Save The Parish - Cornwall

As controversial ‘On The Way’ restructuring plans in the Diocese of Truro attract national headlines, some deaneries are questioning the apparently unaccountable actions of the ‘Deanery Implementation Teams'.  Yes, shades of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four here.  ( Click this link to read more thoughts about the Church of England's current 'manager-speak' .) 'Deanery Implementation Team' (DIT) is the name that the Diocese has given to the groups of people in each deanery who will be taking the next steps – unless challenged – in the On The Way plans under the leadership of the Rural Dean and the Diocesan Director for Change and Renewal, Ruth Marriott . In Kerrier in west Cornwall, churchgoers report that the Deanery Implementation Team (DIT) seems to be acting without due consultation. In Penwith - a deanery stretching from Hayle all the way to Land's End - a cleric said of the DIT, led by the forceful vicar of St Ives, Rev Nick Widdows: “Their ...

There is still still time to object. Rev Simon Cade (Truro Diocesan Secretary) has published a paper about the budget for the coming years - and central to it is a plan to sell off Cornwall's vicarages to raise money. This is- of course - selling the family silver. There is a growing surge of opinion against Diocesan plans to 'restructure' the Church of England in Cornwall. Click here to read a dossier compiling the objections of people across Cornwall. There is still time  - just (the deadline is 23 September) - to push back against the budget proposals.  Objections can be brief - or extended. The important thing is to let Rev Cade know your thoughts. Click here to read his paper in full.  His email is simon.cade@truro.anglican.org As usual, the key points are buried in a misleadingly benign 'story-telling' narrative.  Save The Parish Cornwall's Neil Wallis sets out his thoughts below : "As we’ve seen in so many Simon Cade papers, the diocesan secreta...

  "Revolutions begin with an assault on language. Diocesan straplines, cute mission initiatives, the bullying insistence that there is no alternative — what is being rolled out in Truro, Leicester, and elsewhere starts with an assault on theology," writes Rev Angela Tilby in today's Church Times .  "In George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four , the point of “newspeak” was to reduce the range of thought, and so to make certain realities impossible. So, not much hope for parish, priest, tradition, pastoral care, contemplation, or liturgy. The new language has taken over." Click here to read the full article.   Angela Tilby, a writer, broadcaster and theological educator,  is a member of the national Save The Parish steering committee. After working for the BBC for over twenty years she was ordained in 1996 and taught at Westcott House in Cambridge. She was vicar of St Benet’s Cambridge for five years and then Diocesan Canon at Christ Church Cathedral, Oxf...

  Save The Parish Cornwall held a face-to-face sit-down conference this week with Bishop Hugh Nelson and senior officials of the Diocese of Truro. At it, the Save The Parish Cornwall pressed strongly for an immediate moratorium of the diocese’ sweeping On The Way church reorganisation plans that will change irrevocably Anglican worship in the county. Although organised previously, the meeting in Truro came a day after significant coverage in the national press sparked by a 57-page dossier of testimonies collated by Save The Parish Cornwall from deeply concerned and distressed Cornish churchgoers and the wider community about both the manner and the impact of the damaging On The Way plans. The dossier, published widely this week, includes further demands from Save The Parish Cornwall including: *Guarantees that stipendiary priest numbers in the county be increased within a year from the current record low of 54 to a minimum 81 - not including curates in training - and ...

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.

Important - and extensive - coverage in today's Sunday Telegraph of the situation in Cornwall and Save The Parish's campaign to expose the fundamental flaws in the Bishops' On The Way restructuring plans. Click here and here to read.   A spokesman from the Diocese of Truro is quoted as saying 'It is not true that these plans were forced on the deaneries."  The Diocese has repeatedly insisted that the plans were 'bottom up' rather than 'top down' but this has certainly not been the experience of those involved on deanery level.   In fact, the Bishop of St Germans himself said at the Diocesan Synod meeting in November 2020: “ A: The Bishop of St Germans, the Rt Revd Hugh Nelson, explained that, as mentioned by Archdeacon Paul, he is working with Jonathan Rowe on a complex piece of work that will support deaneries and help sustain them. Deaneries in most need will be given support first. A bottom up approach is critical, particular in regard to put...

 Click here to read.   Pages 6-9 of the document.