The real challenge facing the Kirk today

YESTERDAY saw the opening of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. It is inevitable that the Commissioners will have the doubtful future of the Kirk very much on their minds.

In that context, I refer to the Very Rev Dr John Chalmers’ question as to whether “the format of the Kirk’s governance is fit for the present day” (“Former Moderator compares Kirk to a ‘modern-day Rip Van Winkle’”, May 1).

I suggest that it is no wonder the Kirk is in decline given its failing to see that its “problems” can never be resolved by constantly reorganising its institutional structures, the standard solution pursued by bureaucracies struggling to save the institution they serve.

However, the predicament facing it is far more serious. It needs a new theology restating those of its ancient truths which still speak to the issues facing our world today, a new readiness to incarnate the radical and inclusive message of Jesus and a new passion for justice and human flourishing which is surely at the heart of the Christian narrative.

After a lifetime of active Kirk membership, I can no longer go along with the millennial old world view on which its current theology is founded, or confidently repeat its creeds or sing the Victorian hymns, the words of both the foregoing surely being incomprehensible to those seeking to understand Christianity which otherwise has so much to offer such a troubled world.

Dr Chalmers suggests that the Church “needs a very different approach to ministry, mission, governance, management and accountability”, drawing attention to the current “overhaul of our financial contribution system, the structure of our presbyteries”. No doubt these reforms are necessary but the Reformation of the 16th century went far deeper than bringing about a change in Church governance and structures. It gave us a new theology, a new understanding of faith, to live by. Surely that is the real challenge facing the Kirk today.

John Milne, Uddingston