What is in Kelvin's Head?

Rectorial Election – Glasgow University

19/02/2014

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been a candidate in the elections to choose a Rector for the University of Glasgow. The position of Rector in the older universities in Scotland is a venerable tradition. The students get to elect the person who chairs the University Court and acts as their representative at the highest level of the University when decisions are being made that affect the future planning of the life of the University.

It is a great idea – the primary users of the University getting a strong say in what happens to it.

I was asked to run by a student, Alan McManus who became my campaign manager for the whole experience. I’m hugely grateful to Alan for all this. His relentless encouragement and good humour were what got me into this and they have never wavered. It has been a joy to be on the university campus (which is close to St Mary’s) and spend some time getting to know it and meeting people up there. I think that in the last few weeks I will have met about 1250 people – some of them wanting to engage me pretty deeply with their concerns and some of them just so that I could give a cheery reminder to them to vote.

In the end, I was placed second and was very pleased at the number of votes that were cast for me. It was the highest turn-out in a student election in many years.

The winner of the election was Edward Snowdon, the former NSA contractor and whistle-blower who is currently on the run from the American authorities.

In many ways the election was decided by the nomination of Mr Snowdon, who won’t be able to take up the post and won’t be able to represent students at all. Once his nomination was in, it was all that the media were interested in.

One of the things I’ve learned is that we must guard the rules which attempt to prevent biased reporting at elections in the UK. Standing in an election and seeing, whenever it is reported, that it is reported as being only about one candidate is dispiriting and makes you realise how hard it must be to campaign in places where the media can do what they like.

I’ve also been reminded of how much I enjoy campaigning and how much life it gives me. It is no coincidence that the sermon that I preached on Sunday, right at the height of the campaign, was one that people have told me will stay in their minds for some time. I come alive in the heat of battle and that rubs off onto other areas of my life.

With regards to the actual result, I’m very pleased that the issues that I raised during the campaign, which were all student issues really, did have a resonance with those who voted. There were three of us who were campaigning to become Rector on a “working Rector” ticket and I was pleased to be placed at the top of the list of those of us who would have turned up to do the job. In the end there was a reasonable vote for all of us. Graeme Obree, the cyclist is obviously a hero to many and was strongly supported by campaigners from the Sports Association. I was surprised in a way that the Yes campaign was not able to muster more votes for Alan Bissett who came fourth – he was a good candidate who was strongly engaged with the students when I met him. The Yes campaign doesn’t seem to me to be doing as well with young people as I’m sure some people think it is, which will make the independence vote later this year all the more interesting.

Any of the three of us who stood on the working Rector ticket would have been willing to turn up and work for the students of the University of Glasgow. Both Graeme Obree and Alan Bissett have been good-hearted candidates and there has been a spirit of very friendly rivalry between us. In that sense it has been a very happy election campaign. I think we were all disappointed though that now the job won’t get done and students won’t be represented in the way they could have been.

Finally, I’ve been interested in the students’ reaction to a priest running in an election on campus. I was expecting a certain amount of negativity about that. In the end only one person ever raised that issue with me in all the campaign – a mature student who is a member of the diocese who told me she didn’t think people would vote for me because I was a member of the clergy. In fact, I think I’ve learned that students are willing to vote for someone who articulates clearly values that they respect and which they think to be good. Gender politics and LGBT issues played strongly in this election. It is clear to me that if churches want to appeal to the vast majority of younger people then they need to articulate and argue very strongly for progressive values and equal rights in both those areas. There will always be a niche for those articulating that women should be less than equal to men and working against gay rights but, thank God, that niche is shrinking quickly as the years go by.

So, I’d like to thank all those who supported me. It has been a lot of fun to run for this post. I hope that the University of Glasgow flourishes and prospers.

I’ve just heard that Edward Snowden has also been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Guess that one isn’t going my way this year either.

#GURector, Edward Snowden, Rector, University of Glasgow

10 responses to “Where does the Church of Scotland stand?”

Robin

21/05/2013

I understand your sentiments, but both on this issue and on the ordination of women in the Church of England the weary words of Mrs Boyle in Sean O’Casey’s ‘Juno and the Paycock’ in reply to her son, who scorns the Irish Free State and wants an Irish Republic or nothing, are inclined to come to mind:

“To be sure, to be sure — no bread’s a lot better than half a loaf.”

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Nick Brindley

21/05/2013

I think you’re right to think this is a disastrously wrong-headed attempt to avoid having to think the issue through, although we may not agree on what would be involved in such thinking (almost nobody agrees with me!)

I think we need to revisit some pretty fundamental problems on the nature of the moral authority of the Bible, the meaning of “salvation” and what ministry is to make any real progress with this issue and there appears to be depressingly little appetite to do this in a spirit of mutual trust and of trust in the leading of the Spirit guiding our interpretation of scripture

http://loveswork.wordpress.com/2013/05/21/failing-to-be-biblical-reflections-on-church-of-scotland-sexuality-debates/

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Frank keefe

21/05/2013

This is what happens when you water down Gods truth so the secular world will think what a progressive church you are.When a small secular wedge is pushed under a church door you can bet a larger one will be pushed under it in the not to distant future.I believe a liberal minded church like the Church of Scotland is more dangerous to the Christian faith than atheists like Richard Dawkins and his followers. Jesus found it hard to convince the Pharisees of their misguided beliefs if He walked our earth today He would find those modern day Pharisees in the Church of Scotland even harder to convince.

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1. Rosemary Hannah
  
  21/05/2013
  
  Well, there you go – I think the exact opposite – that Jesus, who plucked corn, and healed, on the Sabbath, would be out partying tonight with all sorts of disreputable people. The Pharisees were the people who stuck rigidly to the law, breaking it even as they kept it. Jesus was the one who re-interpreted it.
  
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  1. Frank keefe
    
    21/05/2013
    
    I find it amazing how those who look for sin to be accepted would try and use Jesus to back them up.First Jesus said the Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath.The Pharisees abused Gods law with their legalism.Its why He said about the rescue of a sheep on that day.He didnt re-interpret it He was showing them how it SHOULD BE KEPT as God ALWAYS intended it.Its the church who is doing the interpretation and Jesus certainly wouldnt be “out partying” such disrespect of our Lords holiness is often the way with liberal ” Christians” Instead of the church being a light to the world that worlds darkness is putting out that light.
    
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    1. kelvin
      
      21/05/2013
      
      Bless you for your faith, Frank. May it bring you happiness and joy.
      
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Graeme Cowie

21/05/2013

It’s a fudge, no doubt. And one which, far from preserving the “traditional” Kirk actually serves to undermine it in a number of ways, particularly concerning the status of “doctrine” and who gets to determine what it is, or at least what practical meaning it is for something to be “doctrine” rather than merely a personal religious sentiment. Explicitly to permit complete deviation from “doctrine” by congregations is not very Presbyterian, and the “traditionalists” either didn’t seem to realise that, or they care about preserving substantial doctrines at the expense of, well, what makes the Kirk the Kirk.

To an extent, though, you could see it coming. I think the traditionalist wing sensed they would lose if it was a straight choice (unfortunate phrase) between 2A and 2B, and so tried to push for something that retains a symbolic attachment to historical doctrine whilst letting liberals have the lion’s share of the cake they want, which is to be able to ordain those in committed same-sex relationships and to be done with it. I know for a fact that a fair whack of liberal commissioners were swayed by 2D (not including my parents, who are CofS ministers who voted with option 2A), many seeing it as a way of letting the traditionalists have some sort of phyric victory whilst in fact enabling ministers to be in civil partnerships without any lasting problems. It is much more likely that 2D will make it through Barrier Act procedure now that it’s got the traditionalists’ name on it, and notwithstanding the extra year it’s going to take to turn it into a proper overture, I think the consensus of the Kirk is that they really want to stop talking about this.

The new system ought to be fairly robust once the Legal Questions Committee have had their teeth dug into it. The clear intention was conceded by the movers that they did not intend for Presbyteries to be able to discipline or annul decisions made by Kirk Sessions seeking to be allowed to appoint ministers in civil partnerships, and for a lot of liberals (and actually, a lot of those on the conservative wing too) this will be seen as a critical part of the compromise if it is to be laid to rest. My only real concern is that if the traditionalists are for any reason unhappy with the implementation by LQC it could lead to the whole debate re-opening in GA 2014.

It’s clearly not enough for many liberal ministers, elders and members of the Church of Scotland, for whom this still presents a partial sense of “separate not equal” for congregation and minister alike, and it probably makes it more difficult for the theological position of the kirk formally to be moved away from same sex relationships being sinful, now that the “practical harms” are in a significant sense out of the way, but by Church of Scotland standards, it’s a major step forward for a very broad church, and one which has probably saved it from a major schism (though a handful of churches may still leave over and above The Tron and Gilc South). For those of us in the Kirk 5 years ago, this would have been virtually unthinkable, and momentum has picked up since the Rennie case 4 years ago. The good fight goes on, and hurdles remain, but if it gets through Barrier Act procedure I think the practical objectives, in a Kirk which already offers substantial liberty of personal opinion in matters of doctrine which do not enter into the substance of faith, have largely been met, albeit in a roundabout way.

For more of my thoughts on this matter, see:

http://www.predictableparadox.co.uk/2013/05/church-of-scotland-religious-progress.html

and

http://www.predictableparadox.co.uk/2013/05/presbyterianism-cracking-at-seems-cost.html

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Margaret of the Sea of Galilee

22/05/2013

And it still does not properly address how LGBTQ people (single or in civil partnerships) will be dealt with (dealt to?) when they offer themselves to Presbyteries as feeling called to the Ministry of Word and Sacrament. Will they be asked about their orientation? Questioned? Interrogated? What responses will allow them to or prevent them from pursuing that call?

Who is this Albert Bogle anyway – is he about to become the first to be beatified by the Kirk and for what exactly? By-passing (even disregarding) Kirk “Order”, convincing his important friends to let him bulldoze ahead and his less important friends to print off 700 and something copies of a Deliverance which is incoherent and unimplementable.
Off to read Revelation for other signs of The End Times…
.

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Peter W Nimmo

25/05/2013

Kelvin, you make lots of good points in your post. But just to clarify- what is the doctrine and practice of the Scottish Episcopal Church on this issue? Does your doctrine approve of persons in civil partnerships being clergy, and is that put into practice?

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1. kelvin
  
  25/05/2013
  
  Yes – there are quite a number of clergy in civil partnerships. In England, Anglican clergy in civil partnerships are supposed to declare that they are “celibate”. That isn’t the case in Scotland.
  
  The pension scheme in Scotland recognises Civil Partnerships by giving such partners the same benefits as wives or husbands in marriages. Civil Partners also are treated in the same way with regard to housing as a straight spouse if a relationship breaks down.
  
  Any candidate for ordination who is in a Civil Partnership is expected to be honest about that at selection.
  
  The bishops of the church announced a few years ago that they would not consecrate anyone as bishop who was in a Civil Partnership. They were clear at the time that this was a moratorium. However it is not clear to me whether that moratorium still stands. I do expect there to be questions about that at the coming Synod.
  
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