Parishes kick back against cuts
Susan Roberts, of Save the Parish, writes of her fears for the future of rural churches as cuts by the Diocese bite
YOU could say that Crowan Church is in the middle of nowhere. It’s in a parish in west Cornwall with no town of any size. Our largest village is Praze (population approx. 1,500).
The church’s 15th century tower is visible for many miles, surrounded by smallholdings run by people like my brother, the latest of many generations of my family to farm here. My forebears went to Crowan Church and there are many other local families, too, who over centuries have kept the faith here.
Others too are now drawn to the church. People involved in new industries in Crowan alongside the traditional cauliflower and daffodils – tourists, wedding organisers, musicians and artisans, catering businesses.
Some come only for weddings and funerals. Many others not to attend services, but to enjoy the building’s sanctity and peace. It’s a new church life in an ancient Cornish parish – and one that’s mirrored across the county.
But for how much longer? Because echoing within the walls of not just Crowan but all historic rural churches in Cornwall is a perplexing new church canon led by our Bishops. Talk of Fruitfulness and Sustainability. Kingdom Enterprise. HeartEdge. Mission enablers. What do these words even mean?
The jargon used by the Diocese of Truro as it rolls out a major house-keeping exercise known as On The Way (OTW) is deceptively benign. The Bishops suggest that congregations are in charge of shaping their own new, rosy future. The opposite in fact has happened. As brutal cuts have already started to ‘balance the books’, churches from Saltash to Sancreed are pushing back against the process and the prospect of losing their vicars.
In many Deaneries – from St Austell to Penwith to East Wivelshire – it was made very clear to the ‘leadership teams’ involved that any suggestions relating on OTW had to fit with the Bishops’ vision, so there was little point in including anything they were unlikely to approve.
It’s a miserable business, as the Bishop of Truro, Philip Mounstephen, recognised at the Diocesan Synod last September and in a subsequent letter to church councils. “We need to recognize that change is painful in the church as it is elsewhere,” he wrote.
Transforming Mission (TM) is part of a national Church of England initiative which started in Cornwall in 2017. It was presented as a brave new scheme to draw in missing generations of worshippers and – crucially – funds to sustain future work.
In Crowan we are part of Transforming Mission in a cluster of five churches, led by Camborne – our ‘resource church’. TM is similarly being rolled out in Falmouth, Liskeard, St Austell and Highertown, Truro.
‘Resource churches’ in these towns run ‘worshipping hubs’ in outlying parishes. The Sustainability plan in 2019 for Camborne envisaged a £1m spend over six years, the bulk of this coming from the Church Commissioners’ Strategic Development Fund and Diocesan reserves.
It’s worrying enough to think that we’re an ‘outlying worshipping hub’.
But even more disturbing to realise that Transforming Mission funds do not actually cover ministry. As in the four other TM centres in Cornwall, vicars’ costs need to be covered by parish giving.
Our creative and energetic vicar and her assistant have done their best, especially in the pandemic. But new worshippers and their eagerly anticipated donations have not materialised - while funds have been spent on cosmetics like £10,000 floodlighting Camborne church. Meanwhile the homeless are housed in a nearby carpark in shipping containers.
So in the current economic climate, with collections down and fundraising at a all-time low, we have been warned that that we face losing one or other of these two stipendiary priests through On The Way cuts.
All this, while their Bishops pour Church Commissioners’ riches and Diocesan reserves into Transforming Mission in the very church they serve.
Without vicars to lead and inspire, we – like rural churches all over Cornwall - face an even tougher uphill battle.
No one doubts that some churches struggle to pay their upkeep and the Church of England – financially – does need to be run like a business.
Yet the Diocese’s own accounts show that parish giving was about £3 million in 2020, nearly half of the total annual income of £7 million. The Bishops and their diocesan staff cost £2.7 million that same year. This cannot be right, especially as reserves are being drained through fundamentally flawed schemes like Transforming Mission.
As we face clergy cuts from St Levan to Altarnun, it is time for accountability. Can proper debate replace jargon? Speak clearly, Bishops, and we’ll listen. Please work with us on an open, transparent and honest audit of Transforming Mission and diocesan spending to demonstrate that the Church’s money is being well spent.
Otherwise, change direction and put priests back in the parishes.
Genuinely consult and talk to us. Please don’t tell us what to do. That has never worked well in Cornwall.
As a wise old member in our Crowan congregation once reflected – ‘You can lead the Cornish with a piece of string but you can’t drive them with a whip.’