Day 2
Council for Mission Calls for the Great Commission to Have Priority in Parishes
The Council for Mission has urged General Synod to call on parishes to prioritise the Great Commission over the next 10 years. In a motion in the names of the Revd Andrew Quill and Bishop Ferran Glenfield, the council says that the move will better equip parishes to proclaim the good news about Jesus Christ and to disciple others to make a real difference in our world, bearing in mind the Five Marks of Mission.
In proposing the Motion, the Revd Andrew Quill said that attendance figures in eight of the 12 dioceses of the Church of Ireland had seen a reduction in church attendance and suggested that the Church was weak at discipleship.
“On the Council for Mission, we have been promoting the Five Marks of Mission – last year producing ‘Radiant Faith’ – and believe that effective discipleship would impact the other marks of mission and hence bring transformation to our communities and beyond,” he stated.
Discussing the motion Bishop Michael Burrows (Cashel, Ferns and Ossory) said there were some things worth considering. He said it was hard to assess what was achieved by the Decade of Evangelism and that there were dangers in setting a time. If we are going to do something aspirational for a decade without resources and a point by point idea of where we are going, he said.
“If you are looking at the next 10 years we must think of those who will grow up in the next 10 years. In my own life I am surrounded by these people who are passionate about the environment and their place in it but don’t necessarily connect with the church… It can be challenging to reconnect the church with their passions,” Bishop Burrows stated. He said there was a need for people who had a capacity to converse regularly about why their faith is reasonable and why their faith makes sense. “I have nothing against the motion but ask that we remember that we are not simply about great schemes but we are also about reasonable Christianity and reasonable religion so that people can still find that the genius of Anglicanism is its reasonableness,” he concluded.
Desmond Thorpe (Ferns) said reasonableness was something of which we are too fond. He said he had become a Yogi and had learned to open your minds and hearts to something which may come from the outside. Discipleship, talking to people, was not about reason but feeling it from your heart, he stated.