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Posted by: Andrew Wooding - 21 September 2009
The rhetoric of this second phase of Fresh Expressions seems to place a large focus on embedding fresh expressions in the ordinary life of the traditional church. Fresh Expressions, as an institution, is moving towards the centre. My personal vocation has always been to the edges, and hence I personally react against this move towards the centre. It may be that the move towards the centre is correct for Fresh Expressions, but my question is whether this centripetal movement is missional suicide for fresh expressions.
When I began ministry eight years ago, there was no Mission-shaped Church report, no Fresh Expressions, no mixed economy, no Ordained Pioneer Ministers, no Bishops' Mission Orders; it was an exciting time as we broke boundaries and defined church alongside the traditional pattern. In the past five years all these areas have been developed; many resources have been poured into them as the edges have been pulled towards the institutional centre. The edge is now neatly defined by its relationship to the centre rather than by those outside the church. Fresh Expressions is mainstream.
For many spiritual searchers and post-modern pilgrims, the mainstream nature of Fresh Expressions is deeply problematic. Many questions will be asked such as: 'Do I want to be part of a mainstream, hierarchical institution?' If the answer is no, then we will have failed in this part of the missional task and so, whilst I recognise the importance of the relationship to centre, it seems that we need to nurture the new emerging edges rather than the edges defined by the centre.
Bio: Ben Edson established Sanctus1, a fresh expression of church in Manchester city centre, in 2001. He blogs here.
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Comments
Edgy and marginal
Posted by Pam Smith on 20 July 09 - 15:43
People who are called to the edges and margins may by nature be equipped to deal with it - edgy and marginal in fact - but maybe those at the centre project how they would feel in that position, and seek to bring people into their own comfort zone because they can't imagine anyone being comfortable anywhere else?
I know a very experienced church planter who was delighted to be asked onto a core Diocesan committee and said he was going onto it with the intention of shaking things up.
I said - not entirely jokingly - that he would 'go native' very quickly and spend more time on committees than he did on mission - just like most vicars have to. I think whoever had asked him onto the committee did it with the best of motives - to listen to what was going on at the edges but maybe it would just be good if they could come to the edges to listen rather than ask people to come to them.
Or maybe this is just another version of the 'indrag' model?
Ordained and on the edges?
Posted by Andrew Wooding on 21 July 09 - 16:09
I can't help asking something ... hope you don't mind!
I also feel called to the edges and beyond, which is why I am more than happy being lay. I was cool with my Church Army commissioning service, but was deeply uncomfortable with the pomp and ceremony of the admitting service at the cathedral. One reason I could never get ordained is I'm not an institutional person and I (personally) would feel that I was selling my soul to one denomination and to an organised structure. At the same time, I rejoice that my wife is getting ordained next year as that is exactly what she wants and feels called to do.
So, bearing in mind what you're written on Share ... which I have a lot of sympathy for ... how do you feel your recent ordination (being officially recognised as a priest in an institutional church) fits in with your wanting to be on the edges?
And is it easier being on the edges as a lay person or an ordained person?
Posted by Ben Edson on 22 July 09 - 07:47
For me it is about how I am resourced and sustained spiritually to be on the edge and this needs to come from a firm rootedness in the centre. Personally, without this sense of rootedness then I could loose touch with the edge as I am no longer in touch with the centre.
Whilst lay my role was a confusing one, people saw me as ordained but my 'orders' did not recognize that. This meant that my role in relation to the centre was unclear and hence I was not fully released to be on the edges. It may sounds a bit paradoxical but since getting ordained my sense of vocation to those outside the church has got stronger!
I think that this is where we need to review our understanding of what getting ordained is about and my first ordination was to be a deacon and this is very much about reaching those outside of church, this remains my primary vocation.
Posted by Pam Smith on 22 July 09 - 09:04
I agree with you that it's really about a continued sense of calling to the edges. When I first experienced what I thought was a vocation (in 1992), it came with the word 'threshold' which didn't make a lot of sense to me - or to the DDO who wouldn't send me to a conference since he saw priesthood and being a vicar as pretty much the same thing.
I then went to work in prison as a lay minister and I had the same experience of people assuming I was ordained - and while there were also things that I couldn't do for them as a lay person which I longed to do, such as celebrate communion, this wasn't the central issue - the central issue was as you express it, my own relationship to the centre and therefore *their* relationship to it.
Funnily enough I also feel very strongly about the 'continuing deacon' part of my ministry. I despair when people - including priests - talk about people who don't feel called to be priests as 'permanent deacons'. Everyone who is ordained deacon is a permanent deacon!
Andrew, I'm not sure that your question
"is it easier being on the edges as a lay person or an ordained person?"
really maps onto my experience - firstly because nothing about my relationship with the institutional church has ever been easy, and secondly I really didn't choose to be ordained - when I felt I had to go back and re-engage with the selection process (in 2001) I fought it for six months before I said yes - after some fairly directive advice from my lead chaplain who said I 'didn't have the right' to withhold my sense of calling from the church since it was for the church not my personal property!
Posted by Andrew Wooding on 22 July 09 - 14:32
Re-reading my question, I wonder if my own personal issue is that, even though I am in Church Army, I don't feel called specifically to the Church of England?
Thank you for taking the time!
Andrew
Posted by Pam Smith on 23 July 09 - 09:51
http://www.cpas.org.uk/churchleadersmag/content/documents/CL69-p21.pdf
I read it when it first came out, when I was fairly new to the C of E and didn't know much about anything and this book had a profound effect on how I see ministry. (I suppose therefore it's not really a surprise that I've ended up at the FX end of things!)
My view is that we are all called to where God can use us best, for some this is a formally licensed role and for some it's the opposite. God doesn't call 'special' people to do 'special' things - we are part of an orchestra not soloists.
My personal experience is that since becoming a priest I feel I'm operating from the right place whereas before I always felt slightly out of place.
I think the mistake would be if I therefore went round persuading everyone in whom I saw God at work that they should be ordained!
Posted by Andrew Wooding on 23 July 09 - 18:18
However, my wife read that book and I believe she found it helpful in thinking through her call, so I can recommend it second hand!
I really appreciate your inclusiveness in describing different people in different places in ministry - so refreshing! If only much of the institution practised the same sort of inclusiveness.
Posted by Pam Smith on 24 July 09 - 08:45
I trained at Queen's so I had the opportunity to look at how Methodists do the diaconate - which of course is a completely separate order. I think technically they are meant to determine whether their call might be to the presbyterate or the diaconate during their foundation year, prior to the selection process - but everyone I knew was clear about that before they started.
I wonder if people setting up and running fresh expressions come somewhere near how the diaconate looks in Methodist terms?
As far as being inclusive goes - I've never seen any convincing argument for saying ordained people have 'left the laity', any more than priests have left the diaconate. So when I was asked at the end of my first year as a curate how it felt to have 'left the laity' I said 'I haven't'.
I think it's easy to lose sight of the fact that most people wouldn't be ordained if you offered them a million pounds - and that the church simply would not function at any level or in any mode if God wasn't calling a lot of people to serve in non-ordained roles.
Posted by Andrew Wooding on 27 July 09 - 13:13
The Revd George Lings (my boss) says he is still lay, so you're in good company!
I have learned a lot from this discussion. Thanks.
Staying on the edge
Posted by Jenny McIntosh on 21 July 09 - 22:16
However, my guess is that it hasn't because the power of the centre always always pulls the edges back into itself. The end result it wants is for everything to be a part of it and bums on seats.
Either way, the edge just has to go outside of where it was before and keep going or move out altogether. It is a bit of a tricky place to be.
Maintaining sharpness
Posted by Mark CE on 22 July 09 - 04:23
Any particular new church (or fresh expression if you will), whatever its shape, whatever its values, will one day not be new. Will one day lose the inspirational catalyst-people who inititated it. When that day comes, how is the initial impetus, the "call to the edges" of the founding community to be maintained, fostered, even increased, in the missional life of the community of people who have gathered into that shape, formed around those values?
Edges will always be defined by a centre. The very fact of being called towards the edges presupposes that you see yourself as "inside" something with a "centre" and with "edges" that you can be called towards.
Where we do have a problem is if we examine our centre and find it's not God the Trinity.
embeding may not mean dumbing down
Posted by Steve Hollinghurst on 22 July 09 - 21:12
firstly always with edgy and to the edge. But i think you may ahve miss-read the Fresh Expressions agenda. everything i hear coming from that camp tells me the agenda of 'embeding in the centre' is nto at all abotu moving to the centre, it's about ensuring the radical edgy values of Mission Shaped Church are re-enforced, recognizing that the fast expansion of Fresh Expressions has lead to a lot of folks perhaps embracing it enthusiastically but not really understanding it. the next phase is about embedding that understanding, it is in fact about returning the church to the edge and embedding the edgy into Fresh Expressions; about trying to get the centre to the edge of you like and stop the dumbing down process.
Posted by Ben Edson on 22 July 09 - 21:44
We need to get more radical, I'm hopeful that you're hopeful! I am hopeful too, I think there are some fantastic people in FE but think that we can't be complacent...
Do we need a new model?
Posted by Pam Smith on 23 July 09 - 11:09
I wonder if the image itself is completely accurate - with FX on the ends of spokes coming out from a central wheel. Whereas what's happening is perhaps more messy, with overlapping and networking between groups and between fresh expressions and established church.
From the inherited church perspective, perhaps being at the centre can feel more like a scene in a cowboy film where the wagons are pulled into a protective circle to keep the attackers out?
And from the 'edgy' perspective, maybe it can sometimes feel that we are being pursued by 'the centre' which wishes to engulf us - a bit like the threatening bubble in The Prisoner?
I do know of areas where fresh expressions are being integrated in a positive way into the local church scene, but I also observe that adverts in the Church Times for people to do full vicars jobs AND set up/lead Fresh Expressions are also on the rise - which must express a profound misunderstanding of what FX is meant to be about.
I do think it's worth trying to work this out though.