ANOTHER warm weekend on the General Synod in York, but heads were generally cool as debates on the stickiest issues within the Church of England unfolded.
There were two items on the Living in Love and Faith (LLF) work: a presentation, followed by questions, on Saturday afternoon, and a debate on Monday on a motion to maneuver forward previously agreed proposals on the blessing of same-sex couples.
Although the lead bishop for LLF, the Bishop of Leicester, the Rt Revd Martyn Snow (News, 21 June), acknowledged that “none of us get what we would like” on this, the Synod agreed to remove impediments to the usage of these blessings (Prayers in Love and Faith) in stand-alone services, and to supply delegated episcopal ministry for opponents of the changes. A call on whether priests are permitted to be in same-sex civil marriages has been deferred until February.
The debate wrung out the final dissatisfaction from each side, while the presentation recounted the mostly positive experiences of members of the working groups, including their meeting in Leicester earlier this 12 months.
Another chunk of time was dedicated to safeguarding, which featured in three items of business.
A personal member’s motion, moved by the Revd Robert Thompson (London) on Sunday, called for a recent independent inquiry into abuse within the Soul Survivor network. He argued that neither the investigation by the National Safeguarding Team (NST) (News, 8 September 2023) nor the inquiry currently being undertaken by Fiona Scolding KC (News, 9 February) were “sufficient or right in principle”.
Despite support from Charismatic Evangelical members, nonetheless, the meat of the motion was rewritten after a successful amendment from the lead bishop for safeguarding, the Bishop of Stepney, Dr Joanne Grenfell, who argued that the NST’s investigation had been “handled well”. Towards the top, the Archbishop of Canterbury conceded that the talk had raised questions on “how we cope with very powerful leaders. . . You don’t wish to quench them, but you do wish to make certain that they don’t go bonkers.”
The wider reform of church safeguarding was tackled in an unusually calm and comparatively temporary discussion on Monday, after which an easy motion brought by Dr Grenfell was comfortably passed. It “welcomed the progress” of the Response Group tasked with proposing a way forward for church safeguarding structures, informed by recent reports from Sarah Wilkinson and Professor Alexis Jay.
Two bishops — Blackburn and Newcastle — who had previously desired to implement the independent structures advisable within the Jay report modified their minds in support of the route now being taken.
The independent co-chair of the Response Group, the businesswoman and NGO leader Lesley-Anne Ryder, said that she had been “struck by how complex the systems and processes” of the Church are. “Seriously — I cannot easily discover whose job it’s to take governance decisions here,” she told members, to an uneasy ripple of laughter within the chamber.
Two years within the making, the National Redress Scheme for victims and survivors of church-related abuse accomplished its revision stage on Tuesday, with two failed amendments and little or no debate.
Clergy well-being was the difficulty of the day on Saturday, when the Synod carried a Winchester diocesan motion that asked the Archbishops’ Council to amend the Terms of Service regulations, to entitle clergy to 36 hours of rest in every seven-day period, including an uninterrupted rest period of 24 hours.
“You are a precious resource. . . Our priority is to take care of you,” the mover, Alison Coulter (Winchester), told the clergy.
During the talk, many examples of “unmanageable workloads and unrealistic job descriptions” got. An amendment from the Archdeacon of Blackburn, the Ven. Mark Ireland, was passed affirming the sabbath principle.
It was “business as usual” for the planned Archbishops’ Council budget of £64.1 million for 2025, the chair of the Finance Committee, Carl Hughes, said on Saturday. But some members were “uneasy” without the chance to scrutinise its apportionment, referring to projects that, they said, had not been budgeted for.
The picture of decline in church attendance, vocations, and parish giving meant that “the first crisis the Church is facing today is missional,” Mr Hughes said. There was also significant “financial anxiety” among the many clergy, which was affecting well-being, and housing prospects for retiring clerics looked bleak.
Concerns about apportionment and transparency were also raised in Sunday’s debate on the annual reports of the Archbishops’ Council and Church Commissioners. Introducing the reports, the First Church Estates Commissioner, Alan Smith, said that “vigilance and discipline” were needed; meeting targets was not guaranteed, as previously well-performing asset classes were delivering negative returns.
Archdeacon Ireland (Blackburn), then brought a following motion that regretted the omission of the National Burial Grounds Survey. Parishes needs to be told not to enroll to it due to risks, including the possible sale of information to the Mormon Church, the motion said. It was carried.
One of the more contentious debates over the weekend was again on funds, this time a proposed 25-per-cent rise in diocesan registrars’ retainers. This caused some astonishment amongst members, and suggestions that the rise was “excessive”, “ridiculous”, and “unacceptable”, given the already “squeezed middle budget” for a lot of dioceses.
The accompanying paper records that hourly rates increased greater than usual in 2023: the common for non-London clerks was £149, up from £126 in 2022 (an 18 per cent increase), and for non-London solicitors, £287 up from £236 in 2022 (a 22 per cent increase). “In order for the overall cost of the retainer to stay the identical in 2025 as in 2024 the charitable discount would must be increased to twenty-eight per cent,” which was impossible, it says.
Projected annual fees for every diocese in 2025 would range from between £100,000 and £200,000. During the talk, the Dean of the Arches, the Rt Worshipful Morag Ellis KC, said that, compared with industrial rates, the proposed rates were low.
None the less, a procedural motion from Aiden Hargreaves-Smith (London), a registrar himself, to maneuver to next business was carried. He was concerned that the rise could cause difficulties in relationships between dioceses and registrars, which, he said, were fundamental.
Also on Monday was a debate about foodbanks and the inadequacy of social security, informed by direct experience. The Archdeacon of Sheffield, the Ven. Malcolm Chamberlain, introduced a motion from Sheffield diocese which called on the House of Bishops urgently to have interaction with the brand new Government to review the adequacy of current social-security provision. Mass dependence on food emergency parcels was “an ethical scar on our society”, he said. Speakers agreed, a lot of whom were involved in church-run foodbanks.
Issues surrounding mental and physical well-being, stigma, and inequality were raised, in addition to endorsements of the Essentials Guarantee and calls to scrap the two-child advantages cap. Penny Allen (Lichfield) summarised the consensus: “If all of us work together in civil society, we can have more effect.”
The Revd Jonathan Macy (Southwark) said that greater than half of the households with a disabled person in them were below the poverty line. He spoke of “a vortex where individuals with disabilities are over-concentrated in areas of poverty. Churches with the bottom resources are working with the best and most complex needs. What they do on a shoestring is staggering.”
The God-given dignity of disabled people had been affirmed during a debate on Sunday afternoon on a motion from the diocese of Liverpool, which challenged a culture of presuming that a prenatal diagnosis of disability was a “tragedy”. It also urged each the NHS and the C of E to enhance their offering to folks.
The debate was led by the Archdeacon of Knowsley and Sefton, the Ven. Pete Spiers, who was born disabled, owing to Thalidomide. He said: “With the fitting support at the fitting time, it is feasible to assist pregnant moms and their unborn children to hold on with their lives and be glad.” Whether a pregnancy proceeded or was ended, “love, compassion, and style are needed greater than anything.”
On the ultimate day, Tuesday, the Synod endorsed a day of prayer and motion for the persecuted Church, after a debate full of stories about how, world wide, believers continued to suffer for his or her faith. While only one abstention was recorded in an otherwise unanimous vote of 230 members, Nadine Daniel (Liverpool), though in support, identified that there was already an International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, an ecumenical initiative during which the C of E took part. She asked members to offer some thought to the implementation of the brand new one.
The last item of business — which,one member suggested, must have been the primary — was a confident presentation from pupils from Archbishop Holgate School, in York, and the Archway Learning Trust, in Nottingham. It was an “obvious” reminder to the Synod that young people were the long run of mission and ministry, one member said. Others suggested that the accompanying survey and overly optimistic report had been “over-managed” by adults and weren’t inclusive of young people outside the Church.
The item was led by the Bishop of Portsmouth, the Rt Revd Jonathan Frost, who chairs the National Society. He said to the pupils: “We hear you. We value.”
Before prorogation, the Archbishop of Canterbury led a farewell to the Bishop of Worcester, Dr John Inge, who’s retiring (News, 3 May). He described Dr Inge as a person of “enormous generosity of heart”, who, tellingly, could be missed most in his diocese, where he has been Bishop since 2008.
