EXCERPTS FROM THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS – ANGLICAN SYNOD, NEWCASTLE

By the Bishop of Newcastle, the Right Reverend Dr Brian Farran

This Bishop opened his Presidential address by acknowledging the Awabakal people on whose land the Synod will meet and commended their careful custodianship of this ancient land.

The Bishop welcomed to Synod Mr. Mike Tyler as a Trustee and Mr. Greg Flint the CEO of Anglican Care; Both Mike and Greg are practising Roman Catholics.

The amended ordinance that I hope to have passed later will enable them both to be present at Synod as it does Mr. John Cleary, the Diocesan Business Manager. I see the situation of these men as living instances of the relationship established by the Tri-Diocesan Covenant that we renewed earlier this year in Sacred Heart Cathedral Hamilton.

The Bishop also welcomed the Director of Professional Standards, Michael Elliott who commenced in January having been previously employed by the Roman Catholic Diocese as a Case Manager at Zimmerman House (the Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle’s Professional Standards Unit). The Diocese of Newcastle and the Roman Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle continue with a joint approach to the management of professional standards.  This initiative allows the two dioceses to work together to ensure a comprehensive approach to the issues of professional conduct and professional standards training. It is a practical example of the Tri-Diocesan Covenant in action.

Michael has been instrumental in implementing and furthering Safe Ministry training in the Diocese. This was initiated following a review of CEY ministries. We are very fortunate to be able to fund a full time professional standards Director in our Diocese and have offered Michael’s expertise to the Diocese of Grafton and the Diocese of Armidale. Michael’s expertise is strongly valued by me.

Koinonia and the constraints of six degrees of separation

One of the events that has always puzzled me in the Acts of the Apostles is the sudden deaths at the apostles’ feet of the new Christians, the husband and wife Ananias and Sapphira. The issues that apparently precipitated their public deaths were lying and fraud. The two conspired to keep back from the apostles and the wider Christian community a proportion of the money generated from the sale of their own land. They perpetrate the fraud and lie about their actions and both drop dead, seemingly from the inquisition of the apostle Peter.

Biblical scholars either skirt this episode without making any comment at all or they seemingly suggest that it was totally factual and make no further comment. The episode comes very early on in the life and history of the apostolic church. It is a horrible story and according to the text ‘great fear seized the whole church and all who heard of these things’.

One major theme developed and reinforced in the early chapters of the Acts of the Apostles is that of the quality of the common life of the early church, the koinonia.

Koinonia can be translated with several nuances such as fellowship or partnership or community. The depicted experience of the apostolic church embraces all these nuances. The richness of the common life of the first Christians was greatly attractional. Indeed, it is seriously suggested that the later exponential growth of the church in the first two centuries owed much to the attractive moral and ethical dimensions of the koinonia of the church.

The Bishop is given the role of governing the Diocese. The Ordinal makes that clear. The Bishop also has the task of holding accountable all those who have leadership roles and responsibility within the Diocese. Again the Ordinal makes this clear.

It has become clear to me this year through the quite difficult decisions I have had to take as the Bishop that we suffer from a cleavage within the Diocese generated by koinonia and the six degrees of separation that have long been experienced within the Diocese by many who hold leadership or representative positions. The notion of six degrees of separation simply means that the connections people have with each other are very close. And because close, these relationships can be sadly potentially compromising.

People can find it difficult to take the necessary hard decisions when the decisions affect their friends or people they know and admire. It is natural that within a Diocese as relatively small as is this Diocese that people will know each other well. Indeed, as I look out on this Synod I imagine that some of you have been attending Synod for years and years.

Synod has the responsibility of taking account, scrutinizing and determining what is acceptable to the will of God and what is not. This responsibility of ensuring accountability is exercised too through the various boards of governance within the Diocese. I have noted that some boards have had memberships of a very long standing which can create a climate of affection and diminished ability to challenge and interrogate.

As the Bishop I had to face people, reluctant or paralysed, with the fact that koinonia includes responsibility and accountability. Koinonia is not sentimentality that indulges whatever happens as if it were inconsequential.

The way out of any potential compromising through the social phenomenon of six degrees of separation is professional attitudes, perspectives and conduct. Robin and I offer hospitality that is an expression of koinonia but I know that there must be professional distance so that when the difficult issues arise I am not compromised and thus compromise the Diocese.

What might falling down dead at the feet of the Church today look like? Well, such a death might look like a sought resignation or a termination of a board, or a recommendation from the Professional Standards Board.

My point is that accountability brings forms of death in order to ensure life for the body, the church. Ananias and Sapphira and their tawdry attempt at cheating the apostolic church focus the seriousness of such attempts at non-accountability. It makes the significant ecclesiological point that accountability surpasses any instance of six degrees of separation.

Koinonia is vigorous in nature because it is not essentially our creation. The koinonia that we experience within the Church is a gift from God that reflects the very communal nature of God.

I highlight the importance given to accountability within the divine gift of koinonia because my impression is that across the Diocese maintaining happy relationships has become the priority. The requirement of at times being impelled to take hard decisions has been avoided with serious detrimental consequences that continue to impact negatively and that become through the inheritance of office problems for others. This is a cultural phenomenon that must be addressed through a wiser appreciation of the nature of the common life, the koinonia that is to shape the Church.

This knowledge must be appropriated by all of us, especially those in Synod who have the task of discerning God’s will for the Diocese. It would be so easy to capitulate our theology to psychology or sociology at such moments. I affirm that theology must have the priority in shaping our decisions when we act as church as we do in Synod.

The significance of the Diocesan Strategic Plan

The consultation process has been broad and judicious. I think that those who have carried the work of amending and formatting the plan, Archdeacon Stephen Pullin, Bishop Peter Stuart, Archdeacon Arthur Copeman, Mr. John Cleary and Father David Battrick, deserve our gratitude for the important work that they have undertaken.

The mnemonic of the six ‘e’s is not to be clever but to hold clearly before the Diocese in all its components six basic areas of life that must be attended to and developed. The strategic directions in the plan before us for later consideration in Synod can act as a helpful simple template for every aspect of Diocesan life to evaluate, determine and enact mission. I am hopeful that this will be a simple effective tool for everyone as we change our behaviour and seek to be a missional church.

The six ‘e’s resonate with our situation as a church –

Equipping – providing quality education, training and formation pathways for all people

Enabling – ensuring there are appropriate structures, funding and support processes in place

Empowering – witnessing to God’s compassion and care through ministries of

Social justice and environmental service

Energizing – affirming and renewing existing ministries

Engaging – helping people connect with the Church to deepen their faith and discipleship

Emerging – engaging people who have never connected with the Church

It is not untheological to be strategic or to develop a plan that offers directions for the future. The prophetic visions in the Hebrew Scriptures as much as the ministry manifestos in the gospels about the mission of Jesus are themselves versions of strategic thinking and action plans. Scrutiny of the missionary methods of Saint Paul will reveal obvious strategic thinking and planning.

To be fundamentalist: not to plan is to plan (usually for failure). The Diocesan Strategic Plan provides us with a language with which to express our hopes and dreams to be a missional church. The Strategic Plan also gives us a common language so that we can speak clearly to each other and understand each other as we undertake mission.

I think we are being called in this inter-paradigm era to an ecclesial equivalent of the Qantas Group two-airline policy:

a full service church (akin to Qantas), the parish system and

a lighter, more flexible form of church (akin to Jetstar).

It is worth noting that in this very difficult financial period the growth for the Qantas Group has come through Jetstar. Newcastle is the maintenance base for Jetstar at Williamtown airport. Maybe, this Diocese of Newcastle might become a similar maintenance base for Fresh expressions of Church for the Anglican church of Australia?

The issues the Diocese has faced this year

1. The Global Financial Crisis

The Trustees lost about $7 million in the value of the share portfolio to 31/12/08. This led to a lower declaration of interest on the trusts payable to parishes and to the Diocesan Council budget. However, the prudent management and regular briefings from the portfolio managers has ensured that the losses have been as minimal as possible. There has been a reasonable recovery of approximately $4 million since.

The Trustees took advice of increasing the diversification of the portfolio and secured a Newcastle CBD property as an investment, with Kings Hall Chambers was purchased. From early November this will house the Diocesan Offices as well as other long term tenants that will provide a commercial return on this property investment.

The building will be named Bishop Housden Hall. The dedication and blessing of Bishop Housden Hall will take place on Saturday afternoon, November 21^st at 3.30p.m.

Parish Contributions:

There has been an effect on the level of parish contributions to the Diocesan Council budget which continues to concern me. The figures given about parishes and their indices of pastoral contacts through confirmation, weddings and funerals reveal decline in about 75% of the parishes. That flows through in financial giving and that flows through to the Diocesan budget which funds the development of the future for the Diocese as much as servicing the present.

The Diocesan Council budgets in the past three years have produced modest surpluses even though they were adopted as deficit budgets.

2. The establishment of the Newcastle Anglican Schools Corporation

I affirm quite publicly that the Bishop and the Diocesan Council are absolutely right in scrutinizing appointments to the School Councils and not rubber-stamping potential nominations from the School Councils for Diocesan Council appointments to the School Councils. It is imperative that to effect good governance the School Councils need to be comprised of a range of professional skills as well as effective understanding of the mission of the Diocese.

We are not providing schools simply as alternatives to the public system but as instruments of the mission of the Church so that quality education with a distinctive Christian and Anglican ethos is offered to as large a range of students as is financially sustainable and that expresses this Church’s commitment to social justice.

3. Bishop Tyrrell Anglican College

I was able to negotiate with Newcastle Grammar School for Mr. Alan Green to be seconded to a dual role as the Interim Executive Principal of Bishop Tyrrell Anglican College until at least December 31^st. I deeply regret the anxiety and difficult morale that the staff has had to live with but the outcome is for a sustainable and developing College.

This whole event has consumed much of my time as well that of the Diocesan Business Manager, the Trustees and Mr. Green who has been most generous to the Diocese. The College, with the assistance of the interim Executive Principal, has already made significant changes to its 2010 Budget. In addition to the financial assistance, the Diocesan Council has endorsed the interim management and governance arrangements for the College.

4. Coalitions for Mission

The development of a new Missional coalition has been developed between the parishes of Mayfield, Islington and Carrington and the chaplaincy to the Sudanese and the chaplaincy to the Seafarers in the Port of Newcastle. This is known as the MICA Ministry Unit.

The new Experimental Pastoral area of Mayfield & Islington Carrington (MICA) has begun under the pastoral ministries of Fr Andrew Knox & Fr Andrew Akol.

This ministry is addressing the urgent needs of inner city life, and is confronted with the challenges of urban change and growth. A new community provides the opportunity for new life and new ways. We pray for them God’s blessing and boldness as they continue to seek and explore God’s will together.

5. Clergy Conditions

I signalled in my first Synod Address that I wanted to support the clergy in their professional development given that the clergy were a major human resource for the privileged work of mission. I indicated that I would establish a pool of professional supervisors from which the clergy could draw for individual supervision and that the Diocese would contribute in the ratio of one third to supervision fees.

Supervision, professional development days with outstanding leaders, well led retreats and a stimulating Diocesan Leaders Conference and well received Diocesan Convention have been components of the professional support offered to the clergy. In respect to the emoluments of the clergy I have been very keen to position the Diocese in a comparable position with Dioceses of similar size given the competition for stipendiary clergy across the Australian Church. In 2005 the Diocese of Newcastle had fallen out of such a comparable position. There has been a significant increase that has positioned the Diocese of Newcastle in a comparable relationship with other dioceses.

Issues before Australian society

There is a recognized social phenomenon whereby a series of discrete legitimate acts eventually combine to bring about the very opposite to what the individual discrete acts intended. The classic example of this is the first weekender built in a secluded beautiful seaside location. Soon with the legitimacy of a whole series of similar decisions a town is formed and the very phenomenon from which all the residents of these weekenders were seeking to escape is (by their combined decisions) a perverse reality for them.

I think it very possible that our pursuit of individualism will bring upon us the collapse of the necessary institutions that sustain our individualism. Anti-institutional thinking and behaviour has even seeped within the church. I believe that such practices will diminish the effectiveness of the church and possible harm those who so endorse individualism.

We have been through a period of high individualism and privatism whereby religious experience has generally become personal, private and introspective. This has fuelled the texture of community that has been formed.

Homogeneous churches can decline into theological fascism and develop community by rigid exclusion. Do we not encounter strident resistance to such excluding community in the social practice of Jesus and indeed in those quarrelsome churches in the New Testament?

I think that we need to bring a kingdom of God perspective and critique to the vapid individualism that is more a cultural than a Christian expression. I hope that parishes will evaluate their approaches to community, to liturgy and to prophetic engagement on the basis of that astonishing perspective ‘the risen life was one of common ownership’. This is counter-cultural as is so much of the teaching and expectation of Jesus.

1. The new homeless in Australia

In last year’s Synod address I shared my concerns at the increasing number of homeless people in our region and across the Nation. This increase had occurred during a decade of increasing affluence in Australia and was a situation described by our incoming Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, as a national disgrace.

There appear to be two key policy issues in Australia which have not been adequately addressed in recent years.

· First, the cost of housing. Housing in Australia is too expensive for people on low-incomes to purchase or to rent. For example, according to the Hunter Valley Research Foundation, people earning 80% of the average income, which is currently people earning around $710 per week, can only afford to purchase 1.8% of available homes which are for sale in Newcastle. This compares with 59% in 2001. In Lake Macquarie it is a similar situation with only 1.8% of the population earning 80% of the average wage able to buy a home in Lake Macquarie compared with a figure of 50% in 2001.

This has made rentals similarly unaffordable for people on low incomes and it is particularly single income families who are struggling. This has caused much distress for people unable to afford somewhere to live and significant problems for social welfare agencies where people spend far too long in emergency accommodation because there is nowhere for them to move on to.
So the lack of affordable housing is a major problem. Some 20 years ago government policy moved away from the provision of public or social housing in favour of subsidies to people renting privately. This may have seemed a good idea at the time, but we have known for years that this is not working.

· The second policy gap has been in the lack of services to prevent homelessness happening in the first place. This is surely more cost effective than waiting until people are destitute. For example:

1. It is well known that people leaving mental health services or correctional institutions without any support are likely to become homeless. Services for these people are few and far between.
2. That young people need more support to maintain their connections with education, training, family and employment if they are not doing well at school.
3. That people experiencing difficulties with mortgage or rental payments need access to legal and financial support to maintain their homes.
4. That people with disabilities or mental health issues need support to maintain their accommodation on a week by week basis.
5. Women and children experiencing domestic violence need to stay in their own homes and communities wherever possible.
6. More accessible support services are needed for Aboriginal people who comprise 9% of the homeless population.

So what is being done? Certainly much has happened since last year’s Synod at the policy level, even though the numbers of homeless people are still the same. The Federal Government has released a white paper on homelessness entitled “The Road Home” promising to halve all homelessness by 2020. This includes a pledge to provide 20,000 more affordable homes, which is certainly a start; even though ACOSS asserts that we need some 250,000 new public or social housing units. Two months ago the NSW government released its five year NSW Homelessness Action Plan. This was entitled “A Way Home”. This plan sets out broad strategies to address concerns such as those I am raising.

Time will tell whether these plans will achieve the results they claim. But we must hold our governments accountable, both federal and state, to achieve their targets. We need more than promises and plans. By this time next year we should be expecting results.

Business, community and church groups must also do their share in reducing the numbers of homeless people in our region. Currently some 3,000 people are homeless across our diocese on any given night. Admittedly almost half are living with relatives and friends but these situations often break down; many are living in transitional accommodation, motels and caravans and some 450 sleeping in cars, empty buildings or sheds. These numbers must be reduced urgently.

Samaritans are reviewing their services to play a more significant role in this area, particularly with regard to young people, people with disabilities, and people leaving prison and juvenile justice centres. The Diocesan Social Responsibilities Committee has released a pamphlet outlining what parishes might do. I hope we will all support Samaritans and parishes in their endeavours and that I will certainly encourage our political leaders to hold firm to their vision of an Australia where all people have the right to a safe, secure and affordable home.

To decision-making!

Now we come to the matters on our agenda. These are urgent, demanding and complex. They call for careful thought, discussion and decision. May God help us to be wise as those committed to supporting the in-breaking of the Kingdom!