TACKLING mental ill-health inside and outside the Church must be regarded as a mission priority, the General Synod heard on the Wednesday morning.
Introducing a motion to affirm the work already under way, including the national working group led by the Bishop of Bedford, the Rt Revd Richard Atkinson, Dr Jamie Harrison (Durham) said that, despite growing awareness, mental health did not seem to be improving across society.
It was easy to have doubts and concerns when suffering from mental ill-health: “Where is God in this? Where can I find relief?” His motion asked dioceses to review the mental-health training offered to both ordinands and clergy.
It also asked the National Society to prepare additional materials for church schools on the subject. Dr Harrison also wished the Liturgical Commission to have a deeper focus on how its texts might affect someone struggling with their mental health, and to engage with “how the Holy Spirit can heal”.
The support offered variable, he suggested. “This is a missional and gospel imperative.” The Church should bear good news on mental health rather than feel “powerless and impotent”.
Beginning the debate, Katia D’Arcy-Cumber (Chelmsford) said that ethnic-minority people were disproportionately detained under the Mental Health Act: Black British people were detained at 12 times the rate for white British people. The pressures of being a black or brown person in the UK were immense, she said. She was a born-and-bred British citizen with two British parents, and was regularly told that she did not belong here, among other expressions of racial hostility. There was a “constant barrage you cannot escape”, even in speeches in the Synod chamber, she said. The Church, therefore, had an important part to play in supporting those whose mental health was affected by wider issues of social injustice.
Professor Muriel Robinson (Lincoln) drew attention to clergy mental health, suggesting that a mental-health placement should be offered to all ordinands. Her father had been chaplain to a large mental-health hospital, but had been completely out of his depth, she said, even as an experienced parish priest. Today, given the ever-growing scale of mental ill-health, it was crucial to prepare the priesthood properly, she said. Dioceses should consider what else they could do to lift the burden of stress from their clergy, even including covering the costs of a vicarage gardener, for instance.
Canon Kate Wharton (Liverpool) said that it was shocking that the Synod had not directly debated mental health since 2008, even as the understanding of mental health had grown. Her ordination training did not cover mental health at all, despite her ministry regularly bringing her into contact with the issue. She said that she had suffered from periods of “severe depression and anxiety. I’m not ashamed of the mental-health challenges I have faced, but they have been difficult to talk about as a church leader.” The Church should be the safest possible space to share vulnerably about personal struggles, she said; but, sadly, it was not always.
Joel Plant (Youth Representatives), who is currently undertaking a Master’s degree in mental-health studies, said that he had been diagnosed with OCD seven years ago. People who struggled with OCD could often struggle with moral issues, which was called scrupulosity, he said. The Church had not always been a “great space” for him while he dealt with this. Moving forward, he said, it would be useful to have a mental-health expert involved in liturgical work. Although mental-health issues were separate from neurodiversity, this should be included in the paper.
Geoff Crawford/Church TimesKatia D’Arcy-Cumber (Chelmsford)
The Revd William Harwood (Truro) put forward an amendment that sought a less “modest” approach to the subject, because there was a “mental-health crisis across our society”. It would make supporting people with mental-health issues more explicit in training. There was an overlap between the spiritual and theological world, he said, and he called for mental-health first-aid training. The clergy should learn to recognise mental-health issues and be able to signpost people to professionals.
Dr Harrison accepted the amendment.
Before his ordination, the Revd Jonathan Macy (Southwark) had run care homes for people with learning disabilities, and had since been a chaplain in secure wards. The churches with the fewest resources often faced the greatest needs, he said, especially on housing estates and in low-income areas. As a priest, he had had to go on a “mad learning curve” to pick up knowledge about mental health, as his training had not begun to prepare him. He supported the amendment.
Dr Nick Land (York) said that churches could make mistakes at both ends. Some discouraged people from seeking professional mental-health treatment, even when it was desperately needed, while others “uncritically accepted” all medical interventions, when good pastoral care was a more appropriate first line of response. He urged the Church to engage with well-being on the psychological, social, spiritual, and biological levels. “We must not overlook the healing potential of a good church,” he concluded, “as it brings people into relationship with the living God through word and sacrament.”
Helen Lamb (Oxford) said that her church was on the doorstep of a university, and, therefore, regularly encountered young adults in “great distress”. She asked whether the training for clergy could include ways to mobilise lay resources: “Clergy, you are not on your own.” It was also vital that clergy knew how to signpost people to better-resourced support services elsewhere rather than assume that they had to fix everything themselves.
Dr Laura Oliver (Blackburn), a GP, strongly supported the motion and amendment. People needed medication and therapy from professionals, as well as gospel truths about finding rest in Jesus. Often, her patients said that the trigger for finally seeking medical help was a conversation with a friend or family member. Were clergy being trained to recognise the signs so that they could also signpost?
Rebecca Chapman (Southwark) moved an amendment to address support for children and young people and their carers. She had been raised by a single mother, and so her childhood had been challenging, she said. She could not always understand why her “depressed and suicidal” mother could not get out of bed some days, or would disappear for hours at a time. Her church had been a place of safety and a shield from the challenges of home life. It was easy to overlook young people and young carers, but the Church could help to break patterns going back generations, she said.
Dr Harrison accepted the amendment.
The Revd James McCluskey (Chelmsford) spoke of an incident in which he was attacked by a stranger who entered the church during a family event. He was told that the attacker was suffering from mental-health issues and addiction. On another occasion, he had felt ill-equipped to deal with a woman whose safe house was breached. Subsequently, he made contact with the community-interest ompany in his parish, which provided resources, and worked with the NHS and health professionals.
Canon Mark Bennet (Oxford) spoke about Space Makers, a resource designed by his diocese to meet the growing mental-health needs of young people. He said that dozens of schools used these materials to help young people to learn preventative techniques and to equip them with resilience.
The Revd Captain Nicholas Lebey CA (Southwark) supported the amendments and emphasised the need to be well equipped in ministry. He described his experience as a youth worker, and of young people who “look OK” on the outside, but were struggling inside.
The Revd Lesley Jones (Durham) spoke about community, in which, she believed, it was clearer to see when people were struggling, and therefore easier to offer support and improve the quality of pastoral care. She urged members to consider ongoing training.
Geoff Crawford/Church TimesThe Revd Alice Kemp (Bristol)
The amendment was carried.
Moving a further amendment on clergy well-being, Mr Harwood spoke about the disparities in discussing physical-health and mental-health issues. He was sometimes hesitant, he said, to discuss his own mental health, as he did not want to appear “weak” or a “broken man in need of psychological support”. His diocese had paid for his therapy sessions, but not all dioceses would be the same.
Dr Harrison accepted the amendment.
The Dean of St Edmundsbury, the Very Revd Joe Hawes (Southern Deans), considered himself to be a “shop steward” to the clergy in his diocese. He warned of the burden felt by those receiving large sums of money from the national Church for mission initiatives. The expectations on project leaders must become more “realistic”, to avoid a “substantial cost” to mental health, he urged.
Elizabeth Olsen (Chester) said that the media had recently reported that up to 30 per cent of the clergy might be experiencing depression at any one time. She hoped that there could be free, long-term, confidential Christian counselling. “We do not want to lose our clergy, and the NHS is overwhelmed when mental health is concerned.”
The Revd Mark Miller (Durham) spoke of the clergy well-being covenant, a commitment that the Church had made to good relationships, listening, and culture. Clergy were increasingly overstretched “at the coalface”, and mental health could not be addressed only by better training or support: there also had to be efforts to prevent a crisis before it arose, he said. Dioceses and bishops must be attentive and have realistic expectations of the clergy.
The Interim Bishop of Liverpool, the Rt Revd Ruth Worsley, said that her combination of nursing training and ordination training had taught her to attend to the needs of the whole person. She welcomed the motion’s emphasis on mental-health training and provision for clergy, but she wanted to extend it to a requirement for all priests to have pastoral supervision.
Emma Robarts (St Albans) could not support this “sticking plaster” of an amendment. Parish clergy posts were being relentlessly cut, putting ever greater pressure on serving priests. No doubt clergy were suffering from poor mental health, but the best solution was more priests, she suggested. “The Church Commissioners have plenty of money; so let’s spend it quickly on this,” she argued.
The amendment was carried.
Canon Alice Kemp (Bristol) said that she had lived with mental-health challenges, on and off, besides supporting friends and family with their own struggles. When she felt unwell, she struggled to engage with the Church, she said, finding liturgy and offers to pray for healing unhelpful. How could churches be made places of sanctuary instead of unintentionally excluding people? Her diocese offered mental-health first-aid training for all curates.
How churches approached mental health could have a deep impact on well-being, Kat Alldread (Derby) said. She had been part of churches that had implied that mental ill-health was a result of a lack of faith; and this brought isolation and “great shame”. Her church now was open and affirming for those struggling with their mental health, and this had been “lifegiving”.
The Archbishop of Canterbury praised members who had spoken of their personal experiences. She referred to the “huge impact” of the pandemic on mental health, loneliness, and isolation, and hailed the motion for addressing young people, the laity, and the clergy. While mental-health services were overstretched and underfunded, even secular research had recognised the beneficial effect on mental health of being part of a faith community, she said.
“There is much excellent work going on in our churches,” the Archbishop said, speaking of examples of collaboration between the NHS, local government, and churches in south London. “This motion offers an opportunity to turn our power into practical action.”
Paul Waddell (Southwark) supported the motion and especially Ms Chapman’s amendment. He had been raised, he said, by a mentally unwell and sometimes abusive single mother, who occasionally pushed him to run away from home, he said. Becoming part of a church choir had been a “source of joy” — until his vicar tried to “excommunicate” his mother to “make the problem go away”. But a church that he joined later had been transformative, he said.
The Bishop of Beverley, the Rt Revd Stephen Race (Northern Suffragans), said that, as a trustee of charities that helped people with mental-health needs, he knew how overwhelmed the health services were. When offering support, he relied heavily on his “intuition” and the families of those affected, but this was “not ideal”, he said.
The Revd Robert Lawrance (Newcastle) supported the motion and amendments, but emphasised that it was “important to not reinvent the wheel”. He recommended online forums, retreats, and charities for resources and support.
The amended motion was carried. It read:
That this Synod, affirming the work of the national mental health working group, and recognising the high prevalence of mental health conditions in the population, especially post-COVID, and the close relationship between spiritual and mental wellbeing, believes that responding to people’s mental health needs in an informed, prayerful, and compassionate way is integral to our mission, and therefore:
a) call on diocesan ministry training leads to include specific content in their IME and CME courses on how to support those facing mental-health challenges;
b) request the National Society to develop further training materials on responding to mental health challenges for use in Church Schools and children’s groups, with a focus not only on those directly affected, but also for those children and young people who live with, or are carers for, others with mental health challenges,
c) request the Liturgical Commission to ensure that the church’s liturgical materials are drafted with attention to the needs of, and impact upon, people facing mental health challenges and supported by guidance notes relating to their use in the particular circumstances of those facing mental health challenges;
d) recognising the 2025 report from St Luke’s for Clergy Wellbeing on counselling provision for clergy, call upon all dioceses to ensure that their offering of mental health support for clergy provides accessibility, independence; and clarity so that the best practice celebrated in the report can be reflected across all parts of the Church of England.
Read more reports from the General Synod Digest here