Church of England lifts 400-year-old rule on mandatory Sunday services
I'm hoping some of our friends in the C of E can tell us about this story. Is this a portent of lean times? A practical solution to the situation as it exists on the ground? Changing agéd rules made in different circumstances to accommodate contemporary reality?
In short, big deal, or no big deal?
In short, big deal, or no big deal?
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So according to him, no big deal.
The Church of England’s own account says
Technically, lay Episcopalians may conduct morning and evening prayer and compline but they probably need to be authorized to preach.
Lay people may preside and administer a baptism? Here a layperson may do an emergency baptism in the field (danger of death to the convert, and the baptism needs to be later registered with a church in the diocese). Regular Episcopal church conducted baptisms require clergy like a deacon, priest or bishop.
All can bless - depends on how you read the bible of course and interpret your rules. It really needs a bit of lateral thinking around the concept of ordination and calling - you could then have a more flexible set up.
Yes bizarre isn't it? As a confirmed believer the CofE will recognise me baptising anyone in extremis as long as I follow a Trinitarian formula. They won't though accept my ordination as a Baptist Minister even though I trained alongside Anglicans.
I can save through baptism in their eyes but I can't preside at communion. We've come to a pretty pass haven't we with this kind of stuff?
Time to reclaim the real idea of ordination in the sense of calling and equipping. You'll then have enough people to cover way more services than keeping it to a trained elite.
Nevertheless I agree with EM's comments (well, you'd expect me to, wouldn't you!) We need to face up to the fact that we are ministering and worshiping in a vastly different world to that of say 50 years ago. This requires us to be flexible, imaginative and above all outward-looking - things which many "traditional" or "mainstream" churches aren't good at. We might see the CofE's recent announcement as evidence of retrenchment and decline, in fact we'd be silly to regard it as anything else. But it also represents a nod to honest reality, and another one to simplifying structures so that new initiatives may freely bloom.
(As an aside, the "new churches" tend to be looked on with a great deal of disfavour on these boards. But, whether one likes them or not, it cannot be denied that they are attracting a demographic which few of our other churches are doing. We may shudder at their entreprenurial spirit, wince at their theology and feel that they embrace contemporary culture rather than challenging it ... but they are clearly doing something right and do not always deserve the criticisms heaped upon them).
When my 19 year old daughter was home at Christmas she was pretty disparaging about the church I serve which has loved her and nurtured her for years. She attends a new church in Edin Hugh, and is fervent in her faith. We managed to have a good discussion in the end about certain things (why we have an offering and why it is not a collection, the merits of corporate prayer etc.). And I told her that the established denominations are going through a crisis out of which they cannot (should not) emerge unchanged. But I am called to these villages and these people. Her new church generation will, I hope pick up the baton that my mainly elderly congregation will relinquish when they go to their reward, and if I find it too hard to adapt to their new ways, I certainly will stand at the side cheering them on.
The situation in cities is different, especially where there has been significant demographic change or where the multiplicity of churches may be down to long-distant Anglican party politics.
What is the difference between "equipping" and "training"?
So a little village church with only a handful of people attending could still be open for worship every Sunday, but with Holy Communion on perhaps just one Sunday a month, or less frequently if push came to shove, so to speak.
The late +Michael Perham advocated this more than 30 years ago, making the point that, whatever the form of service, the time should be the same each week wherever possible. He also recommended the use of the same lectionary each week (BCP or the modern equivalent - ASB back then!) for the sake of continuity.
AIUI, the use of Communion by Extension depends on the attitude of the Diocesan Bishop - ours, for instance, really only approves in cases of emergency (e.g. a priest suddenly becoming ill or otherwise hindered from celebrating), and even these occasions have to be notified to his Chaplain asap. Ours is not a rural Diocese, so we don't have many multi-church benefices (I can think of one with 3 churches, and another with 4, but I think that's the maximum).
Quite so. Nothing new at all, and Synod is just catching up officially with what has been the reality for many years. My earlier reference to +Michael Perham, and his suggestions regarding multi-church benefices, harks back to about 1980.
The way I make a distinction in my mind (and this is sort of just me, not something I remember being taught) is that when the money people give, in whatever way, is dedicated to God during worship that is an offering. It is part of our worship of God offered in a tangible way. When people are given an opportunity to give but it is not dedicated, that is a collection and is on a par with other kinds of fund raising. Good, necessary, but not part of our corporate worship.
Ah, but don't forget that God has a say too. The Holy Spirit seems to be doing a grand job of increasing focal ministry around the country. People, lay and ordained, are coming forward to focus on one church and its parishioners, to great effect.
God equips (gifts). Man trains (sharpens and develops the gift).
For example, with the exception of our local cathedral, out church is the only one in our part of the diocese that has Morning Prayer on a Sunday (only once a month) and the only one in the entire deanery where MP and EP are said in public daily - and that is provided by a rota of lay people because the house-for-duty PP doesn't "do" the offices as a rule (!). None of the deaneries that border us have a church where either of the offices is said publicly on a regular basis.
Now can anyone tell me how to square that with Canon C24 1 and 2?
*the-powers-that-be
It already was, and continues to be possible for non-Eucharistic services to be led (and indeed daily morning and evening prayer to be said in each church in the benefice) by suitable people ordained or not as decided at a parish level, and even for a suitable person ordained or not to preach occasionally.
If, however, someone is going to minister the word regularly, or to minister the sacraments, they are expected to go through a process which engages the wider church, beyond a single minister or congregation, so that the process of discerning their calling to preach and/or to minister the sacraments includes diocesan and sometimes national processes, and the expectation of a significant commitment to sharpen and develop their gifts.
While this is a CoE practice thread, I might add that lots of Canadian churches have been sustained by services led by lay catechists, or readers, and often for extended periods (two to three years at times!!). You'll need a person ordained as a priest to preside at the Eucharist, but that's common among the greatest part of Christianity. In recent years, local leaders in remote areas have been ordained priests for this purpose, but they haven't been through the college mill.
The problem might not be as much in finding people to lead the services as much as it might be to get them to attend them.
I'm a little surprised that more Church of England parishes don't seem to have trained laypeople leading Morning or Evening Prayer.
Yes, lay people can take 'reserved sacrament' communion to individuals and groups within the community eg residential homes.
That's not the same thing as 'communion by extension' which involves a lay person leading a communion service within a church using reserved sacrament. This needs specific approval by the bishop, afaik.
I would only have to walk c400 metres across a field - but then I don't live in the parish where I play. From the parish where I work you'd have to travel at least 6 miles to get to another church with a regular communion service - and the nearest only has a said 8am, their main event is an All-Age Worship, referred to by its refugees in my choir as Bear Garden with Choruses.
Yes. Lay members of our (TEC) shack visit one old people's home every Sunday bringing the reserved sacrament, and another once a month. There's a form to be used in the BCP.