Save The Parish - Cornwall

The five churches in Camborne Cluster: Camborne, Crowan, Tuckingmill, Treslothan and Penponds. A meeting of churchgoers from churches around Camborne - dissuaded by senior figures in the Diocese from meeting at Camborne Church - filled a community hall nearby last night in an effort to find a constructive way forward from the controversy sparked by expensive mission plans for local churches.  The meeting - which started and ended with prayers and a hymn - was prompted by concerns about a lack of transparency over the Transforming Mission programme in Camborne and surrounding churches, funded by the Church Commissioners(60%) and Diocese of Truro reserves (40%).  The multi-million pound programme, which initially envisaged a spend of more than £750,000 in Camborne between 2019-2025, has also been rolled out in four other Cornish towns (Falmouth, St Austell, Liskeard and Highertown). It originated as a well-meaning attempt by the Diocese to reach ‘missing generations’ and invigor...

  A bleak night in Portreath, Cornwall, saw Carnmarth North deanery plan voted  through after two delays. Initially Rural Dean Caspar Bush and his team failed to submit it in time for Episcopal College approval before the June synod meeting. Then following the death of the Queen, the 9 September 2022 synod  was postponed. On Tuesday 18 October, Rev Bush finally saw the On The Way plan approved which will see him as Rural Dean Tsar head up a new 'On The Way' unit swallowing up Transforming Mission Camborne. His former curate Rev Graham Adamson becomes a 'peripatetic' vicar across Carnmarth North's 18 churches. As one clergyman from Camborne bravely said at the Synod, a fair amount of the Church Commissioners' Lowest Income Community funding - which will finance this new roaming position - will be spent on his petrol costs. Rev Adamson will also in an odd twist be overseeing the work of his former boss Rev Rosheen Browning, priest in charge at Camborne, who has st...

Senior clergy in Carnmarth North Deanery steam-rolled through their On The Way plan on Wednesday (15/6/22) despite Rural Dean Caspar Bush admitting that the 67-page document had only been distributed to parishioners at the last minute and there was no time for proper consultation. Rev Bush only sent the document out to Deanery Representatives on Sunday morning (12/6/22) due to a ‘technical glitch’ with the Diocese. This meant that in the best-case scenario – if the plan had been then immediately been distributed to congregations by the Deanery representatives, who were not instructed to do so – congregations had just over three days to digest proposals which will change church life forever. In fact some present at the meeting at St Mary's Church, Portreath, said that their Parochial Church Councils were unaware that the Deanery Synod was taking place. “We can’t pretend that’s been done as well as it should have been done,” Rev Bush said. “I put my hand up on that. I give my ...

A response by the Bishop of St Germans, the Rt Rev Hugh Nelson,  to a request at last Saturday's Diocesan Synod for transparency over Transforming Mission finances is reproduced below. Bishop Hugh did not directly respond to the request to provide the original sustainability model spreadsheets. We would be interested to hear of people's responses to this statement.  Bishop Hugh repeated figures produced by the Diocese earlier in the month relating to vastly increased youth work in Camborne Cluster following Transforming Mission.   These figures contradict a Diocesan document produced in October 2018, which details extensive youth work across Camborne Cluster   before the Transforming Mission programme was started there in 2019. TRURO DIOCESAN SYNOD    28/5/22   9/1     Question under Standing Orders, Vivian Hall Altarnun w Bolventor, Trigg Major Deanery Synod, and General Synod 'Can you please provide the original su...

  A well-argued and well-balanced letter in the Church Times today (Friday 27 May 2022) by a vicar in Ashford, Kent, questioning the box-ticking and numbers' obsession of Transforming Mission, an evangelical programme being rolled out across five towns in Cornwall. The Rev. Dr Stephen Brian's letter is in response to a letter by Rev Rosheen Browning, Priest in Charge at Camborne, Cornwall, published last week - suggesting an indicator of  the success of Transforming Mission lay in the level of its engagement with young people.    Rev. Browning's figures contradicted a Diocesan document produced in October 2018, which details extensive youth work across Camborne Cluster   before  the Transforming Mission programme was started there in 2019.

 An interesting letter in the Church Times today from the Rev Rosheen Browning, Priest in Charge at Camborne, Cornwall, where one of the county's Transforming Mission programmes is being rolled out. Rev Browning says numbers at toddler groups and holiday clubs show that engagement with young people has vastly increased in her five-church cluster's work, pushing back at critics suggesting the scheme is not quite the success expected as large numbers of new worshippers have not materialised.  These figures contradict a Diocesan document produced in October 2018, which details extensive youth work across Camborne Cluster   before the Transforming Mission programme was started there. In the Church Times, however, Rev. Browning writes that an increased engagement with young people in a deprived area indicates the programme has a 'sustainable future'. The churches in her cluster - Camborne, Penponds, Tuckingmill, Crowan and Treslothan - engaged on a regular basis with just 20...