Ecclesianarchy

John Williams

Description

Arguing that what is needed is a provisional approach to ministry which recognises that all forms of ministry are, and always have been a response to social and cultural context, 'Ecclesianarchy' brings theological and practical insight to bear on the question of ministry's provisionality.

Informations

• Publié par: Hymns Ancient & Modern
• Date de parution: 30 septembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780334059820
• Langue: English

Extrait

Ecclesianarchy
Adaptive Ministry for a Post-Church Society
John Williams






© John Williams 2020
Published in 2020 by SCM Press
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Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version (Anglicised edition) copyright © 1979, 1984, 2011 by Biblica (formerly International Bible Society). Used by permission of Hodder & Stoughton Publishers, an Hachette UK company. All rights reserved.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
978-0-334-05980-6
Typeset by Regent Typesetting
Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd



Contents
Preface

Introduction
1. Liquid Modernity: Hallmarks of the Post-Church Society
2. Unfinished Business: The Historical Contestation of Ministry
3. Threefold Disorder: Diaconal, Presbyteral and Episcopal Ministry Today
4. Interrogating Ordination: Ontology, Function and Gender
5. Shared, Lay, Local and Collaborative: The Road Less Travelled
6. Distribution and Difference: The Pentecostal and Charismatic Inheritance
7. Chaplaincy: A Very Ancient and Postmodern Ministry
8. Fresh Expressions: Hope for the Mainstream Denominations?
9. Signals of the Impossible: Reimagining the Role of Christian Faith
10. ‘Ecclesianarchy’: A Blueprint for Adaptive Ministry
11. Stirring Up the Gift: On Being Formed for Christian Ministry
12. Identity Crisis: Negotiating Role and Person in Ministry
Conclusion

Bibliography





Preface
This book has been a long time in gestation. A few years ago, after over 40 years of active participation in the Church of England, 30 of them in ordained ministry, I came to a troubling conclusion: a surplus of ecclesiology and ministerial theology is impeding the prospect of the Church renewing its connection with contemporary people, culture and society.
As a newly practising Christian in the 1970s, I was introduced to shared, collaborative, ‘every-member’ models of ministry. From my time at theological college in the 1980s, my commitment to these became intentional and strategic. I strove to develop these practices in parochial ministry in the 1990s, and worked to help other parishes do the same in a diocesan post in the early 2000s. I also tried to attend to my own development as a practical theologian, completing a doctoral thesis in 1986, and contributing to diocesan ministry strategies, writing discussion papers and publishing articles in ministry practitioner-related journals.
From 2008 until my retirement in 2017, I held a senior lecturer post in theology and ministry, teaching students in training for both lay and ordained ministries at diocesan schools of ministry. During this time, I continued to research and publish in the field of evolving patterns of ministry in the Church of England and other mainstream denominational churches. Towards the end of this period, I developed an interest in the emerging independent churches, together with the growth of chaplaincy as a fascinating but under-reported alternative ministry model. The more I reflected on my experience as a practitioner and theological educator, scrutinized ministerial strategies being pioneered within my own church communion and learned more about the approaches being taken within the new churches, the more the troubling conclusion referred to above was borne in upon me.
This book is my attempt to work through the unsettling position I have reached, to locate it in a wider historical and contemporary socio-cultural context, to analyse and assess its implications and conduct a thought experiment. Supposing the churches could suspend ecclesiological constructs and reimagine ministerial order without restraint, in response to present-day needs, what might the resulting expressions of ecclesiality look like? I have coined the term ecclesianarchy to capture this, because – although critics might accuse me of wanting to unleash chaos – I believe a case can be made for treating anarchy as a valid, if challenging, conceptuality for the character of ‘church’.
I want to make two points for the avoidance of misunderstanding. My approach is sometimes provocative, but there is absolutely no intention to disparage or belittle the challenges faced and sacrifices made by thousands of ministers, lay and ordained, who have to work within the inherited ecclesial structures. The second point is that this is not a manifesto for any particular form of alternative, experimental or radical form of church and ministry. My argument is that all models can be burdened by an excess of ecclesiology, wherever requirements for the proper structuring of the life of the Church and the ordering of its ministry are regarded as warranted by fundamental theological tradition. I have concluded that there should be many expressions of church that do things in startlingly different ways; but not that any one of them can justifiably lay claim to be the correct way, in the sense of God-given .
I am grateful to all those who have encouraged me over the years to pursue my thinking about ministry and to commit some of those thoughts to writing. Among them I must pay tribute to two now departed this life, Bishop Geoffrey Paul, who when Bishop of Hull first stimulated my appetite for theology in the late 1970s, and Professor, later Bishop, Stephen Sykes, who encouraged me to undertake doctoral studies in Durham in the 1980s. Other mentors and supporters have included colleagues and advocates of shared ministry in the Diocese of Wakefield between 1993 and 2008, among them Canon Margaret Bradnum, Canon Dr John Lawson and the Revd Janet Sargent; and Bishop Stephen Platten, who gave me a positive steer towards developing my academic interests and publishing my work. Among colleagues at York St John University from 2008 to 2017, Louise Redshaw, Professor Andrew Village and Dr Ann Christie have been friends and supporters on my theological pilgrimage towards this book. Professor Jeff Astley gave me valuable guidance about publishers and proposals. Thanks are also due to those who commented helpfully on drafts of some chapters of the book: my colleagues Andy Village and Chris Maunder, fellow advocates for collaborative ministry Malcolm Grundy and Joanna Cox, and two of my students, Jonathan Foster and Rachel Shackleton. Last, I need to thank my wife Ann-Marie, who has understood my need for times of seclusion, sometimes away from home, in order to write.




Introduction
Post-church society and radical ecclesiology
The doctoral thesis I completed before ordination (Williams, 1986) opened my mind to two key issues I have grappled with ever since. The first concerns the evolving patterns of presence and influence of the churches under the impact of social, cultural and religious change, and hence the crucial relevance to ecclesiology of the sociology of religion. The second is the search for new expressions of ecclesiality: springing from a desire in the 1980s to respond to secularization, but today more often to ‘postmodernity’. I use this term with a caveat: it is too soon to be certain whether it is a new era or a convulsion within the history of modernity, and therefore some may prefer to speak of ‘late’ or ‘advanced’ modernity, to avoid giving the impression that modernity is over and has been superseded by something else. The first part of this Introduction explains the terms used in the title of the book.
In the subtitle, the present context is designated a ‘post-church society’, defined by Mobsby and Berry (2014, pp. 1–2) as one in which ‘the majority of the population do not attend church and no longer see the Church as a major feature of life’. Clearly this does not mean that church is no longer present; there are churches aplenty, and new ones are constantly being started. But in a ‘post-church’ society, the churches are most obviously characterized by what they are no longer . Across the societies of Western Europe that were the cradle, not of Christianity, but of Christendom, the churches no longer occupy the position or play the role that Christendom allocated to them. These societies, including Britain, in varying degrees no longer live under the ‘sacred canopy’ (Berger, 1967) of the Church: it no longer dominates day-to-day life; it is no longer obeyed, or even heeded, as the principal moral authority; its gospel is no longer heralded as the one and only saving truth. It no longer constitutes the spiritual or religious arm of government, except in certain vestigial or ceremonial ways. Churchgoing is no longer a social obligation, nor a badge of respectability; Sundays are no longer set aside for rest and worship. The churches are no longer the customary recourse at times of birt