Clergy numbers and mental health
From Dr James Oliver
Sir, — The Revd Andrew Village and Canon Leslie Francis are right to highlight the worrying trend towards deteriorating mental health in this country while at the same time pointing out the apparently protective effects of spirituality and “soul care” (Comment, 22 July).
Taking their findings one step further, I would like to highlight the results of a paper published in the journal General Psychiatry in 2020, which emphasised the part played by the clergy in the UK as a front-line mental-health service. The results showed that just over 60 per cent of the clergy sampled were engaged in providing ongoing support for individuals with mental-health problems.
This is of key importance, since mental-health services within the NHS are currently under immense strain, owing to both a significantly increased workload and difficulties in the recruitment and retention of staff.
Given this combination of circumstances, it does seem somewhat counterproductive for the Church of England to embark on its current programme of radical reductions in the number of clergy. Obviously, there is a concern that many people suffering from mental-health issues may be harmed by the removal of an important source of help and support.
I have heard the argument that there is no alternative to these cuts, because of the worsening financial position of the Church. I have also heard the argument that the retrenchment to “resource churches” can be justified by comparison with the part played by minster churches, dating back as far as the Anglo-Saxon period.
My point would be that there can surely be no greater historical precedent than the Christian Church’s provision of care to the sick and dying — since this goes back to the ministry of Jesus himself.
In historical terms, it is only relatively recently that religion and health care have somehow become disconnected in the minds of both the population and those involved. Nevertheless, as publications such as The Handbook of Religion and Health document the considerable volume of published evidence pointing towards a positive association between church membership and better health, one might even go so far as to regard the Church as a complementary therapy in its own right — benefiting not only those who suffer, but also those who help others.
Given that current discretionary spending on complementary therapy in the UK is estimated to be approaching £4 billion annually, and with many millions of pounds in government contracts on top of this to address such issues as health inequality, it is perhaps a shame that the Church has not yet tapped into this potentially huge resource.
The important point is that nearly all therapies have the potential to be harmful. For example, more or less every beneficial drug used in modern medicine is either toxic or fatal if used incorrectly. That is why it is vital that the Church should maintain a workforce that is educated, professional, aware of the dangers, and prepared to work collaboratively with other agencies when necessary.
In my opinion, the Church of England lies at a crossroads. On the one hand, it can continue on its current path of withdrawing the professional clergy — notwithstanding the potentially deleterious effects on the health of many local communities. Or, alternatively, the Church can really go back to its roots and invest in a modern, well-trained, and professional workforce, delivering a modern and relevant ministry, based on the fundamental principles of compassion, competence, and care.
JAMES OLIVER
Kerdevez, Lender Lane
Mullion, Cornwall TR12 7HS
Ukrainian harvest and the famine in East Africa
From Dr Ruth Valerio
Sir, — It is true that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has exacerbated food crises around the world. To say, however, that “Ukraine war is causing ‘famine in East Africa’” (online headline, News, 29 July) — is to underestimate the complexity of the hunger crisis.
Even before the war, people in East Africa were facing up to the worst drought ever in their lifetimes. Small-scale farmers have been experiencing a prolonged and severe drought, compounded by locust and pest infestations, as well as the impacts of the pandemic and localised conflicts. All of these factors combined have eroded the resilience of ordinary people and have drained public resources that might have otherwise helped them to cope.
The narrative that implies that once grain leaves the Port of Odesa all shall be well is wishful thinking. It significantly downplays the challenges faced by agro-pastoralists, such as those in Kenya and Ethiopia. Having previously grown their own food successfully for decades, these people now find themselves at the sharp end of a climate crisis not of their making. And, despite promises made by wealthier nations, sufficient financial assistance to support farmers to adapt agricultural practices to cope with these new conditions, or switch to alternative livelihoods, has not been delivered.
The harsh reality is that the war has also drawn heavily on precious humanitarian funding that might have otherwise been directed to prevent famine. The rise in fuel and food prices will make it ever more costly for people to survive and find their way out of poverty.
To help alleviate current and future food crises, it is vital that wealthier nations step up their support for lower-income countries to adapt to climate impacts and invest in a sustainable future.
To this end, through its Time to Deliver campaign, Tearfund is calling on the UK Government to use its influence with other wealthy nations to ensure that overdue pledges of support are fully met and that finance reaches communities bearing the brunt of the crisis. We would welcome support for this important campaign. You can find out more at www.tearfund.org/climate.
RUTH VALERIO
Global Advocacy and Influencing Director
Tearfund, 100 Church Road
Teddington TW11 8QE
Development of the C of E’s redress scheme
From the Redress Scheme Victim and Survivor Working Group
Sir, — Further to the letter from the Bishop of Truro, the Rt Revd Philip Mounstephen (5 August), who chairs the Church of England’s Redress Board, we would like to add the following points.
Over the past year, the working group of victims and survivors has met to help shape the development of the redress scheme. Both as a group, and with two representatives on the Redress Scheme Project Board, we are working to be a voice for survivors and help to ensure that the redress scheme is centred on the needs of those who have experienced church-related abuse.
We are working with the Church of England in the hope that the scheme can be a functional and fair source of redress, offering compensation for harm caused, acknowledgement and apology, and support for emotional and spiritual recovery. The plans are developing and moving forward, although the scale of the task means that it is slower than originally hoped for, and we want it to be the best it can be.
We are pleased to hear that the Church is discussing closing the gap between the interim scheme and the redress scheme. It is crucial that the current gaps in provision are closed, to ensure that the necessary support for survivors remains available.
c/o Church House, Great Smith Street
London SW1P 3AZ
[The membership of the group is kept confidential. Editor]
Saving the parishes: they have potential
From Dr Robert Wickham
Sir, — I read with interest the two letters (15 July) about the Save the Parish Summer Conference in York. I was both impressed and concerned by the debate. Three issues particularly interested me, perhaps owing to my background in economics and development.
Professor Nicholas Orme made a key contribution in pointing out the early origins of the parish. Parishes evolved naturally in their locations. This immediately resonated with the spontaneous order explained by authors such as Friedrich Hayek, Israel Kirzner, and Elinor Ostrom. Their emphasis is on the local spontaneous order rather than the forced or top-down approach.
The parish is the natural location for the concentration of local skills and knowledge. The studies of local agricultural communities by the Nobel laureate Ostrom detail how these communities evolved, not just to deal with business matters, but social organisation and sensible modest regulation.
Second, the concern about central costs is in line with the conclusions of studies of bureaucracies. One has to be cautious about this, because it depends on the outlook of the central administration. Indeed, the late David Say, Bishop of Rochester, regularly emphasised that the office existed to serve the parishes.
Last, the examples of closed church buildings’ coming back into church/community uses is supported by experience and, indeed, was again referred to by Dr Say. Over the years, I have enjoyed working across the denominations and seen ten new churches or major expansion schemes come to fruition. The process of renewal continues.
We are all aware of the serious housing and social needs of the UK. Indeed, the Archbishop of York referred to some of these. The Save the Parish movement has all the key elements for renewal. The opportunities are great, and it is appropriate that the gathering was not too far from All Saints’, Monkwearmouth, which saw amazing events early in the last century.
ROBERT WICKHAM
Consultant economist, Chartered Town Planner Trustee of Green Pastures Housing
79 Great Peter Street
London SW1P 2EZ
Flaw in business model
From Mr Philip Belben
Sir, — In comparing the Church’s “making disciples” to a manufacturing business, the Archbishop of York (Lambeth Conference, 5 August) exposes a serious problem with a common model of mission. Many a business has failed because it concentrates on manufacturing and neglects to support its products. If the Church sees its members as people, and not just raw materials for a disposable product, then pastoral care of its flock is essential, not just a marginal activity alongside the core mission.
PHILIP BELBEN
The Chapel, Maitlands Close
Nettlebridge, Radstock BA3 5AA
Pope Pius XII and his record during the Nazi era
From Mr C. D. C. Armstrong
Sir, — According to Michael Coren, Pope Pius XII was not a “significant enemy” of Nazi Germany (Comment, 15 July).
On the contrary, a German intelligence source (quoted by the late Owen Chadwick in Britain and the Vatican in the Second World War) called the pope “the mouthpiece of the Jewish war criminals”. As for Mr Coren’s assertion that Pius XII never made any explicit condemnation of the Holocaust, he should look again at the 1942 Christmas address from Rome.
No one at the time failed to understand what that statement meant. Eden praised the address in the Commons. Robert Ventresca in his Soldier of Christ notes that commentators around the world took the address to be implicitly critical of Germany. The 1942 broadcast deserves to be compared with the Declaration on Nazi Atrocities signed 11 months later by Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin — men who, unlike Pius XII, had armed might at their command and who were not, as he was, living in a city under Fascist control.
That declaration makes no reference to the Jews, though it does to (among others) Polish, Italian, Norwegian, and Cretan victims.
C. D. C. ARMSTRONG
Flat 2a, Ulidia House
34 Donegall Road
Belfast BT12 5JN
The real economic truth was declared by Jesus
From the Revd Martin Jewitt
Sir, — Jeremy Williams’s article “Economics is for all — not just for economists” is welcome (Comment, 5 August). His definition of economics as “the business of how a society lives together” reminds me that it is a New Testament word: oikonomia, usually translated “stewardship” — literally, the laws of householding, though, as he writes, not hard and fast unchangeable laws.
I don’t profess to be an “economist”; so, taking Mr Williams up on his invitation, I regard money as seeming to be a symbol of what is happening in the real economy, which is people needing goods and services and people providing them. Economic crises, such as the one that faces us today, are about scarcity of resources caused by unbalanced investment (notoriously in two decades of austerity) and the illusion that allowing profits to multiply in the richest corporations and individuals will result in wealth “trickling down” to everyone.
It is the consequence of treating money as the essence of the economy rather than its working symbol, and has resulted in gross and growing inequality. There is real economic truth in Jesus’s declaration, “You can’t serve God and money”.
MARTIN JEWITT
12 Abbott Road
Folkestone CT20 1NG
Ambridge and faculties
From Mr Philip Deane
Sir, — Recent episodes of The Archers have featured Peggy’s wish to commemorate the arrival of Tom and Natasha’s baby twins with a new window in St Stephen’s, Ambridge. No one has yet mentioned the possibility that a faculty might not be granted for such a thing! Maybe the diocese (Felpersham?) is fairly relaxed about such matters, but I really think that Shula, as a potential ordinand, should have a word with them.
PHILIP DEANE
9 Church Street
Bishop Middleham DL17 9AF
Climate-change denial and the Commissioners
From Isobel Montgomery Campbell
Sir, — I was grateful to the Revd Gillean Craig (Television, 5 August) for putting into print what I had felt myself when watching Big Oil v The World. The heinous evil of the PR manipulators employed by Exxon Mobil to cast doubt in the minds of the general public as to the cause of our current climate crisis should be called out at every opportunity.
Sadly, such manipulation is at work in our own country, under the auspices of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, whose trustees are well-known climate-change sceptics/deniers. These include two MPs, one of whom is Steve Baker MP, a born-again Christian. Through its wholly owned subsidiary, the Global Warming Policy Forum, it promulgates sceptical propaganda via its website Net Zero Watch. An essay on the website dated Tuesday 17 May 2022 states that “UK weather has become, if anything, less extreme, annual review shows.” This, it admits, “is according to a new paper published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation”.
That such appalling rubbish is out there is bad enough, but surely the Church Commissioners must lead by example and disinvest from fossil-fuel companies, or the Church of England will have to apologise for its continuing support, just as much as has done in recent years for benefiting in the past from income derived from slavery.
ISOBEL MONTGOMERY CAMPBELL
35 Culmington Road
London W13 9NJ
Remembering the fall of Kabul, one year later
From Canon Peter Liddell
Sir, — The fall of Kabul (News, 19 August 2021) happened on 15 August 2021, the Feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The religious broadcasts of the day, probably like the rest of us, preferred not to notice. We sang the Magnificat to one of its many glorious settings.
Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Marys were cast out on to the streets of Kabul. It is thanks to St Luke that we have Mary’s hymn of praise. Where is his Mary’s lament? Perhaps it was too difficult even for a St Luke to write. Someone had to. It was left to Picander, Bach’s librettist 1500 years later, in the opening chorus of the St Matthew Passion, “Come, ye daughters of Zion, help me lament.”
How will we celebrate the Blessed Virgin Mary this year? She is still there on the streets of Kabul to remind us of the impossibility of grief, against which denials of whatever shape are empty.
PETER LIDDELL
25 St Marys Court
Ottway Walk
Welwyn AL6 9AU
Further responses to the Lambeth Conference
From Canon R. H. W. Arguile
Sir, — Like many readers, I was dismayed by the inadequate way in which Resolution 1.10 was dealt with at the Lambeth Conference (Letters, 5 August), but perhaps for different reasons. Bad theology surely is a poor start to any discussion. My jaw dropped when I read the quotation from Genesis 1 about human beings being made in the image of God, followed by the word “Therefore” and the statement about human dignity.
The story of the fall and the endless debates about its depth and character may not need to be rehearsed, but “dignity” is, on the other hand, in danger of having become a weasel word. Human sinfulness and the need to open oneself to the grace of God rather than the creep towards secular ideas of rights has no place, it seems, in the minds of our bishops. As for lumping together those of different sexuality as if they were a community, this is a concession to a secular movement that strangely does not include people like me, non-practising serial adulterers. There is no such group as LGBTQ Anglicans. There is no sense that modern psychological insights have been received and understood.
The list of inadequacies extends to factual inaccuracies. Poverty, one of the threats to human dignity, has in fact been much reduced in the past thirty years. Look at the numbers. Poverty is cruel: no one doubts that; but getting the facts right gives credibility to a document that no one has any reason to read. Bad theology and inaccurate (and partially selected) facts.
If I do not offer a better version of these wrongheaded statements, it would take far too much of your precious space to set out a possible way forward, based on a review of biblical texts, no doubt, but also on consideration of the tradition as well as modern insights. I, nevertheless, make a plea that whatever bishops say should not fall a prey to secular fashion, and should get its facts right and acknowledge the woeful fact of our human sinfulness, whether exhibited by lust, gluttony, avarice, anger, envy, pride, or sloth (and their countervailing virtue), about which I have not heard a sermon preached in years.
R. H. W. ARGUILE
10 Marsh Lane
Wells-next-the-Sea
Norfolk NR23 1EG
From the Revd Dr David L. Gosling
Sir, — The biblical literalist wing of the Lambeth bishops displays selective attention to some parts of the Bible, and selective inattention to others. If the Lambeth Conference had wanted to present a credible Christian view of important issues, then it should have couched its utterances in terms of the teaching of Jesus Christ as expressed in the Gospels, the experience of the Early Church, reason, and our best and most reliable modern knowledge — science, for example.
Once, the Churches had prophetic leaders like William Temple, Lakshman Wickremasinghe and Janani Luwum; today’s equivalents are people like Tom Daley and Sandi Toksvig, who put our current church leaders to shame.
DAVID L. GOSLING
3 Tavistock Road
Cambridge CB4 3NB
From the Revd David Hewlett
Sir, — May I set out just three reflections on the Lambeth Conference?
First, the seeming lack of any knowledge of biblical studies that have taken place in the past 100 years in some of the comments of those opposed to the blessing of gay marriages. It is astounding that simplistic comments can be made by bishops who are in positions of leadership in their own Provinces. Is this a failure of theological education, or just a refusal to acknowledge the work of scholars?
Second, surely it is time to let the Anglican Communion, in its present, form die quietly. There is not going to be agreement. Why should there be? Theology is based on Bible, tradition, spirituality, and culture. The once-perceived strength that varied cultures were seen to give to the Communion is now one of its problems, given that so many participants now require that all agree on everything.
I am reminded of Bishop John Spong’s words: “Unless biblical literalism is challenged overtly in the Christian Church itself, it will, in my opinion, kill the Christian faith. It is not just a benign nuisance that afflicts Christianity at its edges; it is a mentality that renders the Christian faith unbelievable to an increasing number of the citizens of the world.”
Third, I understand why no Archbishop of Canterbury would want the Anglican Communion to be dissolved on their watch, but were Archbishop Welby to bite the bullet, it could pave the way for new ways of talking and ministering within Anglicanism, and prevent gatherings of bishops from spending all their time discussing sex, when there are so many things going on in the world that our Lord calls us to serve.
Postscript: a great deal of attention needs to be paid to the words of Sandi Toksvig and Matthew Paris in last week’s press.
DAVID HEWLETT
Broxmere, Upper Maund
Herefordshire HR1 3JB
From the Revd Dr Sam Cappleman
Sir, — Was anyone else struck by the stark and graphic contrast between the opening of the Commonwealth Games, with its light and energy, as it celebrated life in all its rich diversity across multiple generations far beyond the athletes who were taking part: a commonality of purpose, reflecting back at the heritage that brought it to this place, and forward to the future with hope; and the overshadowed opening of the Lambeth Conference?
The Lambeth Conference seemed to find unity in diversity difficult to celebrate, appeared beset by partition, dogged by a lack of transparency of who wrote what, and when, and why in the “calls” (and then a voting system that changed in content and technology to give feedback on them) — all of which it will undoubtedly be remembered for?
It is said that there is much good and positive in the content of the “calls”, and there may well be significant outcomes on matters that are so critically important for the Church, and on which divergent views need to be heard and respected. We pray that these, too, will be remembered, and prove to be a far more enduring legacy.
They are, of course, completely different events, and the Commonwealth and Church are not without their respective histories, some of which are inextricably linked. Like the competitors in Birmingham, we had different journeys to get to the place where we are. But the great crowd of the world has been watching as it looked for inspiration, reconciliation, and hope for the future.
SAM CAPPLEMAN
Parish Office, St Mark’s Church
Calder Rise
Bedford MK41 7UY
From Dr Brendan Devitt
Sir, — Some people will see the compromise on sexuality at Lambeth 2022 as “the genius of Anglicanism”. Others will see it as compromise.
BRENDAN DEVITT
206 Lowestoft Road
Gorleston
Norfolk NR31 6JQ
From Dr Richard Gaunt
Sir, — I am an atheist very happily married to a nurse, who became a priest during our marriage. I should be reticent about offering advice to the C of E. But is it not time for the Church to split into a Church in England that follows Christ’s teaching to love your neighbours and an Anglican Communion led by Archbishop Welby et al. who seem to believe that unity is the overriding commandment?
Perhaps, one day, like the Methodists, you will find sufficient love to reunite under Christ’s teaching.
RICHARD GAUNT
Myrtle Cottage, Ham Lane
Kingston Seymour BS21 6XE
From Mrs Pam Walker
Sir, — As the daughter of a gay man who was born in 1915 and spent his life trying not be to that man, I watched the father who wanted to go to church, and who wanted to be loved by God, the man who took me to Sunday school, descend into mental illness and alcoholism. He tried so hard not to be “queer”, unsuccessfully, because that is not possible, but was taught to hate himself, to despise the very core of his being, by a Church that espouses love. His life did not end well.
Fast forward to this year, when my gay daughter married her girlfriend. I thanked God that the talented little girl who played the keyboard for church services had grown up to have the wisdom to understand God’s love is greater than the narrow minded simplistic views of some in the Church.
For the Church, conversations regarding human sexuality should not be tied up in a post-colonial guilt that inhibits honesty. It should not be about the Anglican Communion, but about people, and the power that the Church has to affect their lives for good or ill.
My life, the life of my mother, and the lives of my siblings were affected negatively by the intolerance of the Church. I do not want this, or worse, to happen my daughter’s contemporaries, both in this country and in other places.
Unlike Archbishop Badi (Lambeth Conference, 5 August), I do not believe in simplistic messaging, but in helping others to develop an ever deeper understanding of God’s loving affirmation of his created humanity, in all of its complexity. How else can we seek to understand the complex mystery that is God?
PAM WALKER
The Tower House, Hartburn
Morpeth, Northumberland
From Mrs Elo Allik-Schunemann
Sir, — Again time to write to my beloved Church Times. I am in disbelief about gay sex being considered a sin, again. Who has given the Church of England elders the right to decide this backward decision, over other people in committed and beautiful adult relationships, often longer-lasting and more loyal than the straight?
May I tell you something. I am married and work as a Montessori nursery teacher. In my nursery, we hold dear the British values of mutual respect and absolutely no discrimination against any staff member’s or parent’s sexuality. We have mummies and mamas, daddies and papas. They have children, my brightest pupils. How can I ever, proudly, take them to visit a church, where my husband works as an Anglican vicar? Do we really have to invent a branch where love and loyalty for and to one another is not a sin?
ELO ALLIK-SCHUNEMANN
The Vicarage
College Road
London SE21 7HN
From Mr Keith Porteous Wood
Sir, — The Archbishop of Canterbury has reportedly told the Lambeth Conference that he won’t punish churches that conduct same-sex marriages, and that churches in liberal democracies could be “a victim of derision, contempt, and even attack” (Lambeth Conference, 5 August) that could endanger their very existence if they don’t update their traditional teaching.
The UK is a liberal democracy, and I know that Archbishop Welby is only too well aware that the Church of England is not immune from existential concerns and has already been “a victim of derision, contempt, and even attack” over its stance on same-sex relationships and marriage. Will he now, therefore, be seeking to amend UK legislation, so that the clergy and churches of the Church of England and Church in Wales who wish to conduct same-sex marriages are no longer punished for doing so, as a majority of these churches’ congregants would probably wish?
Surely he would prefer his legacy to be one of promoting religious freedom rather than holding out for secular law to continue to enforce unpopular religious doctrine.
If the Church declines or continues to procrastinate, the time has come for the Government to act, much as it did with women bishops.
KEITH PORTEOUS WOOD
President
National Secular Society
307 High Holborn
London WC1V 7LL
From the Revd Andrew Hunt
Sir, — Full marks to the Anglican Communion for planting a tree (Lambeth Conference, 5 August); I don’t imagine anyone else has thought of doing that.
ANDREW HUNT
58a Cowl Street
Shepton Mallet
Somerset BA4 5EP