Bishop's Visitation Charge 2007
The Occasional Offices – a wonderful opportunity
Hope for Monmouth and Fresh Expressions encourage churches to get more involved in their communities and find new opportunities. It is good to see parishes arranging process evangelism courses and sometimes choosing a secular venue to encourage what are today called the ‘un-churched’ and ‘de-churched’ to come along. But there are, I believe, new opportunities with those who still turn to the church at significant moments in their lives.
As I said earlier, Anglican clergy seek to minister to the whole community; they are not just chaplains to congregations. And there are two great missionary opportunities – our church schools and the occasional offices. I know that parishes with church schools value the links and use them well. But baptisms, marriages and funerals are still wonderful opportunities for evangelism if we really use them.
It is always a joy to confirm adults who have come to faith as a result of the reception they received from their priest when they asked for baptism for their child. They were not presented with a hundred impossible things to believe before breakfast, or a set of hoops or hurdles through which or over which they had to jump. They were welcomed with real warmth and given time. On family told me that the priest welcomed them by saying ‘Yes, the church wants to baptise your baby, so come along and let’s talk about how we can make your baby’s baptism a really special occasion’. They were encouraged to think through what they were asking for their baby and discovered that was what they also wanted for themselves.
One of the shifts in culture, is that marriage is often delayed or not on the agenda at all. Sometimes the baptism takes the social place of the wedding, although a recent survey shows that 36% of unmarried men and 38% of unmarried women aspire to marriage and of those planning a wedding, 75% believe that the church is the proper place for it. The survey findings say (and I quote), ‘Couples who had recently married in church largely spoke about their vicar extremely warmly, although many had expected that this would not be the case. Positive characteristics of ‘good vicars’ include being ‘modern’, ‘not too stiff’ and ‘approachable but not too matey’.
Today of course, many couples are already co-habiting and are therefore likely to continue to live in the parish rather than move away. The survey to which I referred indicates that 55% of those being married in a church are doing so because of the spiritual or sacred ambience of the church. The older marriage preparation courses were designed to help people see if they really wanted to get married. Today, we recognise they have already decided but they want to know more about the spiritual meaning of marriage.
Funerals continue to provide a tremendous opportunity. In some parishes, licensed readers and authorised lay people assist with funerals, and here again there has been a huge cultural shift. There has been a shift from burial to cremation, and from using a standard authorised order of service to tailor-made services with family members and friends paying tributes, and today there is a growing interest in eco-friendly woodland burials and secular funeral officiants offered as an alternative to a Christian minister. Privitized rites and civil celebrants challenge those who have a traditional view of the cure of souls and how we are to make the link between where people are, and how the church can meet them with integrity. Alongside this there is a declining belief in the afterlife – a third of people believe that death is the end, a third believe that your soul lives on and a third believe in resurrection or re-incarnation or are unsure. We need to rethink our theology of death and our pastoral approach to the bereaved.
Some parishes I know have a good-quality printed card which is given to bereaved families. It contains some prayers they might wish to use – and also an invitation to come to church to hear their loved one being commended by name in the prayers. Then there are people trained to identify those coming who might be bereaved and they help them follow the service and invite them to coffee afterwards. Some churches owe much of their growth to good funeral ministry.
In all the surveys and studies about rites of passage, the attitude of the parish clergy is the most important factor in whether or not people are drawn more into the life of the church or alienated from it. Most people are uncertain of the welcome or reaction they will receive from the clergy because they are conscious of their lack of any church observance. When the welcome is warm, friendly and loving, they become open to what the priest has to say. If what the priest has to say is ‘person- centred’ rather than ‘church-centred’ then enquirers will know that the priest is listening to them and a real exchange can take place.
A few of years ago, I read an article that had been written by a nun who had been looking at religious orders that were bucking the trend and still attracting novices. She wanted to see what they had in common and when I saw her analysis, I realised that what she had written also fitted with my experience of growing churches. She said that growth depended on three intimacies or three loves