Church Building Reviewed and condemned?

I'm not sure how many people have read the Church of England's 'Buildings Review Group' (BRG) report (you can read it HERE) but I am certain that a good many more will have read Gile's Frasers take on it in the Guardian (Thursday 15th Oct). What follows is a 'five minute splurge' (time it takes to have a brew) - it's not pretty and possibly wrong, but then aren't we all at some time in some ways?

In his article, Fraser, points at the Church of England's 15700 church building - 12,560 of them listed and dismisses them as,  'A millstone around our necks, sapping the energy of our wider social and religious mission, and transforming the church into a buildings department of the heritage industry.' He continues by saying that he suspects that, 'If every single one of them were blown up tomorrow, England would be a much more Christian country in 10 years’ time.'

Now having quite recently visited a place with two listed church buildings, one whose average congregation was less than the number on the PCC (still struggling with that one) and the other with attendance numbers you could count on both hands and feet, I have some sympathy with those who would like to see something done with the black hole for cash and emotional collateral that is the small and fading church. The problem is that, in my humble view, Fraser has got it wrong on more things than he has got it right.

A legend in his own lunchtime, Fraser is the doyen of many (usually intellectual and nicely-placed if my experience is typical) after the St Paul's debacle. 'Listen to this man,' said a friend, 'He is the future of the Church!'  Yeah? Well his words might just suggest otherwise*!

But let me agree with him first:

We do need to work out ways of rationalising the building stock we have, for we spend too much maintaining monuments rather than doing Church. I don't think anyone can have a doubt about that.

I have come to the conclusion that those who pass by the doors of some church building are convinced by the small numbers going in, and their oft desperate air, that the Church is on the decline. I felt the same when visiting a Tesco somewhere on holiday: It felt tired and made me feel the store was on the downwards slope and because of this was losing out to the new revamped Sainsbury store up the road!

But then I have to take issue with Fraser's own too often 'willy-waving' writings in that:

1. Beeching's actions extended the cuts which were already on the table in response to vanishing communities (removing about one-third of the network). It was a prime example of bean counting and paid little heed to the news of the communities the railway served.

And this is where we need to lay our first marker: Church is about serving the people in all communities, not just those who can pay or where the congregations remain about some benchmark level (often decided by those who live in places where the tide is high and money's coming in!

This is predominantly a hit at those rural communities who find their local church to be a place of cohesion and service; people who (I think I'm right here) account for some 45% of the whole Anglican population. Church is not a spreadsheet exercise but the real engagement with real people: Simple to have high views in a tourist attraction with a heavy footfall!

Beeching was right in that where the communities were no longer present then there was also no need of a station. But the line between two points was still needed. The intelligent action is to decide which needed to go to support an efficient infrastructure, not cull the lot (some of which are now in the process of being reestablished by the way)!

2. The idea that culling of church buildings would see us with a more Christian country is folly and akin to those who put aside the early and late services on the grounds that it makes for a greater, and more engaged, congregation at the mid-morning service form which growth can come.

The reality here is that where three services with congregations of 8, 25 and 8 respectively are amalgamated there is an increase in the mid-morning service (last experience was 32) but that means that in the doing, nine (22%) have been lost.

What we see here is mathematics rather than an understanding of serving already hit and diminished rural communities. It is economics and top-down management by those who who have no understanding of the customer and the next step to a church whose motto is: 'Can't pay - can't have!' - mind you, once all bishops and senior clergy have their MBAs I guess this will be the Gospel we hear more and more. Sad because I'd rather we had informed people of faith leading us rather than the economics displayed in the response especially.

3. Look at the faithful, sacrificial (so much free giving of time and skill) ministry and maintenance that the predominantly rural churches referred to in the report and response refer. Church for the people buy the people: 'I'm from head office, I'm here to help,' has always been a lie, still is! This response shows how little understanding of Church and how much damage a little knowledge misplaced >Iconoclasm gorn mad,' as a friend put it) and validated by monetarist policies (blimey, could be something from Blair, Thatcher and the like could't it?).

4. Give the building to the councils?
Get real - wake up and smell the mould because the one thing councils don't want to do is add to their building stock with a grade whatever listed building! But what we do need to do is get constructive in the way that we use the buildings and this needs so common-sense responses from civic and heritage groups; those people who never set foot in a building and yet dictate as to how it should be because Dickens or William Morris or some other worthy one set foot in the place. If that's what they want then pay for the upkeep and take it over as something for themselves - otherwise, back off!

The value of our church buildings is in the fingerprints of those who populated it in time past - and in thieve present too, we need to be able to make what buildings we have useful for containing a living body that is Church and for serving the community**.

We do not only have the 'cure of all souls - but also function as the curators of a places memories.' a precious and much to be protected reality which the number crunching approach, a la Beeching and Thatcher.

A quick rant - a real splurge which I hope makes some sense, 'cos I ain't a clever as what some of those what niggle me at times are - obvious that, innit?

pax

It's all relative isn't - coke and burgers inside?

* I know this is extremely cheeky of me to hold such views as the minister of a church which runs fairly consistently  year-on-year in an urban priority area with some thirty members - after all I am low quality in pretty much every aspect when standing in the light of such august folk!

**  I often say, 'Give me a building and I'll live in it and keep the sanctuary open as a chapel of ease,' I'd love it and the community would prosper and the church saved from some expense. How's that for a plan?

The 'Evening Service': a thing of the past? (the village store)

Here's a little parable which might bring some coalescence between the reality that is the Sunday evening service and the report of the Church of England's Buildings Review group (BRG). I hope it provides some food for thought:

Once upon a time there was a village shop, the centre of the community, where everybody shopped and gathered to share news and to get everything they need to live out their lives.

The shelves, and the building, were full. Everyone considered themselves to have some interest in the place because, after all, it was theirs and they belonged to it as much as it belonged to them. Generation upon generation had gathered within it's walls to celebrate new life, new family beginnings and to commiserate with those who were mourning. This was the place the community gathered; in good times and bad!

As the years went by, the people started to go into the local town to do some of their shopping. There wasn't the same community feel, but the prices were cheaper, the service was quicker because there was none of the shared conversations and it fitted in with their lifestyles. Things were a little more private and the shops there were open when the village shop was closed - so it gave them choice too; things could be done when the people wanted them rather than when the shop was willing to be open!

The shelves in the shop became a little less stocked as , slowly, the cans passed their sell by date and were buried in the back yard. There was less money coming in and the shopkeeper didn't think there was a problem so failed to refill the shelves as perhaps he should have. The stock levels had fallen, but all things being equal, it was still a good shop and, of course, some people still shopped there because it's had been the centre of the community for so many years. This was their shop, wasn't it?

And time moved on and the shelves became even less filled and fewer people came into the shop. That said, they did come in on special occasions and wanted very little, which was good, for that's what was on offer! The people were in a different time and place; they had the internet and social media to share news, keep in touch and to get everything they need to live their lives. There was no need of the shop as a place of help and information, they just used a search engine or typed, 'How to...'. 

Some people came in because the place had been special to their parents, or more likely their grandparents, and it was something they felt they ought to do so that could say that they had been there. There was even a society to support shops like that in the village and they had special, 'Remember When ...?' heritage days too. The shop spoke of continuation and shared history and yet, because there was so little on the shelves and the language was different and the shopkeeper tutted when they went in with their baseball caps on (even when they were the right way around) so they tended to avoid it except for times when there was a desperate need!

But still the stock diminished and the ability to give the people who passed by anything that they wanted decreased with it to the extent that none but the hard core shoppers - those whose family had been part of the place for generations and who had now themselves become quite old but remembers the shop as it was when they were children - actually shopped there.

Then came the day when there were just a seven cans on the shelf and although the shopkeeper thought to himself, 'Seven cans is still stock and if I have stock I still have a shop,' the reality was that the place was no longer viable. 

'If only you'd have kept up with the times and kept refilling the shelves with the old familiar produce AND tried other products and brands. If only you'd given the customers what they wanted rather than keep to all the old stuff you used to stock,' said the bank manager as he took the deeds of the property and the keys from the shopkeeper and signed the 'completion of eviction paperwork' for the court official who was impatiently waiting to get back a warm office.

And so that was it - the centre of the village was gone, and with it the heart and history of that place too. The end had come and the community and a place of shared history and tomorrow's hopes were no longer. All that remained on view were a few solitary cans on the shelf. A reminder of what had been and a marker of days gone by when the people flocked to buy and chat and celebrate life in all its richness in 'their' shop.

Some remarked that whilst the building remained there was still a hope of a new dawn, but the cans were out of date and the dirt on the windows dimmed the inside and provided some sticking power of the bill and posters which now covered the shop front. In fact the place became so tired and untidy and covered with paper that perhaps that was why no one really noticed the demolition order.







Well not until the day the bulldozers arrived - and by then it was too late!