Church of England has Twenty Years? Missionary Strategies Essential to Halt Decline

"The Archbishop of Wales referring to the report 'Good News in Wales' has been reported as saying that the Church in Wales has about ten years on its side. To that comment one Church of England Bishop said in my hearing, that if Wales has ten years, then the Church of England only has twenty. I have not heard a Scottish or Irish Bishop offer an opinion! Rather than moving from 'Maintenance to Mission' we have moved from 'Maintenance to Survival'. We are now more concerned about survival rather than growth and evangelistic initiatives which will hopefully keep numbers at the same level - if we are lucky!"

So stated Church Army Chief Secretary Philip Johanson addressing more than 300 Church Army Evangelists and staff at the Society's biennial conference in Swanwick on Monday.

He went on: "In some respects this is a rather bleak picture, yet for those committed to relevant faith sharing, one of enormous challenge. Rather than thinking about evangelistic initiatives we need to start thinking about missionary strategies. An evangelistic initiative responds to a given situation where there is some semblance of Christian presence. A missionary strategy recognises the need for a more long-term approach, which needs to be flexible and adaptable to changing situations and circumstances.

"By and large the Decade of Evangelism failed to make any real impact. Oh yes, evangelism is now on the agenda, and at least you can talk about it. However, as a result of the decade, and as far as seeing new Christians and growing churches is concerned, the jury is still out."

Philip Johanson went on to suggest that radical options could assist in the turn-round process in spite of the fact that two thirds of the C of E Dioceses were operating on deficit budgets and one or two were not far from bankruptcy. He had heard that one large Diocese needed to lose 100 posts to reach a break-even position

Commenting on the conference theme of "Travelling Light - Working in the Kingdom" he said both the Church and Church Army suffered from bureaucratic overload and they needed to be released. Experiments with adventurous and risk-taking initiatives had to be undertaken. Church Army's past was strewn with these, recent examples of radical options being the evangelist appointments at St Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin and to the Bournemouth night-club scene. "Travelling Light" was surely part of Christ's instructions to His Church as His disciples explored innovative ways of "working in the Kingdom".