What is in Kelvin's Head?

The Organ & The Consultation

02/12/2013

This picture appeared on my facebook feed yesterday. It was posted by Peter Wakeford who was playing the organ yesterday morning. It shows what was going on during the service.

Now, if you had been there yesterday you would have heard some sumptuous music and would have had no idea that anything was going wrong. However, the last thing an organist wants is for the pistons to fly out when you give them a nudge.

This picture shows something fairly small going wrong with the organ but it is indicative of the state that parts of it are in. Much of the pipework – the bits that make the noise is fine. Indeed, much of the pipework is of significant historical interest. However, the bits that make the pipes play, not so much. There are huge problems with the console and with the transmission – that’s the gubbins that tells which pipe to open after the organist has pulled out a stop and attempted to play a note.

Thinking about the organ is just one bit of what the Vestry are currently consulting the congregation about. A new consultation paper called Releasing the Mission was launched last week at the Annual General Meeting. It is partly about the organ but is also about how we build capacity into St Mary’s so that we can do what we do well and even do more. We are so busy at the moment that the building is creaking at the seams. If we did a bit of development work, we would be able to help to secure the musical life of the place (which is a core part of our mission work), provide more space for the groups and networks that are buzzing, get better use of the building for the local community and also provide a more welcoming space when the diocese is holding big events at St Mary’s.

The consultation paper is available online on the website and the Vestry are hoping that lots of people will respond – whether people who are directly members of the congregation or indeed those who have a more tangential relationship with St Mary’s. The hope is that lots of different voices and constituencies can be heard. Responses can be made using the on-line form or in writing via the Cathedral office.

9 responses to “Another Day, Another Mission Strategy is launched”

Mark

28/05/2010

three diocesan wishes?
(i) Scrap every Diocesan body, council and group; let Bishops commend and expound the Gospel, and care for their clergy.
(ii) Devolve every decision to the locally accountable group; let priests be priests and not bureaucrats.
(iii) Let go of the Anglican communion for the sake of the Kingdom.

Reply
Rev Ruth

28/05/2010

You know, in all the years I’ve been a member of the SEC I didn’t know about the Diocesan Fairy Wands. But now you mention them I can see that there must indeed be such a thing. In the spirit of openness I would like to see them processed in at the beginning of General Synod with the candles and placed on the Table. Carried by small children, perhaps?

Do you know if they are different colours?

And where is The Diocese of Argyll and the Isles’ fairy wand at the moment? Is someone else looking after it and therefore has two? Or is it waiting in a dusty filing cabinet for the drawer to be flung open and set free?

Reply
kelvin

28/05/2010

Please allow me to jump in before anyone from the Diocese Across the Water feels obliged….

Ruth, you should know by now. It is the Diocese of Argyll and The Isles. Not the Diocese of Argyll and the Isles. Nor indeed the Judean Peoples’ Front.

Reply
Scottish Roundup

30/05/2010

[…] To wrap up Kelvin Holdsworth, Provost of St Mary’s Cathedral, Glasgow explains that as a new day dawns a new mission statement is launched […]

Reply
Kenny

08/06/2010

As the Chair of a Regional Council, and a member of Diocesan Council, I feel well and truly “whupped” by your words, Kelvin. If I were the MDO or the Bishop or Dean, I would feel similarly put down. There are folk who are genuinely trying to put together a strategy for mission that works and is not smothered by cynicism from the outset. I think a bit of support or a word of encouragement or advice may have been a bit more helpful.

It is true that some Regional Councils may not be working, but that certainly isn’t helped by clergy staying away from them because it’s bad for their health. On the contrary, it needs these priests to be there, to stand up and question what’s going on or not going on and help shape them into a body that works. The theory is a good one, but Regional Councils will fail simply because some folk will share your attitude towards them. As a member of the Bishop’s Staff Group and a member of Diocesan Council, I find it totally incredible that you choose not to attend and disseminate information from these two bodies, and indeed incredible that you have not taken your Regional Council by the scruff of the neck and shown it how it can be more productive and engage more dynamically in current Diocesan policy.

I sit on Diocesan Council too, and am amazed at the power you think it has! Very often, it seems to me, we cannot make any decisions until they are ratified by the Bishop’s Staff Group, or things come from the Staff Group that we are told to ratify. Debate is sometimes rare and I feel Council is a pretty toothless being, and exists only to ratify what others in more lofty positions want to happen. (Paisley was a prime example of this).

It’s dead easy to sit there and snipe at those who are trying their damndest to wake the sleeping and encourage growth and life. Instead, we need to pull together and make sure something is put in place that is effective and that we can all buy into.

Maybe the Clergy Conference will give us a start, but banging in and damaging the process before it has begun is perhaps not the most constructive thing you’ve done of late.

Reply
kelvin

08/06/2010

Hi Kenny – thanks for your comments. I think you are quite right in some of the things you say, though not in others.

I agree that it was not a constructive way to engage with this to put all of my grumpiness into a blog post and wish now that I had kept quiet.

There are some things which you’ve not got entirely right though. I’m not a member of the Diocesan Council, as it happens. Also, your assumptions about the way in which decisions were made about Paisley are not quite right. However, learning from what you’ve said, I’m not inclined to post more about that on here, but I will be saying more about it in meetings as appropriate.

My comments about Regional Councils are influenced by two things only – the local ones which I have been to and the reports from the Regions which are given at Diocesan Council. (I usually find these quite shocking).

As it happens, I disagree with you about clergy health. Should regional council meetings ever affect the health of clergy, its certainly time to stop going. We don’t think nearly enough about one another’s wellbeing.

I do however take the general point that my blog post was unhelpful. Though it does still represent my views, I’m sorry that I posted it online in the first place and wish I had thought twice about it.

I guess lots of us who keep blogs sometimes make mistakes and this one was one of mine.

Reply
Kenny

08/06/2010

Now I feel like a heel! I’m lucky inasmuch as what I post is largely ignored or unread, so I can rant when I like without too many consequences, unless it annoys or causes hassle for the upper echelons in our little Church.

I know, of course that you are not a member of Council, but you do attend as Provost of the Cathedral and are allowed to contribute.

You did say that Regional Council were bad for your health and well-being. I am concerned about that, and yes, I wish we were all a bit more concerned for each other, but my suggestion was that you took steps to ensure that these meetings were a little more constructive and actually did what they were set up to do. I agree that reports back to Diocesan Council are often dreadful. I shiver when I hear reported that the highlight was a Coffee Morning held in Little St Reubens, but how do we change that?

I often think that the old RCC was much much better at disseminating information down to parishes, and every parish felt part of the processes of Church Government, but new models are indeed needed. I think new processes may well emerge from this new initiative.

I wouldn’t worry too much about the negativity in this particular post. You seem to be redeeming yourself in subsequent jottings.

The truth is that we need you, and your vision, on board, and the Clergy Conference may well be a good place to begin.

Reply
Kelvin

08/06/2010

And we’ve got yet another Mission Strategy document to get our teeth into at General Synod! Hurrah!

And you know what I think of that one?

Well, let me tell you, I think………

No, maybe I’ve learnt my lesson.

For now, anyway.

Reply
Kenny

08/06/2010

I just can’t wait… and I hope tou DO say what you think!

Reply