{"id":26506,"date":"2018-11-05T14:47:11","date_gmt":"2018-11-05T19:47:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/?p=26506"},"modified":"2018-11-05T14:50:43","modified_gmt":"2018-11-05T19:50:43","slug":"diocese-of-niagara-appoints-an-honorary-lay-canon-of-church-closures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/diocese-of-niagara-appoints-an-honorary-lay-canon-of-church-closures\/","title":{"rendered":"Diocese of Niagara appoints an Honorary Lay Canon of Church Closures"},"content":{"rendered":"

That is not the euphemism used in Bishop Susan Bell\u2019s charge to synod, of course; nevertheless, that\u2019s what it is. Or it could be Church Closures, Sales and Demolitions.<\/p>\n

From here<\/a> (my emphasis):<\/p>\n

\"\" I think I am also beginning to see a general loosening of our love affair with bricks and mortar:\u00a0 The property we own as a Diocese is a strategic asset, it\u2019s true.\u00a0 But perhaps not in the ways we used to think about it.\u00a0 The fact is, churches have life cycles.\u00a0 They were and are planted according to key demographics, they have a beginning to their life, a middle and an end.\u00a0 The truth is, very few churches live for a century and fewer still live to see two \u2013 unless it is this venerable and beautiful cathedral that we are meeting in today.\u00a0 Parishes and church buildings are meant to spring up where the mission fields are. And when it is very clear that they have come to the end of their life cycle it is incumbent on us \u2013 the stewards of those resources \u2013 to redeploy those assets as needed for a new mission field – as intended by their founders: Christians who gave money to the church to be the church.<\/p>\n

This is an important thing for us to understand.\u00a0 It is not good Christian practice for us to hold buildings hostage to our desires to hold on to worldly things.\u00a0 It is good Christian practice to make disciples and to preach the Gospel to the whole of creation.\u00a0 So, we are called to go where the mission field is.\u00a0 We will become a planting church once again.\u00a0 And what does that look like in this time?\u00a0 It looks like understanding the needs of new housing surveys; of underserviced inner-city neighbourhoods; strategic small-town locations.\u00a0 These are some of the contexts that we are learning about and planning to engage.<\/p>\n

And to better ascertain how best to deploy our precious building resources I have asked Mr. Terry Charters to lead a new committee that will work with our Secretary of Synod and Treasurer on our property portfolio to best and most strategically maintain, sell, re-purpose, rent or restore property based on the best analysis we have available of demographics.<\/strong>\u00a0 This will also include a focus on our continuing plans for the revitalization of Cathedral Place \u2013 on which he\u2019ll report later in the course of Synod. This group will also have the aim of searching for reliable community partnerships and for income generation plans to support sustainability but also to underwrite future mission and ministry in this diocese. This is the job of tilling the soil and planting seeds for the next season of our beloved church.<\/p>\n

And to go with this new committee, I\u2019ve also conferred on Terry the title of Honorary Lay Canon of Christ\u2019s Church Cathedral.<\/strong>\u00a0 We are greatly indebted to him for his many hours of specialized and valuable ministry among us and look forward to all that he has to share with us in the coming years.\u00a0 We\u2019ll have a service of installation for him and Canon Jody early in the New Year.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

That is not the euphemism used in Bishop Susan Bell\u2019s charge to synod, of course; nevertheless, that\u2019s what it is. Or it could be Church Closures, Sales and Demolitions. From here (my emphasis): I think I am also beginning to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[110],"tags":[2553],"class_list":["post-26506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-diocese-of-niagara","tag-bishop-susan-bell"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26506\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}