The reports conclusions from
analysis of the mission context are
that:
v
The existing parochial system alone
is no longer able to deliver its underlying missionary purpose.
It then takes Archbishop Rowan’s phrase and argues that..
v
We need a mixed economy – no
longer promoting one way of being church
The
language of MIXED ECONOMY was coined
by Archbishop Rowan whilst still in
Mixed
economy means looking at all expressions of church and making some assessment of
what works for which groups in society.
This includes assessing the old and it is clear that some of these
expressions are proving attractive and there is some obvious connection between
the value of spirituality and the virtues of antiquity.
Holy Places are in, and by no means all of that is mere tourism.
That is not to say there are no weaknesses in these developments. There
are dangers in being anonymous attenders who never enter the community life of
church, and equally who never become part of the church’s mission to further
outsiders.
Mixed Economy also means
investing in, creating & nurturing a diversity of the new. This is language
that implies the transfer of priorities and resources to an underdeveloped part
of the life of the overall church.
The variety of FXC is
considerable – here is one list based on chapter 4.
Planters and Pioneers can take great encouragement that this is the warm
and welcoming way the ABC, is considering them :
“what has been so
extraordinary, so life giving and wonderful in the last decade or so, is more
and more stories coming in, of how those fresh encounters happen….. God is
showing us examples of what the church is, in startling new ways, because we are
seeing what corporate forms of life actually happen when people meet Jesus.”
++RW at SBK June
23rd 2004
Mixed
Economy is a both/and mentality, not either or.
The double listening principle in MSC is listen both to the mission
context and the inherited tradition. From that expression of church grow. Part
of our mission context still includes those who encounter Christ, through
traditional expressions of church. Other
parts of our mission context lead to fresh expressions.
Mixed economy is living with both.
Then
as Archbishop Rowan put it, in discussing structural response,
in June 2004
How does the church organise
itself in such a way that ..
A]
it doesn’t simply send out the message that fresh expressions, new
encounters are a kind of tolerable eccentricity on the edge ?
B]
but neither does it send out the message that everything people are doing
as the moment is wrong and they need to forget it.
++RW at SBK June
23rd 2004
Or,
later in the same talk, using a different metaphor
“Mixed economy…. Means
that the church is always a mixture of the disciplined regularities of the prose
and the unpredictable encounters, the new creation beginning to happen afresh
somewhere, the poetry.”
++RW at SBK June
23rd 2004
Yet
we need to be clear what Mixed economy does not mean. The danger is the term can
be a cop out, to have a few mission shaped churches existing alongside unchanged
existing churches. Many of the latter are so unmission minded that I fear they
have become mis-shapen churches. Mixed
economy is about the mixture of inherited and emerging churches – but all of
them learning to be more mission-shaped.
This
charity to the fresh expressions is not new. A source, unlikely to some, comes
from
The
1960’s and the WCC
The churches attitude towards
experiments should not be one of silent toleration, especially towards
experiments which are seeking to create new forms of Christian presence in terms
of particular situations. A missionary church should welcome such attempts and
encourage their multiplication
1967 WCC The
Church for others
What
I think we do not yet know is what the future will be. Clearly we have already
entered the Heineken world – the fresh expressions are reaching the parts the
older expressions could not reach. Mixed
economy has no trouble with that.
What
pleases some, and worries others, is that the change may be far more far
reaching. What I could call the
I
think two major factors have led to the framework in which mixed economy is
worked out on the ground.
1
Both new housing and the rise of networks mean that the mission task
overflows the old ecclesial boundaries. In
such local cases ways of far greater flexibility are being found because the
mission imperative is strong. Better
than simply tearing up the boundaries, people are looking to wider identities in
which they could still be meaningful.
2
Allied to this is what I would call a change about change.
MSC 124-125 recognizes that past gradualist and evolutionary change is
inadequate for what is before us. You
might call this democratic and synodical process the convoy system – which
proceeds at the pace of the slowest ship. MSC
recognizes that the speed of change needed and the slower speed the current
system permits creates real tensions. pp.
131-132 talk of this shift and a tension between being Anglican and Apostolic
At times in WW2 the crisis of assault on a convoy could sometimes lead to
the decision that to scatter and remain in looser contact that was an advantage.
Whether we are at that point is not certain. What is clear is that in any
climate needing rapid and flexible change, it is natural that the role of a
leader is accentuated as the initiator or permission-giver.
The church rightly values order and relationships – because the body of
Christ ought to be functioning as one, not divided nor anarchic. At the same
time it is rightly wanting to be
responsive to a critical need which is one of the levers for change.
It is thus natural and theological that the role of the Bishop as more
directive leader in mission should become the other lever.
So MSC reworded a draft document, I had written with others, from within
Sheffield Diocese and recommended this way of proceeding.
It works with the two instincts I have aired – wider mission areas and
serious roles for the Bishop – and uses four
interlocking principles to facilitate diverse church planting across a diocese.
It suggests the jigsaw of contemporary mission can be put together well,
if all four are employed.
a] the bishop acts as
authorised broker in discussions with ability to authorize or deny permission to
proceed. Broker may be too mild a word.
b] the old and fresh
expressions of church in that parish should be complementary in both aim and
style, where it is agreed that a church plant should be begun, but its meeting
place is in another parish.
c] in all cases legal
boundaries should be seen as permeable, reflecting that such boundaries need to
be both respected and crossed
d] a mutually agreed process
be entered, including review and support to both expressions, in order to hold
these values together [1]
Some
have found this revolutionary, some think it tame. Some argue true network
church cannot sit at all with territorial instincts.
To
the frustrated I’d comment in two ways. Politically the MSC group did have to
make difficult judgements about what was achievable and to offer recommendations
that could be accepted by Synod. To
construct a report that suffered rejection would jeopardise the gains for which
it stood. Its favourable reception
is now the base from which to continue to build.
Locally
two other factors are important. One
is that network churches do have a relationship to maintain with other churches
who may well still think in the territorial way. Also where a network church has
a principal gathering point, ignoring neighbours is neither wise nor
collaborative. Where there is no
permanent meeting place, clear ways of expressing their relationship with other
Christian groups is still a right concern, within one body of Christ.
Celebrating difference and giving mutual affirmation seems the best way
to handle this.
Moving on,
but staying with the two principles, that the mission context dictates to
boundary sizes and that the episcopal leadership in mission is crucial, MSC has
revisited a well known statement made by a Bishop when a vicar is being put in
post – “receive the cure of souls that
is yours and mine.” We observe that this cure is not given away, but rather
shared.
So for
Protectionism can have no
place, when the mission of God is discerned by a fair external process to
overflow those boundaries. The MSC
hopes in a couple of years this change will become law.
Any framework exists in a
historical context. That moment will
certainly express chronos, it may also be kairos.
It may not be just a time, but somehow also “the time”
Archbishop Rowan in the
foreword to MSC speaks of a watershed. Recently
he used the phrase “a sense of providence” – over the coming together of
various factors
My view is that MSC is well
guarded by friends. The ABC is the most
obvious of these. He has come from
The legal experts have been
convinced and recommended more open,
more light touch, more flexible, more permissive patterns which will aid
permission givers to follow their heart without fearing the backlash.
The Church Commissioners,
holding historic assets for the Church are also convinced. 1st time
round the traditionalists in Synod threw our their proposals, btu it may be that
the moral argument is being won.
In
Equally among the pioneering
community there are developments. One commonality is the yearning for missional
or apostolic communities and for them to be more like Orders than pastoral
clergy, that should offer us more flexibility over deployment and more
concentration of resources to plant more effectively.
Such is our kairos moment, for
which we give thanks. What difference it will all make is a ceaseless topic for
prayer, for consultation and discernment, and for the sending out of people to
fashion further fresh expressions of church.
Could be a prayer for our time:
Holy Spirit, your presence is liberty
Grant us that freedom of the Spirit
Which will not fear to tread in unknown ways
Nor be held back by fear of others or misgivings of ourselves.
Ever beckon us forward to the place of your will
Which is also the place of your power
O ever-leading ever-loving Lord. Amen
Bishop George Appleton
[1]
pp. 138-142 A version can be downloaded from www.encountersontheedge.org.uk