• A Welcome Forest of Deans

    Last weekend an open letter emerged from within the Church of England which asked the two archbishops in England to take a message to the Primates’ Conference acknowledging that the Church has failed in its duty of care to LGBTI members of the Body of Christ worldwide and calling for repentance.

    The whole letter is here: https://lettertoarchbishops.wordpress.com/

    Others were asked to sign it to show their support and my name was one of the first to be added on Sunday morning when I heard about it. (It was addressed to Our Archbishops which was a bit problematic but sometimes you just have to go with the spirit rather than the letter of the law).

    I was particularly encouraged to see that this letter originated from a couple of people from within the Evangelical tradition in the church.

    I was also encouraged to see how many Deans of Cathedrals in England had signed the letter.

    Here’s a map showing in green those deans who have signed.

    There may be errors to correct or amendments to make – please let me know in the comments below. Nothing should be presumed about the red dots other than that there doesn’t seem to be a record of a dean there who has signed. Some cathedrals may be looking for a dean and some deans may be out of contact and not have heard about it. Some names may yet be added.

    I believe that Durham has no dean in post at present so have marked that in a different colour. I’ll change any others that are like that if anyone lets me know in the comments below.

    There are two cathedrals in London which seem to be on top of one another on the map – both of them are marked in green.

    Rather encouraging to see the green shoots of inclusion springing up, I think and to see leadership coming from England’s cathedrals.

    [google_maps id=”14812″]

    UPDATES
    Worcester added (missed off in original list)
    Wells and Durham marked as vacant.
    Southwell marked as vacant.
    Rochester marked as vacant.

3 responses to “Bad PR”

  1. Sally Avatar
    Sally

    Afternoon Kevin

    Our apologies if the information that we sent you was not welcomed. Our intention is not to spam but speak directly to people who may be interested in the work Christian Aid are doing in various communities. As you have the Christian Aid banners on your site we were under the impression that you supported the initiative.
    We will ensure that you are not contacted again.

    1. kelvin Avatar

      Actually Sally, that’s to miss the point a bit.

      I do support Christian Aid. I don’t support Christian Aid using bad PR techniques. I’ll maybe blog a bit more about this.

      For starters, I don’t think that the text of what you sent me was at all appropriate. To address the Provost of an Anglican Cathedral (or, lets not be pompous, any Anglican priest) as though they will not have heard of Christian Aid is silly. It was not just style that you got wrong. It was substance too.

  2. kelvin Avatar

    Oh, and by the way, I don’t put Christian Aid banners on my site. Surely a PR agency engaging in an attempt to use social networking for a client like Christian Aid ought to understand the difference between me putting banner ads on my site and Google Ads, which are served up by google and which depend on the content of the text and the context (location etc) of the reader.

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