Save The Parish - Cornwall

 A message from Save The Parish national steering committee member Emma Thompson Dear  Supporter   You may like to know how our Parliamentary meeting went last week in Westminster.  We feel that it went very well.  The 35 MPs and peers who attended are now far better briefed and realise how serious the situation is.  They are also now aware what the Church of England could do, financially, to pay more parish priests.  (Please read the transcripts of our speakers  https:// savetheparish.com/save-the- parish-in-parliament/ .)      After our speakers, parishioners who were present from around England were invited to share their parish experiences for 2 minutes each.  This made it very clear to MPs that there was a geographically widespread pattern of similar experiences.  One of the next steps will be MPs holding their own meeting to agree Parliamentary action.     Please note that a few of the MPs whom STP supporte...

Save The Parish's Emma Thompson describes how a mega-parish re-organisation scheme has  been rejected in Winchester - thanks to local objections Anyone interested in opposing radical pastoral re-organisation schemes might be interested in reading about the below:  proposals for pastoral reorganisation affecting the benefices of Pastrow; and Appleshaw, Kimpton, Thruxton, Fyfield and Shipton Bellinger.    https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2022-11/mpcp2233_pastrow_appleshaw_paper_complete.pdf This was in Winchester Diocese, where villages were threatened with a mega-parish. On page 2, the bases are set out on which the Church Commissioners scrutinised the proposals. Annex R contains the representations that were made. There are some potentially useful grounds for challenge in there - which could be very relevant for Cornwall. The report has now come out from the Church Commissioners of their decision in this case. Click here to read .  The ...

Save The Parish's Emma Thompson writes about a major success at this month's General Synod. The campaign succeeded in blocking moves to give Bishops new powers to sell off parish property .... Given all the big stories that have hit the press recently about General Synod (the Church’s parliament), you would be forgiven for not noticing one little vote on a clause in the very boring-sounding ‘Miscellaneous Provisions Measure’. As is often the case, the more boring the name of a Bill, and the more controversial the matters that surround it, the more likely it is that something significant might lurk in the detail. This Miscellaneous Provisions Measure was no exception. Sitting quietly in clause 15 was a proposal to allow bishops unilaterally to sell parish land during an interregnum. We spotted this and managed to achieve our first major Synod win as Save The Parish. The Revd Tom Woolford, a STP member, proposed what he described as ‘the soft and cuddly end’ of Save...