over the first six months of 2005. I shall continue to watch its progress and impact within the Church of Ireland, not least in our own Diocese where at the Synod of 2003 a number of clergy bemoaned the fact that we have the problems we have because the Gospel is not, as it were, Hard enough. All I can say at this stage is: We shall see. Woven now into the Church of Ireland, set up by the General Synod, the Hard Gospel Project is here to stay. We are at an exciting moment in the life of the Church of Ireland and it is worth noting that the Director who has now been appointed is an ordinand of our own diocese, the Reverend Earl Storey.
Many have expressed in different fora their concern that the term: sectarian can so readily be applied to the Church of Ireland and seemingly so uncritically. None of us likes to carry the name or title: sectarian, of course not! But the Church of Ireland has decided as the General Synod that it is honest for us to carry this together and to do something about it. The truthful identification of the issues which are part and parcel of this designation, along with the issues of dealing with difference in a climate of heightened intolerance which flow from it, relate to far-reaching questions in our society. The days of ?the church? telling society what is best for it and expecting to be listened to are long gone. And in any case the churches understandably speak with differing voices. It is surely not possible to be part of a highly democratic and openly trusting church like the Church of Ireland without such difference and such diversity being the spice of life. It holds us together, east, west, north and south. In the on-going process of shaping our lives in the Spirit of God, there is an important progression and to me it goes like this: intolerance, tolerance, understanding, difference, respect, co-existence, co-operation. There is a lot of work to be done by us all together. Each in our locality we will need to work out the implications of The Hard Gospel and identify how we are going to do it.
All of you will remember the origin of what is to the ear a strange title: The Hard Gospel. It was a participant in the Scoping Study who spoke honestly of the hardness of living the Gospel in our peculiarly Irish cold climate of uncharitableness both towards ourselves and towards others. Sectarianism is now best challenged by the recognition of its reality across Ireland and by the living of an alternative to it and to the other unexamined exclusivities which for too long have permeated our religious and civic identity.
In all of this I speak as someone who belongs to and serves in the Border Regions. The challenges to us as members of the Church of Ireland in both jurisdictions come at a time of real need: in Northern Ireland we seek a way forward in a climate where political extremes now luxuriate in the near triumph of the erosion of middle ground. In the Republic of Ireland we seek to challenge the unfettered presuppositions of a confident, successful, increasingly callous free-market economy. Both parts of Ireland are more and more being described as post-Christian. Both parts of Ireland have lots of questions which are not even being asked. In both parts of Ireland there remains a place for the constructive, critical, compassionate voice of Christianity. And to many of us this is no surprise while still being a cause of great alarm. The middle ground, all too often rubbished today as a place of vacillation and indecision by those whose rhetoric of the extreme in fact needs the middle ground as much as does anyone else if they are to be in a position to voice their opinions, is the place traditionally occupied by the Church of Ireland. I can only say: Woe to those who seek to draw us to the precipice of extremism either internally or externally!
ASPECTS OF DIOCESAN LIFE
If the Hard Gospel Programme which has identified sectarianism as one of the deeply-rooted and self-confessed problems within the Church of Ireland sets something of the Agenda vital to the Church of Ireland over the next three years in a particular, specific and systematic way, the shape of our own diocesan life is set in a variety of opportunities and developments which we need to grasp, to own and to implement. Some of these changes which are now essential are shaped by events which are not ours to manipulate. Others can and ought to be shaped by our own response to the life going on around us.
Lest there be any here who seek to accuse me of obfuscation, let me spell it out ? and plainly. In my first address to Diocesan Synod in 2002 I made a suggestion that by 2020 there might be 15-18 parishes in the Diocese of Clogher as opposed to the 32 which we had then. Often I have had it put up to me at Boards of Nomination and elsewhere: ??Ah! but, bishop, sure all they?re doing is trying to close our church??
Nobody who has said this to me has yet been able to identify who the: ?they? are. Again, nobody has been able to identify a single church building which the anonymous ?they? have closed in that period. I suggest, ladies and gentlemen Members of Synod, two things:
First, by the time the key is turned in a church building for the last time, that church has in fact already closed itself. The community to sustain its life, not only maintain its fabric, simply is no longer there as a living, vibrant group of people. Sad but true.
Secondly, the anonymous ?they? are you yourselves, ladies and gentlemen Members of Synod. For it would be through the Diocesan Synod and the Diocesan Council that recommended closures would be approved and on the basis of that approval implemented. Congregations of seven, ten or thirteen struggle to make worship exciting and uplifting. I need to see sustained evidence of both Diocesan Council and Diocesan Synod looking into the future in a sharply focused way and taking the lead for the Diocese in making recommendations which will change for the better and for a sustainable future the parochial life of the Diocese. And thankfully there are signs. Much though I myself delight in the contemporary day-to-day life of Clogher Diocese, this all worries me because I fear that the Diocese may be shielding itself from a situation which will not go away and which will be as big or bigger when next it meets us.
And yet everyone agrees and has agreed that, in Archdeacon Pringle?s now unforgettable phrase: the present is unsustainable. There is much here to ponder: the relationship between people and plant; the number of church buildings and parochial halls absolutely essential to the life of the church; indeed the number of acts of worship Sunday by Sunday in Groups of Parishes. There is now to my mind a real need to consider in any Parish a mid-week evening act of worship as a regular alternative to one of the Sunday Services. This would have a great deal to commend it. Many people, realistically, have weekend commitments and many people now work throughout their weekends. A Tuesday or a Wednesday Evening Service might be strange to start with but, even as something to try, it might just strike a chord with the people who are NOT in church on Sundays. Because it is for those who are not in it and of it that the church really does exist as much as for those who are there. Later I will go on to say something of the initiative of Diocesan Pastoral Assistants to which the Diocesan Council has committed itself and on which a Commission has been working over the past year. Again this cannot be implemented without the energetic support of the diocese and in particular of this Diocesan Synod. Change can and should be something we face with hope.
MISSION AND YOUTH
Often, and rightly, we are concerned for the combined work of mission and youth. In this respect 2006 will be a positive and a special year in the life of the diocese with the coming to fruition of this particular combination of young people and mission as a self-conscious diocesan initiative. I personally greatly welcomed the J1 ? Jesus First ? initiative three years ago as a way in which Clogher as a diocese could offer something companionable and substantial to the young people of the diocese. I know, however, that it had its detractors among some of the clergy but I am pleased that those who put such hope, prayer and enthusiasm into the planning and the execution of it stuck with it. Meeting over a weekend in the autumn in The Share Centre, Lisnaskea these gatherings ? facilitated financially both from within the diocese and by the Church of Ireland Youth Department ? have grown from being a novelty to being a vital part of diocesan life. The commitment and hard work of those associated with the thematic planning and the practical delivery of J1 have been significant. During this period what has now developed is a dynamic way of equipping young people for discipleship at home and ? a new development ? mission partnership overseas with the announcement of Project South America 2006. This project is designed as a follow-through from the initiatives of J1 which in a genuine sense have taken up and developed some of the needs and talents of the young people who have been confirmed. This project challenges those of what is often referred to as the forgotten age of our church, 18-30. I hope that those who take up this opportunity will return to contribute to the life of the diocese at home and abroad.
In the life of faith there is the tension between what we do on our own and what we do with others. Individuals develop in different ways and at different paces. Project South America 2006 is an opportunity for individuals to take the best of Clogher and as a group to share that with the people who inhabit a country which is vibrant, dynamic and different. It is an opportunity to explore the riches of the tradition in all its variety which they have received, learned and lived thus far and to stretch it imaginatively and faithfully in the service of others. All too readily, I think, we forget that our calling, like that of the Lord Jesus, is to serve others not to serve ourselves.
Coupled with this initiative is the arrival in Dromore Parish to work there and in the diocese of two individuals from Chile. They are SAMS Mission Partners and we will soon all get to know Suyai and Gerardo Gimpel. I had the pleasure of helping to launch them on their way in mid-September. I have given them Permission to do particular work in the Diocese and look forward to the contributions which they will make. They are indeed most welcome here.
ORDAINED MINISTRY
It would be difficult not to follow all of this with the hope that arising from initiatives such as J1 and Project South America 2006 combined with the work of clergy in schools within their parishes and with the work of our Diocesan Director of Ordinands, more people will also offer themselves for selection for the ordained ministry. I should like to pay tribute to the industry and insight of Canon Gillian, Diocesan Director of Ordinands. In this regard we maintain a steady stream: two of our ordinands have been ordained this year (the Reverend Denise Acheson and the Reverend Margaret Pringle), two of our deacons in the diocese have been priested (the Reverend Henry Blair and the Reverend Ian Linton) and two ordinands from the diocese begin formation and training this month (Mr Charles Eames and Mr Stephen Farrell) and Mrs Elizabeth Thompson is in her third year in the Theological College. Mrs Alison Seymour-Whitely who will come to live in Newtownbutler Rectory with her husband the Reverend Richard Seymour-Whiteley early in 2006 is also an ordinand, now in her second year in the Theological College.
As well as being a seed-bed of vocations for clergy for the church at large, we need many more clergy in this diocese and we need clergy who will stay for a decent length of time. Increasingly the strategic place of locally resident, non-stipendiary ordained ministry is recognized. We have two clergy in this category, the Reverend Isobel Nixon and the Reverend Margaret Pringle. We value them both and we need more like them alongside more stipendiary clergy. By December 2005 ten parishes will have been, or will remain, technically vacant as incumbencies, with notice already of one other early in 2006. Of course this does not mean that pastoral provision is not being made for these parochial units, nor does it mean that the diocese is not doing anything about the situation. And in relation to this I pay a special tribute to Readers and clergy, active and retired, who have taken on extra duties often at very little notice to maintain the regular cycle of worship and care. But what it does mean is that the close, active co-operation of lay people and clergy which is the glory of parochial life simply cannot happen in the way it ought. There are significant parts of parochial life which do not happen when a parish is, in that dreadful term, ?vacant.? The urgency of a vacancy, however, is that co-operation at all levels of parochial and diocesan life is more important and strategic than ever.
PARISH DEVELOPMENT - INTERNAL
Increasingly parishes will have to become accustomed to organizing their lives from within their own resources. They will have to do so with authority from me as bishop and with the use of their own imagination so that existing parishioners will remain and new parishioners will be attracted. The Church of Ireland in general and this diocese in particular has been talking about lay ministry for decades. The time has come for lay ministry to show itself in service, in humility and in effective action in our parishes in all aspects of parochial life. Alongside this expression of lay ministry which I wish to encourage ? and which will be dealt with by others in a special presentation on Diocesan Pastoral Assistants ? we need more clergy to sustain and develop the life which is in our parishes in abundance, to nourish the faithfulness to God and the commitment to the Church of Ireland which there is in the people of our parishes. I meet these people Sunday by Sunday in their churches and at social gatherings. There is tremendous attachment and devotion shown to the Church of God as expressed in the life of the Church of Ireland country-wide. There is also a creeping concern about how it will be sustained. We need a good combination and mixture of women and men, stipendiary and non-stipendiary clergy in all of this work to encourage, to care and to lead.
Four particular initiatives are important in our life as a diocese as we look forward to 2006. They are: the document Border Protestants; the Clogher Commission; Macartan 2006 and Sri Lanka 2005.
BORDER PROTESTANTS
The matter of identity of Border Protestants is something into which a lot of study and research has gone over the past decades. Anyone, such as myself and such as many of you, who have grown up in the Border areas will know the ingredients of the dilemma of Border identity. A mature understanding of this part of the social jigsaw is essential to any lasting peace in Ireland ? and we are strategically positioned for this, with Clogher Diocese comprising almost all of Fermanagh and Monaghan, parts of Tyrone, Donegal, Leitrim, touching on Cavan and Louth. The study itself, of which there are some copies for those who are interested in the body of the Synod Hall, BORDER PROTESTANT PERSPECTIVES concentrates on the situation and attitudes of Protestant people in the Border Counties of the Republic of Ireland. For my own part I have spoken before at this Synod about the situation south of the Border and have done my best, as bishop of the diocese, to convey something of the appreciation of the diocese to those who faithfully maintain witness week by week and day by day in the County Monaghan area. My hope is that you will feel some sense of affirmation in this.
My interest in the study, however, goes further than this for I feel that there are implications for all of us together as members of the diocese, in solidarity with one another. The Diocesan Review Group drew together people from geographical locations across the diocese and across the Border ? deliberately ? and the contact was both enjoyed and appreciated. Consideration of this Report Border Protestant Perspectives is worth doing as an exercise in itself and also to enable us to make a realistic and locally informed contribution, expressing our own particular concerns and hopes, to the field work component of The Hard Gospel process. We need to consider this Report and its ramifications for the whole diocese for another reason and it is this: in my experience there is no single Border Protestant identity, there are Border Protestant identities and the diversity itself needs to be identified if the very idea is to be of any use in preparing for a future in which we are active participants and contributors.
I have said it before and I shall say it again: Clogher Diocese has its own particular story coming out of The Troubles still to be told. As we move forward into a new era of Irish life there is much for good that can be learned through this story. With this in view I wish to invite a small group of people to look into the points of importance highlighted for us in the Report and to draw out from a Northern perspective, to parallel the Southern perspective, that other part of our Border identity, the Northern part, Fermanagh predominantly and Tyrone also, so often neglected hitherto in a mature assessment of The Troubles and their impact on the generations. Let us not forget, ladies and gentlemen Members of Synod, that people of this Diocese ought to be remembered for good in history as being the people who did not retaliate in the darkest days of The Troubles. This is a noble legacy from a very bleak period of Irish history.
THE CLOGHER COMMISSION
At the invitation of the Diocesan Council, this Commission was established following the excellent, clear Report presented by Archdeacon Pringle, a report which resulted from a revisiting of the Diocesan Review ten years after it first did its work. That Report had concluded that the present was unsustainable. That conclusion is chilling and it was my considered opinion that action was needed. I say this very much with a pastoral heart and concern and not through any sense of managerial hype, business wizardry or sound-bite spin. It is my firm conviction that what some, with lively insouciance, refer to as: the management of decline is more responsibly and properly referred to as: the love of the fragile. And I make this point because, whatever shape the diocese may have in the future, the witness of generations to date to the presence of Almighty God in their lives and in their churches has to be honoured and invested in the future life and witness of the diocese within the church and its mission to the world. What is especially fragile is any clear sense of what the future might hold. So often the ways of God make sense in retrospect, even for the most prophetic of us. The love of the fragile is the nurturing of the witness to Almighty God on the part of people whose community, often now small in number, needs to cease fearing statistics and to continue to embrace their neighbours along with their own witness. Too often a glib distinction is made: missionary activity as the exciting bit, pastoral care as the boring bit. This is a recipe for disaster and we need to avoid it. Our people are hungry for pastoral care and ministry.
In light of an unanimous decision at the Special Meeting of Council, the Commission was established, chaired by the then Canon, now Dean, Thompson. With an array of lay and ordained members of the diocese the Commission has been listening to people in parishes about the future. Dean Thompson will present aspects of the work of the Commission later in Synod. I wish to say at this point that I am behind the work of the Commission. It seeks to establish in the weave of the diocese something we do not have: pastoral ministry by lay people ? appropriately trained and equipped ? to lay people. It also seeks to be an essential component in a scheme of authorized lay ministry, complementing in various ways parochial readership, diocesan readership and ordained ministry but most of all providing pastoral care to and in parishes where there are not resident clergy ? and where there may indeed not again be resident clergy. It will require training at diocesan level. It will require a financial commitment on the part of parishes equal at least to the financial giving required of parishes at present. It will above all require people willing to put themselves forward for selection, preparation and learning on the job. For this will have to ?kick in? as people today say very fast. It will be a challenge on the level of every-member ministry. It will be a challenge to week-day ministry because the Diocesan Pastoral Assistants cannot be expected also to be the Sunday people without further willingness, selection and training. The DPAs will have responsibility for regular week-day ministry in consultation and co-operation with the Director of Diocesan Pastoral Assistants and in co-operation with the clergy. It is a long time since my predecessor Bishop McMullan sought to implement a team ministry in this diocese. The de facto rejection of this even as an experiment has meant that valuable time has been lost in terms of working through the inevitable difficulties of lay and clerical co-operation. This will have to be addressed sooner rather than later. It is an exciting development and I urge your support of it.
MACARTAN 2006
The patron saint of our diocese is Macartain. Both of our cathedral churches carry his name and he is marked annually in the Church Calendar on March 24th in close proximity to Patrick on March 17th for a very particular reason. Macartain was Patrick?s strongman, his companion in mission and ministry. Patrick settled his friend and supporter in the diocese geographically closest to Armagh, that is Clogher, just across the River Blackwater. If you wish to see a point where the two dioceses meet, divided only by the river, then simply travel from Augher to Aughnacloy. Just beyond Errigal Protclare, that last outpost of our diocese nestling in the trees, you meet the Blackwater. If you want to see a rather lovely representation of the relationship between Macartain and Patrick carved in wood, then please go to worship in the side church in Holy Trinity Lisnaskea.
Macartan 2006, the fifteen hundredth anniversary of the person who in missionary service brought the Gospel to this part of Ireland, is an opportunity for celebration not to be missed. Plans are in place to take the theme of mapping the way of life and to listen to the stories of two people in particular:
Bishop John Sentamu as Bishop of Birmingham agreed to come to launch Macartan 2006 with a mission in the diocese on March 24th 2006, St Macartan?s Day. Although he is soon to become the Archbishop of York, he nonetheless hopes to fulfil this commitment. My hope is that, in accordance with tradition, this mission will start in Clogher, in the diocesan cathedral, and move out into the parishes of our counties and diocese. Bishop Sentamu is well placed to show us a way through hatred and prejudice: outlawed by President Amin and forced, while a High Court Judge, to flee his native Uganda, he followed the call of God to serve in the ordained ministry in areas of deprivation ? East London ? and of cultural and religious diversity ? Birmingham. In November he becomes archbishop of York and brings to that genuinely exalted position an acute mind, a great deal of street wisdom and a deeply-rooted Christian faith. We hope he can come to share something of how his life has been shaped in the Spirit of God.
Bishop Carlos Lopez Lozano, Bishop in Madrid in the Protestant Episcopal Church of Spain and Honorary Assistant Bishop in the Diocese of Europe, has agreed to come in Advent. This Church has a special link with Clogher Diocese because Bishop Stack, the first bishop of Clogher after our diocese regained its independence from Armagh was one of the three consecrating bishops, all of them from the Church of Ireland, of the first Bishop of Spain. This diocese was in the process of establishing itself during the Spanish Civil War, so it too has an interesting tale to tell about shaping in the Spirit of God.
I am very pleased to have been able to invite both of these bishops to our own diocese which, let us never forget, is one of the most ancient in Western Christendom. In looking forward to their being with us in the diocese next year I know that they are assured a genuine welcome. As well as being very open and friendly people in themselves they will give depth, resonance and perspective to our Christian life, our mission and ministry, in 2006. As Ireland opens its doors to those who are seekers of asylum, the churches need to open their hearts. Bishop Sentamu has ?been there? in both senses. He has ?done that? and knows that there really is no t-shirt! Bishop Lopez Lozano reminds us of the European dimension to our Christianity and is tremendously excited about coming to a diocese which he regards as the spiritual home of his own diocese.
My hope is that there will be other initiatives ? in parishes and also in the diocese. I encourage all to think of some special way to mark 2006. I hope that you all will do so. The success of MACARTAN 2006 depends on the support of the people of the diocese.
SRI LANKA 2005
The response from the people of Clogher to the human and infra-structural disaster caused by the tsunami of December 26th 2004 was truly outstanding. My thanks to everyone were expressed in my letter in the Diocesan Magazine which for once, and uncharacteristically, was not printed. So I shall express them again now. Very quickly I decided that through The Bishops? Appeal we think seriously about supporting the relief effort in one country. Through my work on the Anglican Oriental Orthodox International Commission I have come to know Bishop Duleep, Bishop of Colombo in Sri Lanka. Such is the better side of world-wide communication that I was able to send a message of solidarity and concern to him for the people of Sri Lanka, particularly those who live in his diocese, by e-mail on the day itself. I also thought that Sri Lanka is an island and we are an island. My deeper sense was that it would be wrong not to respond to so profound a human tragedy. Many people gave clothing, cooking utensils, non-power tools which were dispatched to Sri Lanka early in the year. Others gave money which has come to well over £100,000 taking into account what was donated both North and South. This diocese has given 50% of what has been given to the Tsunami Appeal from the whole of the Northern Province through The Bishops? Appeal. It has gone to support a range of projects which reflect areas where the Clogher contribution can be felt to do some genuine good.
This has been made possible by the willingness of Ms Florence Creighton, parish reader in Holy Trinity Parish, Lisnaskea to return in the spring from Nepal via Sri Lanka and to visit Bishop Duleep, some clergy and parishes and also to visit first hand the camps where three months afterwards people were living in very difficult personal circumstances and conditions. This was followed up by a visit made by the Revd Dennis Robinson, Rector of Aghavea and Diocesan Bishops? Appeal Representative, and Mr Glenn Moore, Diocesan Secretary in July to Sri Lanka. For the energetic interest in progressing this project on the part of all three of these people I am immensely grateful. There are possibilities of continuing links with the Diocese of Colombo because the problems have not gone away simply because the world?s media has found something else in which it is more interested. Whatever form these links may take I trust that the clergy and people of Clogher will remember that it is in a Gospel, indeed in a properly Evangelical spirit and in imitation of that Gospel question: Who then is my neighbour? that we reach out in hope and help mindful of our very privileged and affluent lifestyle here in Ireland, mindful also of the intensely volatile political complexities of Sri Lanka and mindful that the response to human need in the name of Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit is the primary response of the Christian person irrespective of personal prejudice and party position. Again I applaud the generosity of the people of Clogher Diocese to the people of Sri Lanka.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
As I conclude my own modest remarks, expressions of hope for my home diocese, I have great pleasure in welcoming all of you, ladies, gentlemen, friends, colleagues and visitors today to the Clogher Diocesan Synod, the one hundred and thirty-fourth occasion of its meeting. For your presence today I thank you all. Some of you are here as a regular part of your work, some are here by creating time in your own lives and business to be here and others are representing other Christian churches. Among members of other churches I wish to include representatives from the Methodist Church and from the Presbyterian Church. They will bring greetings to us during the Synod. I welcome Sir Anthony Hart, a son of the diocese whom I trust you will receive graciously as Assessor. As always Sir Anthony brings a wealth of expertise in both the ecclesiastical and legal fields. As his home diocese we express to him and his family our sympathy on the still-recent death of his mother. Mrs Janet Maxwell, Head of Communications in Church of Ireland House, has come again to our Synod. A representative of PSNI will address us slightly later with his reflections on Northern Ireland and the future role of policing in the country. Our own Impartial Reporter staff along with the staff of our own Fermanagh Herald, whose interest in our parochial and diocesan activities all year round we greatly appreciate, are also here as are representatives of other media.. I seek your compliance in welcoming all of these persons to a happy Synod.
At this point I express admiration and gratitude for the work of the Clogher Diocesan Board of Religious Education, the Diocesan Board of Mission, the Diocesan Healing Committee, the Girls? Friendly Society, the Church of Ireland Youth Department and our own Youth Councils Northern and Southern together with the work of Sunday School Teachers and Youth Leaders across our parishes.
Among clergy to leave us through resignation and retirement I mention the following. The Reverend David Luckman, after a brief incumbency in the Galloon Group of Parishes, resigned his cure of souls and has left the Diocese. The Revd Michael Bryce, incumbent of Lisbellaw, Rural Dean of Kilskeery and for six months a most assiduous Clerical Secretary of the Diocesan Synod moved to the Diocese of Newcastle to take up an incumbency. We thank him for his work in parish and diocese. The Reverend Canon Raymond Thompson was appointed to the challenging new grouping of The Clogher Cathedral Group of Parishes as agreed by this Synod in 1998 but never implemented. He subsequently accepted my invitation to become dean of the cathedral. It is to me personally a great blessing to have Dean Thompson in Clogher, the diocesan cathedral. As rector of Derryvullan North and Castle Archdale he was already renowned for his work across the community and as Rural Dean of Kesh he worked well beyond the call of duty with great clarity, compassion and conviction in many difficult and thankless situations of human contrivance. If I may presume for a moment to be domestic, it will be a great pleasure, God willing, for me to ordain Mrs Elizabeth Thompson to the diaconate in what for parochial purposes I may call her cathedral in the great Year of Macartan 2006. We look forward to welcoming to the Parish of Derryvullan North and Castle Archdale the Reverend Glenn West, currently incumbent of Annagh, Diocese of Kilmore, in early 2006. His Clogher credentials go before him as he has already served here as curate assistant of St Macartin?s Parish, Enniskillen and as incumbent of Lisbellaw. The Reverend Richard Seymour-Whiteley is to come to the Galloon Group of Parishes as incumbent. He is currently rector of Grey Abbey and Kircubben in the Diocese of Down. The Reverend Bryan Kerr, currently rector of Garrison Group, is to be instituted next month in Lisbellaw.
Almost in the same breath the Reverend Canon Edwy Kille for thirty-one years incumbent of Aghadrumsee Group of Parishes and the Reverend Canon Robert Riddel, incumbent for twenty-five years of Cleenish and Mullaghdun and Fivemiletown with Kiltermon progressively, retired. Such examples of long service are few and far between in today?s Church of Ireland and for this reason as well as for the strength of service they gave these clergy are to be remembered and treasured. The Reverend Francis Rutledge, rector of Donacavey with Barr since February 2004 moves in October to undertake the work of the joint Church of Ireland-Methodist charge The Primacy in the greater Bangor area. The Reverend Canon Trevor Gillian has accepted my invitation to be Prebendary of Donaghmore on the Chapter of St Patrick?s Cathedral, Dublin in succession to Canon Riddel. It is very important that as a diocese we have a voice on the Chapter of the National Cathedral. Canon Gillian joins the ranks of distinguished occupants of that particular Prebendal Stall. Mr Glenn Moore is our Diocesan Secretary of one year?s standing although any of us could be forgiven for thinking that Glenn has been doing this all his life, such is his competence and his courtesy with all of us. He has greatly added to the working life of the diocese. We thank him for what he does so well and so cheerfully.
We record the death of the Reverend Joshua McCloughlin, formerly curate of Magheraculmoney, rector of Drumkeeran with Templecarne and Muckross and rector of Aghavea and of the Right Reverend Robert William Heavener, deacon, priest and bishop of the diocese. There will be a Memorial Service for Bishop Heavener in Clogher Cathedral at 3.30 p.m. on the afternoon of January 22nd at which the archbishop of Armagh will preach. I hope that, with almost four months? notice, many Members of Synod will be able to attend. All of the families of those who have died we wish well in the name of the Lord for the years ahead. Canon McGirr and his parochial team have our thanks for accommodating us today. It is the first time we have been in Ardess for Diocesan Synod and we are most appreciative of your hospitality.
PERSONAL VISION FOR THE DIOCESE
I give you my own personal vision for the diocese, the fruit of prayer and thought:
? that the Diocese of Clogher seek to promote and nurture a living faith in Jesus Christ among those who themselves seek to serve God in serving their neighbour in parish and community.
My hope is that this vision might be shared by us all, whatever our shade of opinion, across the diocese as we go about the work of shaping our lives in the Spirit of God.
To those who have relinquished existing roles and to those who have assumed new roles and responsibilities we give our thanks for what they have done and share our hopes for what lies ahead of them. I wish also to pay a tribute of gratitude to the retired clergy, to our auxiliary clergy and to Diocesan and Parish Readers in good standing for all they give in terms of service, encouragement to others and hard work all year round in our diocese. Without you we would be in what I called last year and still can only call : worshipful liquidation ! You have helped to cheer us all in difficult and stretching times.
Shaping our lives in the Spirit of God is the title which I gave to this Address to Synod. Our calling remains God?s calling of us to reconciliation and peace. For this we need the humility to be courageous, the honesty to be forgiving and the love to be compassionate. Let the spirit of respect for others temper our thirst for an integrity which, whatever turn it might take, might somehow just take us too far away from one another. That would be a step too far and a great sadness.
The spirit of Clogher is admirably summed up in the Collect for St Macartan?s Day, our Patron Saint, with which I end. It talks of building and strengthening, of Gospel proclamation and leadership, of reconciliation and peace in our time:
Heavenly Father, we thank you for Macartan, faithful companion of St Patrick, and builder of your church in Clogher: Build up your church through those whom you call to leadership in this generation and strengthen your church to proclaim the gospel of reconciliation and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Again I offer it to you as again together we seek to shape our lives in the Spirit of God.