Reminder: please write to your MP

-

If you are worried about developments in Cornwall - plans for radical parish re-organisation and our Bishops' drive towards lay ministry in the Diocese of Truro - then please think about writing to your MP.
Save The Parish is organising a meeting at the Houses of Parliament on 25 April 2023 at 6pm. We are keen for as many MPs as possible to attend so they can learn about what's happening in Cornwall - and elsewhere in the country.

Anyone can contact their MP at any time. If you do not know your MP's email address, you can find it via this link. 

FIND YOUR MP 

 Below is a suggested template with a Cornish angle for you to work with - and add any details you wish.

I am worried about the future of our parish churches in Cornwall and am writing to ask for your support with a campaign that I have joined: ‘Save The Parish’.

There is a meeting taking place in Committee Room 14 at 18:00 on 25th April 2023 about the future of our parish churches, and the Church of England itself.

The Church of England is at a crossroads and I very much disagree with its leadership which is seeking to fundamentally alter the way the Church is run, and, by default are dismantling our historic parish system to do so.

Clergy numbers are being cut across the country but the situation appears to be particularly severe in Cornwall. Parishes are being coerced into mergers. Dioceses are selling off vicarages and houses built at the expense of the parishes. The Church of England is removing those profits away from parish work at a time when they are barely getting back up on their feet after COVID when the Archbishops agreed to the closure of all parish churches.

Power centralised. Parishes merged. Clergy cut.

This is no way forward for the Church of England.

The benefits of parishes in our constituency are incalculable. Parishes are the pillar of so many communities in Cornwall and across the country. They are a vast, social support network which amounts to £55 billion a year of benefit to local communities. Their loss would be incalculable for our country.

According to government statistics, rural communities make up over 90 % of the population of Cornwall, farming and agriculture related professions have higher than average rates of depression and suicide. Our rural parishes have major problems with mental health, loneliness and isolation, the presence of churches and clergy in these remote areas provides support for all parishioners, whatever their needs. The proposals by the Bishops in Cornwall to concentrate clergy in hubs based around towns, to which the countryside villages have little or no access, will remove a major source of support from all those who live in isolated rural areas. Clergy on the ground provide mental health support and community cohesion. Their absence from rural parishes can only be detrimental to the social fabric of our communities.

Parishes are our national heritage. So much of our local history is reliant on the living presence of these buildings. Nearly 50% of the listed buildings in the UK are churches, and the task of preserving those buildings for future generations is left entirely to local parishes. Abandoned by the central church, they are being left to rot or sold into private hands.

I am asking you to join this meeting and to participate because we need your help. The Church of England is the established church and you have influence over the future of these issues and are in a position to hold the Church Commissioners to account. Save the Parish is a group of clergy and parishioners from all across the Church. They are united in their view that the parish system must be protected and have been championing parishes within the Church of England; now we are turning to Parliament to help.

Chris Loder MP, the MP for West Dorset is holding a cross-party briefing on 25th April 2023 at 18:00 in Committee Room 14 to go into more detail on how Parliament can help. Please attend this meeting – I would really appreciate it. Chris will be able to let you know more. His email is: Chris.Loder.mp@parliament.uk

Thank you for your time, I’d be very grateful if you could support this campaign and I look forward to hearing back from you.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Save The Parish Cornwall responds to Diocese of Truro statement

-
Image
Save The Parish Cornwall issues the following response to a regrettable statement by the Diocese of Truro published on its website on 5 March 2024. The Diocese misleadingly says that Save The Parish Cornwall is 'targeting clergy' and providing inaccurate clergy figures. Save The Parish Cornwall’s recent analysis of clergy numbers in the Diocese shows that there were just 39 priests for Cornwall’s 200 plus parishes and 300 churches at the end of December 2023 - according to figures supplied by Church House sources at the end of January 2024. A further 19 other incumbencies remained vacant. Stipendiary priests in Cornwall at the end of December 2023, and their locations: data supplied by Church House sources to Save The Parish Cornwall at the end of January 2024. There was, therefore, one stipendiary priest to 15,000 people: the population of Cornwall is just over 600,000. The number of stipendiary priests in Cornwall at the end of December 2023 was 39. Save The Parish Cornw
Read more

Save The Parish Cornwall calls for a moratorium on the Bishops' divisive On The Way plans

-
Image
Click here to read our dossier, published today to coincide with a meeting with the Bishop of St Germans, the Rt Rev Hugh Nelson, and Diocesan Secretary Rev Simon Cade. It contains testimonies from people across Cornwall who are dismayed and alarmed at the Bishops' On The Way plans that will change the nature of the Church of England in Cornwall forever. Bishop Hugh has the power to press the 'pause' button as the controversial plans attract national attention. We are urging him to have the courage to do so. How does healing of the church of Cornwall now happen?  Many have been badly hurt and threatened…. Can a safe place be created where all might flourish? We are calling for a moratorium, an increase in clergy numbers, a halt on the sale of parsonages and an end to oversight ministry.
Read more

Cornwall's Bishops in tailspin after BBC Sunday Politics coverage

-
Image
Cornwall’s Bishops have been stung by hard-hitting coverage on BBC Sunday Politics South West of their controversial On the Way cost-cutting programme which is cutting clergy numbers, merging parishes and threatening church closures. In a 1200-word statement on the Diocese of Truro website , and an accompanying letter to all churches, the Bishop of Truro, the Rt Rev Philip Mounstephen, and the Bishop of St Germans, the Rt Rev Hugh Nelson, complain about many aspects of the report ( click here to view the report ). The problem is, as so often with the Diocese of Truro statements, rhetoric does not coincide with reality. Truro complains (on the Diocesan website): “The report lasted just under five minutes but…. Much of the time was given to four speakers from a campaign group, three of whom have no connection with the church in Cornwall or with wider Cornish society." Save The Parish Cornwall explains: The four actually included two well-respected SouthWest MPs who are i
Read more