THE next Bishop of Truro can be the Suffragan Bishop of Basingstoke, within the diocese of Winchester, the Rt Revd David Williams. He was a parish priest for 25 years before his consecration in 2014.
He will tackle a diocese that has emerged recently from extensive reorganisation, heavily criticised by a neighborhood branch of Save the Parish, and where the recruitment of more stipendiary priests has been described because the “top operational priority” (News, 2 June 2023; 15 March).
In an announcement after the announcement of his appointment, Bishop Williams said: “I’m, at heart, a parish priest. I need to proceed working for the flourishing of local churches. The local church is significant to a local people. It’s a spot where we encounter God. It’s a spot where you’re encouraged and comforted while you’re in trouble. It’s also a spot where we’re challenged and learn how you can live in God’s light.”
After spending his childhood in Uganda, Bishop Williams studied social policy at Bristol University. Then, after servig with the Church Missionary Society in Kenya, he trained for ordination at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, and was ordained in 1989, to a title in Ecclesall, within the diocese of Sheffield. He was the Vicar of Christ Church, Dore, also serving as a rural dean.
He moved to the diocese of Winchester in 2002, and for 12 years was Vicar of Christ Church, Winchester, with a congregation that grew significantly under his leadership. A diocesan press release described him as a “hugely loved and valued friend, mentor, leader and support”. The Bishop of Southampton, the Rt Revd Rhiannon King, said that his “faith, energy and love for God and other people is known”.
Seven years after Bishop Williams’s consecration, a crisis within the diocese culminated in the specter of a diocesan-synod vote of no confidence within the Bishop of Winchester, Dr Tim Dakin (News, 21 May 2021), who consequently resigned. The motion referred to “allegations of poor behaviour and mistreatment on his a part of quite a lot of individuals”, and described the governance and financial management of the diocese as “unfit for purpose”. Bishop Williams had himself presented concerns to Lambeth Palace and the Bishop of London.
Restructuring under Dr Dakin had entailed combining parishes, simplifying governance, and uniting benefices. In 2021, initial consultations and conversations were began for 21 pastoral schemes affecting 50 benefices and 103 parishes. A complete of twenty-two stipendiary posts were cut.
Last 12 months, Bishop Williams described the diocese of Winchester as now being “in good heart”, with an “unprecedented variety of ordinands” (Features, 8 September 2023).
Under the previous Bishop of Truro, the Rt Revd Philip Mounstephen, who was translated to Winchester to succeed Dr Dakin (News, 7July), extensive restructuring took place in Truro through the “On the Way” programme, in response to financial and mission challenges. Bishop Mounstephen warned that it was “unsustainable” for the price of ministry to outstrip giving (News 2 June).
In 2023, a diocesan “Plan for Change and Renewal” was set out, forecasting that, inside ten years, most church communities could be led by lay and ordained “local ministers” under “oversight” from stipendiary priests (News, 2 June 2023). The plans led to public disputes between the diocesan leadership and members of the organisation Save the Parish Cornwall, which warned of “brutal” cuts to stipendiary posts and challenged diocesan data on the variety of clergy in post (News, 22 March). Under one plan, the Kerrier deanery became a single benefice of 23 churches served by two stipendiary clergy.
The diocese has reserves and endowments of greater than £115 million. Last 12 months, the diocesan synod approved a plan to spend £22 million of diocesan reserves over the following ten years, to support deanery plans and to “sustain and where possible increase clergy numbers”. The Bishop of St Germans, the Rt Revd Hugh Nelson, has described increasing the variety of stipendiary priests because the “top operational priority”, against the background of a struggle to recruit (News, 15 March 2024).
The Statement of Needs drawn up by Truro’s vacancy-in-see committee refers back to the need for the diocesan Bishop to “listen well to discern meaning and promote understanding with the numerous and sometimes contradictory demands made on them by individuals and groups”. It refers to a “rural, sparse, often isolated diocese” — which is considered one of the smallest by population within the Church of England.
“We know that ‘changes to patterns of ministry’ can feel like code for ‘you won’t see the vicar fairly often’ when the true picture is more complex,” it says. On the Way “inevitably led to each cohesion and to breakage. There are quite a few recent appointments, and overall, a transparent direction of travel with a recent vision that now needs execution and support when difficulties arise.”
Usual Sunday attendance for adults within the diocese’s 300 churches stood at just over 5000 in 2023, and 388 for youngsters, out of a complete population of 571,000. Many churches are actually “completely empty of kids”. Growth on this area is cited as a priority. About 7000 children attend C of E primary schools.
Bishop Williams is married, and has two children and two grandsons. Having “worked in and visited Cornwall over and over”, he spoke of coming back “refreshed and renewed — each spiritually and physically”. He can be installed next spring.
In a message to Winchester diocese he said: “These have been the perfect years of my life and it has been a privilege to serve here. We have taken the communities here into our hearts, and I think you have got taken us into yours. Over all of it there was the remarkable story of God’s grace holding us, being with us through every part.”
