Review of Diocesan Support
for Mission and Ministry
9 June 2008
When the size of the
projected deficit in this year’s budget became clear, I convened a small group
to look at how it might be tackled – and to consider how we might avoid an
even larger deficit in the following years’ budgets. That group recommended
that urgent steps should be taken to reduce parochial clergy numbers to our
clergy share so that we deploy our fair share in relation to other dioceses.
This recommendation was accepted by Bishop’s Council and deaneries are
currently working hard on the production of plans to enable such reduction to
happen.
The Group also
recommended that we should review expenditure on diocesan support for mission
and ministry. This is not simply in order that everyone in the Diocese ‘shares
the pain’ and limit the rises in parish share that would otherwise be
necessary, laudable though these motivations might be. It is also a matter of
enabling a proper balance to be maintained between diocesan and parochial
expenditure . Alastair Findlay, Chair of the DBF, has pointed out that the great
majority of our expenditure is on parochial ministry but that, were nothing to
be done to reduce diocesan expenditure, draft budgets show that the proportion
spent on parish ministry would drop significantly over the next few years.
This would result in a shift of the balance of resourcing away from
parishes at a time when one might hope that less expenditure on stipendiary
clergy to release funds for imaginative mission initiatives in parishes and
deaneries.
A
reduction in stipendiary ministry and the rise in authorised and licensed lay
ministries which we hope will accompany it will, no doubt,
require more diocesan expenditure in some areas than has hitherto been
the case. However, if such extra expenditure is necessary, we ought perhaps to
be asking ourselves whether there is other expenditure that we need to forgo in
order to maintain the above balance.
With this in mind, and
following consultation with Alastair Findlay, Bishop David, Archdeacon Fred and
Robert Higham, I have asked Bishop David to chair a group which will be charged
with reviewing diocesan support for mission and ministry, with particular
reference to diocesan posts. I shall be asking the group to make recommendations
on how the balance of our expenditure might be shifted towards rather than away
from parishes over the coming years. Just as deaneries are not being asked to
look at clergy redundancies, it is not envisaged that anyone will be made
redundant through this process but, rather, that posts may not be filled when
they fall vacant. The group will be asked to report to Bishop’s Council at its
January meeting next year.
I
commend the process to your prayers as we seek God’s will for the proclamation
of the gospel in our diocese.
With my very best wishes,
Yours,
Dr John Inge