Dr Beasley’s debate adjourned, he regrets
THE debate on a motion to transfer £2.6 billion from the Church Commissioners to diocesan stipend funds (News, 31 January) was adjourned on Friday afternoon when time ran short. Its mover, the Bishop of Bath & Wells, Dr Michael Beasley, said: “I would that we had had proper time to discuss this,” after moving the adjournment. “This motion sought to bring to our serious consideration the utterly grave financial situation of our parishes and dioceses which are affecting so badly our ability to staff and take forward the ministry of our churches.” At the end of 2024, 35 dioceses had beenb in deficit to the tune of £61 million in total, he said: “Our Church’s financial architecture is not working, and bringing us close to an existential crisis.” He requested that the Business Committee allot enough time for the resumed debate in July. In the mean time, the dioceses whose synods had supported the motion — Hereford, Gloucester, Coventry, Blackburn, Chichester, Lincoln, and Bath & Wells — would be engaging with Archbishops’ Council and Triennium Funding Working Group, he said.
Love and care for one another, members told
THE General Synod took note on Monday of the Business Committee report. The committee’s chair, Robert Hammond (Chelmsford), described it as an “especially complex agenda . . . packed with little light relief”. The Committee was acutely aware of the “unease, distress, and uncertainty” of members, given the agenda. “Love and care for each other,” he said, mindful that victims and survivors were present or watching online. The Revd Jenny Bridgman (Chester) urged the Synod to take “a trauma-based approach”, and warned against lapsing into “collective trauma” — and against “good guys versus bad guys”. Adopt Bonhoeffer’s “discipline of the tongue”, she said. Canon Mark Bennet (Oxford) was concerned about the limited legal resources for such an “overcrowded session”. The Archdeacon of London, the Ven. Luke Miller (London), who chairs the legislative-reform committee, gave assurances of progress in areas where legal resources were not needed. Penny Allen (Lichfield) urged adherence to the Vernon principle of conduct, given that there were no sanctions in Synod should a member resort to shouting or intimidating behaviour. The Revd Christopher Blunt (Chester) was concerned by a “functional agenda” in which doctrine appeared to have been “carefully distanced”. The Revd Robert Thompson (London) said that the agenda focused on “what is at the very heart of our crisis. . . What is an inappropriate speech to one may be a passionate speech to another.”
Confirmation statistics matter, Synod decides
A MOTION from Canterbury diocesan synod requesting that confirmations be included in the Statistics for Mission was carried on Wednesday afternoon. Members told stories of their own confirmations in a debate taken from the contingency business on the agenda.
‘Embarrassing’ Issues must go, Southwark cleric urges
THE Revd Mae Christie (Southwark) presented on Friday morning a petition in support of her private member’s motion calling for Issues in Human Sexuality to be dropped from the vocations process. Ms Christie asked that her motion, backed by 146 members so far, be debated in July. Issues was “antiquated and embarrassing” and should be consigned to history. This would happen as part of the LLF process, but delays meant that it remained in place, Ms Christie said.
Registrars’ fees to rise by ten per cent
THE Synod approved on Wednesday a rise of ten per cent in the level of legal fees for registrars, in a debate adjourned from last July. The Fees Advisory Commission had, at that point, suggested a rise of 24.8 per cent, but Synod members had protested that diocesan budgets had already been set for 2025, and that such an increase in the cost of the retainer could not be accommodated. The acting chair of the Commission, Carl Fender (Lincoln), said that these strong views had been listened to, and a ten-per-cent increase settled on, “in order to move as far as possible towards the retainer amount indicated by the 2014 formula, whilst also taking into account the views expressed by Synod members and Diocesan Secretaries in July as to what could be accommodated in diocesan budgets”. The Commission had also reviewed in previous years, and an information-gathering exercise would help to determine whether a full review of the methodology was needed. “I think we need to cherish our registrars, who do very good work for us indeed,” Mr Fender said.
