Essays published by STP on behalf of their authors. Please contact us if have one of you own you would like published.
“THE first challenge is recognising that each rural area is distinctive. Central church bodies tend to view rural churches through urban or suburban lenses. This is to the detriment not only of the life and mission of rural churches, but also, paradoxically, to that of urban and suburban churches. People Read more…
Save our Parsonages (SOP) was founded in 1994 as a result of deep concern in the parishes about the number of fine rectories and vicarages that were being sold off against their wishes and without prior discussion. Our aims are a) to make the Church understand the value of its Read more…
It hardly seems possible that, in a few weeks, I will be celebrating fifty years since ordination to the priesthood – and so will Tony Mortimer! We left Salisbury Theological College on the same day, went our separate ways for 35 years and in 2006 found ourselves washed up on Read more…
How Village Churches Thrive: A Practical Guide. Church House Publishing, 2022, £9.99. ‘So, if anything, I think many rural churches are rather like spring bulbs, ready for the right conditions to release all the potential they hold, and to thrive.’ Those are the words of comedian Hugh Dennis, a vicarage Read more…
“The combined scent of damp hymn books, dahlias slightly past their best, candlewax, Brasso and Victorian radiators: breathing in this intoxicating smell is one of the delights of living in England, with its 12,500 parish churches at the heart of every village and town. To press down the latch and feel the church door opening rather than remaining stubbornly shut is one of life’s great reassurers.”
“Over the last couple of difficult years, the parishes have proved themselves full of courageous and generous insurgents. Church House and the dioceses less so. The parish system in this country is a deeply embedded capillary network of neighbourliness and personal relationships. But Church House and the dioceses no longer seem to view it as vigorous and life-sustaining.
“[Priests] are good, giving people, and they need to be properly paid and they need to be properly housed because they are the bedrock of our Christian faith. They are the people that are going around talking to parishioners, and they can learn a great deal of what is actually needed by the man in the street. Unfortunately, the Church of England is reducing their number and of course in turn that is going to reduce the churches, and they will be sold. So it is something that really needs to be supported.”
“I won’t be launching any new initiatives… I’m committed to supporting and empowering, as best we can, each local context to discern for yourselves how you are to be God’s people in your bit of the world, always facing outwards to the needs of the community in which you are based and working in partnership with others.”
“So, the CofE picked up on the social damage done by closing railways (churches), but hasn’t picked up on the underlying causes of why the railways (churches) weren’t being used, nor has it picked up on the fact that once the railway as been ripped out (church closed) then you can’t put it back again. I do not know if I wasn’t clear, or whether there is willful or accidental blindness on the part of the CofE hierarchy.”
“What we vicars need is a bishop who, like an elder sibling will swoop into our parishes and help sort out nonsense, and if required (safeguarding rules permitting) give us a hug. Bishops should be able to hang around in a parish for a few days, not just a few hours. In my mind a bishop should be to the vicarage family like a grandparent who says to the vicar and his wife, “You are overworking, so tonight I’ll look after the kids so you two can go off to the cinema.””