Save The Parish

 

You may have seen something of the Save The Parish campaign either online or in the national press.

 

Let me say to begin with that in many ways I am all for the parish and I sympathise with much of the campaign. I think the local church is really where the action is. And I think it is great that the C of E has a vision for the whole nation, for every blade of grass and for those who don’t yet come to church.

 

But we would do well to ask: What is the parish? Does it need saving? From what? For what?

 

There is much that is good about the Church of England and its parish system. But if we were starting from scratch, we probably wouldn’t invent the whole thing quite like this.

 

One of the main points about the C of E is that it isn’t a blank sheet of paper. It is hundred and hundreds of years of history, some good and some bad, some suitable for the future and some not. We must value and give thanks for our inheritance. We are custodians of a great and various tradition. But we must not be imprisoned by it – or by one understanding of a particular version of it. Sadly, in some places the expensively educated Rector in his mansion next door to his single parish church is a thing of the past.

 

In some places the parish is in rude good health. In most it faces challenges. In a few places it is in crisis.

 

The challenges are not just financial. Our buildings are a wonderful blessing, a great witness and a real asset for ministry and mission. But often a burden too. Sometimes they are in the middle of a field miles from the nearest High Street. Being from the 13^th Century, some of them need a little work – and skilled stonemasons are less ubiquitous than handy persons or builders who could throw up a value for money building with a loo, small meeting rooms, an office and actual working heating. Sometimes almost every parishioner could sit in the parish church and sadly we don’t often need that. It is next to impossible to close many of our church buildings and even if we could, some would need to be given away rather than making us millions.

 

Above all, the challenge within and without the church is spiritual. If the parish is to be saved, it can only really be saved by and for Jesus. The church exists to know, love and follow Jesus and to make him known. It is not for us to save the parish church as a museum. If the nation wants to do that, fine, but it must pay for it. Our structures, buildings and finance must be fit for purpose and that means keeping what good we can from the legacy parish system, but also being open to change. Life is much less parochial than it once way. It may be the church must be.

 

The church only has a future is we have kids and nurture them in the faith, and if we see others won for Christ. Given that many of our committed church members are in their eighties, we can’t just look for natural growth. We need to pray and plan for the miracle of conversion, for new birth. It may be that new wine will burst some old wine skins.  

 

In most diocese, there is no magic money tree. The cavalry is not coming. If Jesus is to save the parish church, he will must likely do it through us here. There could no doubt be better sharing and mutual support. Diocesan, national and international initiatives can have their place. But it is the clergy and people of the parish who must be and share good news in the parish if these somewhat dry bones are to live. The Word and the Spirit retain their power. We must pray and plan and preach to these dry bones by word and deed, asking that Jesus will be pleased once again to revive church and nation.

 

The salvation of the church is secure. The gates of hell will not prevail against it. But how and where the C of E parish church will be remains to be seen. If we are to answer these questions, we need to prayerfully revisit the what and why of the parish church with open bibles and open minds.