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Carey urges more 'coal face' bishops
By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent
THE TELEGRAPH
5/30/2005
The former archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Carey, has lambasted the Church of England for appointing too few bishops with real parish experience.
Lord Carey said that if the Church was to reverse the decline in churchgoing, it needed leaders with proven ability to increase their congregations when they were vicars.
Instead, he said, most of them lacked the background to understand the pressures that ordinary parish priests were under. His attack will irritate many of his former colleagues, who are involved in a huge effort to reverse the long-term haemorrhage of worshippers in the Church.
"If bishops have not had a decent record as ordinary parish priests, how may they truly be leaders in mission?'' he asked. ''How may they manage missionary growth? Do they understand the pressures placed on clergy today and have they spent substantial time at the coal face of ministry and mission?"
Preaching in an east London church, the former archbishop, who initiated the much criticised "decade of evangelism" in the 1990s, exempted his successor at Canterbury from criticism.
Neither Dr Rowan Williams nor the Bishop of Durham, the Rt Rev Tom Wright, spent much time in parishes, as their background was largely as academic theologians.
Dr Carey said that both were examples of "missionary theologians and teachers on the frontiers of world and Church".
But he added: "My argument is that a missionary Church must have a majority of bishops who have had proven success in growth. Sadly, that has not always been the case either in the past or now."
At least a quarter of the current crop of senior bishops, including a number of the most recent appointments, never ran a parish before they were promoted up the hierarchy, and others spent little time in one.
Lord Carey cannot escape all the blame, however. A Church spokesman said that three quarters of the diocesan bishops now in office had been appointed during his time at Canterbury.
Meanwhile under plans to halt the Church's decline bishops and cathedrals could have their incomes slashed.
A new report, commissioned by Dr Williams, will urge the Church to channel more of its resources into experimental schemes to boost churchgoing.
The report, which will be debated by the General Synod in the summer, says that much of the Church has become a "club" for existing members with little effort to attract new ones. Written by a working party headed by the Bishop of Bath and Wells, the Rt Rev Peter Price, it urges the Church to "think outside the box".
Its most radical proposal is that central funds should be increasingly redistributed to the dioceses so that decisions about where the money is best spent are made locally.
As a result, resources that have historically been earmarked for bishops and cathedrals may instead be siphoned into youth initiatives and "raves in the nave".
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