How bad must it get for a bishop to resign?

 No economy at the top: "Bishop Mary and Bishop John join the Church's Bench of Bishops"                                                                    Source: Church in Wales

The Vicar of Radyr has announced that she has submitted her resignation as incumbent and Ministry Area Leader to the bishop of Llandaff. 

The Reverend Vicki Burrows said that she could no longer, with integrity, knowing the many things she knows, serve in the diocese where she believed a 'culture of fear' exists. A diocesan survey conducted after her initial exposure 'brought up the same results'. The senior leadership team acknowledged there was room for improvement. See the vicar's statement in this video link  starting at position 1.00.15  

The problem for the vicar and those for whom she is sacrificing her ministry is that the bench ditched integrity as soon as they had their own way on the ordination of women. See Brood of vipers!        

It is not expected that the bishop of Llandaff will consider her position having already been engaged in a long running battle with her side-lined Dean and the new archbishop confirming his impotency in such matters. 

Bishop June also has the precedent of the bishop of St Davids sitting tight until the storm blows over after the Twitter scandal in which she insulted many of her flock. Bishop Joanna is now making more frequent appearances as if she had never blotted her copybook. 

Vicars are expendable it seems while bishops expand their empires despite Recommendation XXV for diocesan reform in the 2012 Harries Review.

Instead we have feminist triumphalism praising their latest 'successes'. Recently the Church in Wales tweeted: Our new bishops, Mary Stallard and John Lomas, join the Bench of bishops. We now have more women bishops than men, which we think is a first in the Anglican Communion @AnglicanNews @ChurchTimes.

This is somewhat ambiguous. Presumably they mean joining the bench for a photograph. According to the constitution the “Bench of Bishops” means the Archbishop and the other Diocesan Bishops but the gloating "We now have more women bishops than men, which we think is a first in the Anglican Communion" implies the prospect of an expectation of feminism influencing the Church in Wales even more.

It has been said that the hat makes the man so perhaps the mitre may be thought to make the women. That could explain the biggest mitre being sported by the assistant bishop. If I remember correctly she saw a woman wearing a mitre on a visit to the USA and was even more convinced that women bishops were right!

Postscript [01.04.2022]

Church Times - Dean’s complaint of bullying by Bishop of Llandaff to be heard at tribunal:

"No date for the tribunal has yet been fixed. A spokeswoman for the Church in Wales confirmed on Tuesday that the tribunal panel was currently being appointed by the president, Mark Powell QC. It can have five members, and must include a diocesan or assistant bishop from another diocese.

"The Church in Wales has appointed Gavin Foster QC — joint registrar in the diocese of Salisbury, a former Crown Prosecutor, and former domestic chaplain to the Bishop of Winchester, Dr Tim Dakin — as Proctor to bring the case. The tribunal has considerable powers, ranging from absolute or conditional discharge, rebuke, or monition, to deposition from Holy Orders."

Another Church in Wales senior appointment

The Archbishop of Wales at the window in HQ which affords distant views of the Salvation Army
DHQ and the Church of St Mary's The Virgin in Butetown .  Source: Church in Wales

Hot on the heels of the Church in Wales advertisement for a Director of Welsh Language and Bilingual Mission (Grade F – £36,225 to £40,986 per annum) comes another bishops' adviser senior appointment. This time for a Director of Education Policy (Grade G – £42,692 to £48,302 per annum).

According to the job description the post holder will be responsible to the Bench of Bishops and the Standing Committee of the Governing Body of the Church in Wales through the Bishop holding the Education portfolio (currently the Bishop of Llandaff) for the content of work. The post-holder will be a senior advisor to the Bishops and will be responsible for ensuring that they are kept well briefed and well-informed about developments in the areas of work covered by this role.

With a bloated bench of  six diocesan bishops for a province the size of a Church of England diocese and no sign of reducing the bureaucracy as recommended in the Harries Review (Section 15), one has to wonder how the bishops spend their time with advisers assisting them with the briefs. Perhaps that is why they are so out of touch, spending time indulging their LGBTI/same-sex marriage obsessions.

In a previous entry, 'The cost of change', I noted that the  bishop of Llandaff, the holder of the Education portfolio, had said, "You can talk about it as a story of decline but actually what it is about is change." So there we have it. More bureaucracy.

While the peasants at the bottom of the pile are urged to dig deeper there is no shortage of money for the lord bishops' advisers. 

There is a salutary tale from the US on the decline of the Episcopal Church (here) but the bench continues to look to TEC for support. Their ex-Presiding Bishop is mentoring ♀June and ♀Joanna.

Female bishop mentoring                                 Source: Twitter

Since we were led to expect so much from women bishops it is a bit of a mystery why they need mentoring: 

“People were delighted in my appointment because it was fairly unexpected that in a single year the Church in Wales went from having six men as its bishops to a third being women. I can’t tell you the amount of pleasure and delight it causes people. It’s now what we expect, we don’t expect there to be barriers for women. That is as true for spiritual leadership and the church as for medicine or journalism or the boardroom.” - June Osborne. 

Not without substantial help apparently. Who is paying the mentoring bill and why choose a woman who has been exposed for her non-Christian theology?

If there is so much money about might I suggest another senior appointment? Someone who can advise the bench how to get back on track after being derailed by the former archbishop and his heretical mentor. That would be money well spent.

Swan song? If only...

The Archbishop of Wales                                                                                      Photo: Church in Wales

[NOTE: According to the Church in Wales web site the programme referred to below has been re-scheduled for broadcast on 8 December 2013 by which time the Archbishop should have retired from the scene had he been employed in the secular world he so much admires but since he is responsible only to himself no doubt he will continue to apply his own personal standards and stay put. - Ed.]

Whether the English 'Songs of Praise' or the Welsh 'Dechrau Canu Dechrau Canmol',  first, praise where praise is due. My thanks to the Church in Wales for providing bloggers with such fertile ground for blogging.

From a recent press release: "The Archbishop of Wales will present a special edition of the S4C worship singing series Dechrau Canu Dechrau Canmol on Sunday 17 November (8pm, English subtitles) to celebrate his tenth anniversary as head of the Church in Wales".

'Dechrau Canu Dechrau Canmol' is the Welsh language version of  Songs of Praise broadcast on S4C which, just like the Church in Wales, serves a minority of people in Wales. It is ranked ninth in the top twenty S4C viewing figures with 31,000 viewers. That's 1% of the population, curiously a similar number of people who attend Church in Wales services regularly each Sunday. But the Archbishop likes minorities, always providing that they are secular, see here and here . They give him the platform he otherwise would be denied for his political posturing to the detriment of the Church. For minorities viewing outside Wales S4C can be accessed online, by satellite and cable, see here.

The S4C programme is produced by a Cardiff-based independent TV production company, Avanti, strangely the same company that was used to produce Songs of Praise sessions from Llandaff Cathedral which resulted in allegations that procurement rules may have been broken. If that rings a bell, so might this headline: "First female Dean of Llandaff Cathedral quits after two months". Full story here but discount the mischievous and unsubstantiated claim: "Church in Wales sources have told WalesOnline that Dean Henderson had had “a 'difficult time' since her appointment, with some clergy resenting the appointment of a woman", a story put about to influence the vote on women bishops with great success after two prominent women clergy in the Archbishop's entourage succeeded in removing statutory provision for worshippers who have not been taken in by the current fad for using the church as an organ of society. 

It is fitting that the Archbishop will be celebrating his own ministry since everything has to be done his way. A chapel boy from Neath, he clothed himself as an Anglican after using his local Anglican Church to learn to play the organ, obviously one of his passions! His journey ends in Llandaff, Cardiff, "where he now lives and where he was first ordained 41 years ago". He says: “I’m deeply aware that I’m following in a line of some of the giants of the Christian faith – people such as the translator of the Bible to Welsh, William Morgan, Alfred Oliver, Joshua Hughes and Richard Lewis and that makes me feel very humble.” Humility is not an obvious trade mark. No bishop from Dubricius in 522 to the much loved Roy Davies in 1999 has done more than Barry Morgan to marginalise the Church in Wales. His magnificent Cathedral is in dire straits with the prayerful few constantly pressed to increase their giving sacrificially to support his 'take it or leave it' regime which is designed to marginalise those who disagree with his secular approach to religion.

If you were to ask people what first came to mind on hearing the word 'Cathedral' no doubt many would say music. A musical tradition to match the splendour of the architecture, the diocesan church par excellence as Barry described his Cathedral. In Llandaff the reality is very different with talk of financial irregularities, nepotism and in-fighting - see comments under the 'Morgan's organ' entry here.

Relations in the Cathedral have taken another knock with the news that 'Peggy Pilot', the omnipresent Archdeacon of Llandaff and part time Cathedral overseer cum temp Dean is to investigate allegations of homophobia within the Cathedral’s choir, story here. No prizes for guessing who will be exonerated.

Two thousand years after Christ appointed His Apostles, Dr Morgan believes that it has fallen to him amongst all the "giants of the Christian faith" to break with the Apostolic Succession. That is not humility, it is conceit. Only he and his fellow bishops now enjoy positions of security in the Church in Wales. While they are adding to their pensions, lesser mortals face an uncertain future under the Church in Wales programme of managed decline. Instead of adding to the number of Christians, they have done the opposite while pursuing their narrow objective of appointing a woman bishop for purely political reasons contrary to the beliefs of the Apostolic Church. Barry's goal now looks likely to succeed unless the church collapses beforehand under the weight of episcopal incompetence.

Dechrau Canu Dechrau Canmol is often recorded in Welsh chapels with congregational singing rather than a large formal choir, the fate that awaits Llandaff Cathedral on current trends although they will have a magnificent £1.5m organ to accompany the handful of worshippers left in the congregation.

If only Dr Morgan were returning to his roots and this programme were his swan song. Then there would indeed be songs of praise, thanking God for an overdue retirement, 'Dechrau Canu Dechrau Canmol' yn wir!

Postscript

Fans of Dr Morgan, another minority no doubt, will be disappointed to learn that Dechrau Canu Dechrau Canmol this week has been cancelled/postponed having given way to a fundraising concert for the Philippines appeal, details here.

Donations can be made here

Another politician in clerical clothing

 In the latest helping of the views of the Archbishop of Wales in WalesOnline we have Organ Donations, Devolution, Gay Marriage, Homosexuality, Women's Rights, Demographics and the Welsh language. Unlike Her Majesty the Queen who broadcast a simple Christian message in her Christmas Day broadcast [see previous entry], here is another cleric who finds it much easier to preach politics from the privilege of the pulpit than to offer himself for election. The closest Dr Morgan gets to God is when he talks of the decline of the church, again abdicating any sense of responsibility with the words: “At the end of the day, the church is not the clergy and the church is certainly not bishops. The church is the whole people of God.” - If that is the case, why does he insist on ploughing his own furrow contrary to the direction of the universal Apostolic church to which he professes allegiance every time he recites the Creed?

Apart from the dwindling few he has gathered around him, the 'whole people of God' as he sees them couldn't care less for the views of the Archbishop according to the results of the 2011 census which showed his diocese of Llandaff as home to areas in the UK with the highest rates reporting no religion. Caerphilly takes the lead on his patch: Some local authorities in Wales also reported some of the highest levels of no religion. Caerphilly had the largest percentage point increase since 2001 of 16.7 to 41.0 per cent . Blaenau Gwent, Rhondda Cynon Taf and Torfaen also saw large increases of no religion with 16.0, 15.5 and 15.4 percentage points respectively.

I hear on the grapevine that managing the decline of the Church in Wales has already run into trouble with problems implementing the 'Harries' Review. Despite a great deal of time and effort looking at clustering parishes this is now regarded as a non-starter. Also, as if to kick a man when he is down, Dr Morgan's cherished plan of making the Diocese of Llandaff the Archiepiscopal see will not take place in the foreseeable future. Added to which parsonages will not be sold off as recommended and the Archbishop has admitted that he has no power to close buildings so churches will continue to be used until they fall into disrepair for lack of funds and, presumably, become unusable on grounds of safety. None of this really matters to the bishops because all seven of them keep their jobs (I use the term advisedly) regardless of further decline below the 1% of the 'whole people of God' they care for in Wales, allegedly. This strategy also keeps all the bums on the bench so that when women bishops take over they will have somewhere to sit while wondering where all the people have gone. As senior appointments now go to outsiders, they could of course spend their time learning Welsh so they can talk among themselves in their 'home' language since a vast amount of money has been spent on translations for Welsh speakers, now down to 19% of the population and a tiny fraction of churchgoers practically all of whom no doubt would be bilingual.

Dr Morgan is very keen on supporting (some) minorities. He was particularly miffed at not being consulted over plans to exempt the Church in Wales from David Cameron's same-sex marriage proposals claiming that it would make the Church in Wales appear homophobic. What an appalling claim for an educated man to make, even worse by a cleric and more so by a bishop. It is not homophobic to believe that marriage is a life-long union between one man and one woman. But this is just another smokescreen. It is an attempt to conceal Dr Morgan's main aim which is to enhance his liberal credentials at any cost in the same way that he proposes a sleight of hand to allow the admission of women to the episcopate by making supposed provision for those opposed when he has already indicated that there will be no provision other than on his terms. If he were to offer himself for election, who would vote for such duplicity?

Church in Wales looks to Nonconformists in survival plan

In concert: Tabernacle Chapel, Morriston - 'The Cathedral of Welsh Non-Conformity'

Wales has effectively been a Nonconformist country since the mid nineteenth century but the Church in Wales has maintained a parish system for the hundred years since disestablishment - until now. The 'independent' Review led by the Archbishop's old friend Lord Harries, the former Bishop of Oxford, recently came up with a plan to abandon parishes in favour of ministry areas. On Saturday came news that Churches and chapels in Wales are being asked to discuss radical proposals which could result in closer unity. Proposals on the agenda include a new kind of bishop and a single "United Church for Wales" in which there would be an interchange of ordained ministries by those with church or chapel backgrounds. Five denominations - including the Church in Wales, Presbyterians and Methodists - could ultimately share bishops, ministers and buildings. If given the go-ahead, a new breed of bishops would be created and be interchangeable between all denominations in the united group. Ordained ministers would also be free to serve in all churches and chapels in the Church Uniting in Wales.

Now one might be forgiven for concluding that this plan may have been uppermost in the mind of the Archbishop while using the convenient conclusions of the Harries Review to nudge unsuspecting congregations in a predetermined direction. Concerns have been expressed about an indecent haste in trying to implement the recommendations of the Harries Review before they have been properly considered. Forward in Faith (Wales) reports: "The reaction to the Church in Wales Review leaves plenty of us with great concerns. At one meeting recently an Archdeacon reminded those present that at this stage the question should be: do we agree that ministry areas need to be created? and then how do we do it? Not vice versa. In some areas of the Review suggestions are quoted as giving permission for a new development without the necessary agreement of those involved. Some dioceses also seem to be moving ahead in a piecemeal fashion. This cannot be good for the unity of the church."

Unity as he sees it is close to the heart of the Archbishop of Wales. He has refused to secure a future for members belonging to the catholic tradition who would value the prospect of unity with the wider Apostolic Church of East and West on the grounds that the unity of the Church in Wales would be threatened! He argues that to appoint a bishop or bishops with jurisdiction for those opposed to the ordination of women would "alter irreparably the Church in Wales as we know it. It would be to sanction schism and for these theological reasons the bishops, as guardians of unity, could not give their support for such a measure." - Excuse me?

There have already been calls for the Church of England to decide whether it is a Catholic or Protestant body. The latest move by the Church in Wales makes their position abundantly clear. No wonder Anglo-Catholics have constantly to struggle against the tide of liberalism which has overtaken their church. Like headless chickens Dr Morgan and his bishops have tried everything to reverse the decline of the Church in Wales except the blindingly obvious, neatly summed up by Damian Thompson here. Over the years I have encountered many Nonconformists who have been brought to the Anglican faith through the awe of sacramental worship, perhaps no more important a figure than the present Archbishop of Canterbury who, according to Rupert Shortt's biography Rowan's Rule, changed his allegiance from the Presbyterian Church after visiting All Saints, Oystermouth: All Saints' provided the classic, moderately high church diet known as Prayer Book Catholicism. Preaching and musical standards were high; incense would make its appearance on major feast days. This was far richer than Park End Chapel [in Cardiff]. John Walters, Rowan's oldest friend, later quipped that the Williamses were like the Russian envoys in medieval Constantinople who felt transported to heaven by the splendours of Byzantine worship and quickly decided that Christianity should become the new faith of the Slavs [p.32].

All that has changed. As Anglo-Catholics continue to be marginalised much of the mystery of Anglican worship has ebbed away. So have congregations. As costs escalate, maintaining the 'parish share' with declining numbers becomes increasingly difficult as is the cost of maintaining a top-heavy structure. With no parish ties in the future and Anglican services becoming increasingly reminiscent of politically correct school assemblies, local self-supporting chapels will have an increasing appeal for those who are left. As one adherent with a liking for good Welsh hymn singing put it to me, "Rousing hymns with a good gossip afterwards; there's nothing like it".

Readers with access to BBC Wales will be able to watch the latest reality show this evening at 10.35pm, Vicar Academy. The mind boggles.

Area Ministry: the Business Solution

Map: Wikipedia

Landmark report by Church in Wales recommends replacing parishes with ministry areas: 
"Key recommendations include replacing traditional parishes with "ministry areas" modelled on the catchment areas of secondary schools. Each area could include around 25 parishes." - WalesOnline.

In reality the 'landmark report' only repeats what the Archbishop of Wales forecast back in 2006 in a lecture organised by 'The Christian Centre for Rural Wales' when Dr Morgan said:
  "there are provinces across the Anglican Communion in America, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada and in many dioceses of the Church in England and now in Wales, which have begun to examine the setting up of local ministry teams without diminishing the role of the clergy, but which take the discipleship of all God’s people seriously.  Instead of seeing the Church as a community centred around a priest, the church itself is seen as a corporate body which becomes a ministering congregation.  In other words, it ceases to be a congregation which is ministered to but becomes an active congregation and lives out God’s mission in the world."

So the 'Independent Review' is effectively an endorsement of Barry's plan based as usual on the performance of the failing Episcopal Church of America. In this example of area ministry we have the now familiar liberal agenda in a PowerPoint presentation, a business based solution to confront the shrinking membership of the church.  [Download viewer here if required.]

Those members who have already been active in the Church in Wales, seeking to live God's mission in the world, will be sadly disappointed having responded to their Archbishop's urgings to take part in the Review. Evidently eager to tackle the top heavy structure resulting from severe losses suffered in their church, it was suggested by a clear majority [that has a familiar ring! - Ed] that the number of dioceses be cut to three, no doubt with commensurate reductions in senior posts but while the Review recommends that the number of administrative areas be reduced to three, the seven bishops would remain - even if the number of dioceses is eventually reduced! This was the assessment of the 'independent review':

 15. Dioceses: their number and administration
We have received a wide variety of views on how many dioceses there should be
in Wales, fluctuating wildly between one and the opinion that every deanery
should be a diocese! The majority view was probably that there should be three
or four dioceses, with some re-drawing of boundaries. However, we believe that
this is the wrong time to be changing the number and shape of dioceses. It would
occupy time and energy for the next ten years and distract the church from the
urgent changes which are necessary now, irrespective of the number of
dioceses. The present number and shape of dioceses may not be ideal. If we
were starting again we would have three. However, the present number and
configuration works and we think that the Church should continue, at least for the
next four years, with the present six dioceses. ... These recommendations should be reviewed after three years, with a view to evaluating the effectiveness of the change. At that point a judgement should be made about whether or not the church is best served by six dioceses with three administrative centres, or three dioceses. If the latter, we believe there should still be the same number of bishops as at present, namely seven.

No doubt the seven bishops will be well satisfied that the Lord Harries of Pentregarth managed to produce a report which they think makes the Church in Wales 'fit for purpose'. Actually the Lord Jesus Christ did that long before these revisionists started tinkering with His plan. The consequences for the US Episcopal Church can be read here.