Kairos

Kairos – the story so far at St. John’s

Do we care if the church is becoming increasingly marginalised and ineffective? Bishop Kenneth does and that’s why he launched the Kairos initiative. As Dianna Greenfield talked to us about on her visit in January, Kairos refers to our critical moment. So was 2004 our Kairos moment?

As a member of the Kairos team for the Fareham Western Wards it certainly did not feel like it at times as we struggled to come to terms with the objectives. It always seemed we did not have enough time and right from the start we all wondered where it would all end up, but there was never enough time to stop and think about that.

It was hard for the team to arrange meetings as we all had busy lives. The diocese suggested at the outset that the incumbents should not be left to do all the work but did not suggest who should do it. Luckily for the Western Wards there was a great deal of work done by a number of lay people but I suppose in the end it was the incumbents who had to pull together a plan for which they had to give up a number of full days.

We tried to meet more often but because of diaries only met once a month for the first four months. During this time we started on some of the easier internal research and tried to get to know each other, understand each other’s aspirations for the project and the different churches’ characteristics. Great efforts were put in but we often got bogged down in detail and diverted from the real purpose. Having said that, it was often difficult to know what the real purpose was as we had effectively been given a blank piece of paper to fill in. We took safety in working to the brief and became busy designing surveys and collecting data.

In hindsight, I believe we would have all approached it differently. For me it would have been better to abandon the diocese plan and be a bit more realistic about what was achievable. Certainly we should have spent more time in the first few months establishing relationships and understanding of each other’s needs and aspirations. However, as a colleague at work often says to me “hindsight is the most useless gift to man”.

I suppose at the outset we thought enlightenment would come from the output produced by the research and although there were some interesting aspects to the research results nothing really stood out or surprised us. There were some great moments, usually when we invited God into the process, but maybe the real enlightenment came from the process itself. By forcing the churches together discussions took place that would never ever have taken place 6 months ago.

I would say that with some blood, sweat and tears we got there in the end. There was always a huge willingness from all involved to make the process work as we had all bought in to the vision and we all knew that things had to change. The difficulty was that none of us really knew how that change would look. I suppose, that is still true today, but what we have done is suggested a structure that gives ourselves a chance to make those changes together over the coming years. The vision involves setting up a partnership structure amongst the cluster of churches in the Western Wards that will best serve the ministry and mission to the people of the parishes. It will embody the following principles:

To do together what can’t be done separately or can be done more effectively together.
To work with all churches ecumenically, beginning with the Anglican Western Ward parishes of Locks Heath, Sarisbury Green, Titchfield, Hook with Warsash and Whiteley LEP.
To share resources wherever possible.
To initiate and support Kingdom/Gospel ventures, especially new ways of understanding and being church in collaborative ways.
To start small and think big.
To respect the ‘local’ but not neglect its greater potential.

It might not seem a great deal considering all the effort that has gone into the project to date, however we should not underestimate how much progress has been made getting to know each other and each others local issues. I think we have set up the possibility of a new approach to our ministry with a clear intention to embrace the vision of our Bishop of a Broader, Deeper and Leaner Church.

The task may have been too ambitious in the detail of what we were asked to do, but we had to do something. Someone had to start somewhere and as a result of the process the five churches in the Western Wards have got to know each other and have shown a unanimous willingness to work together in the future. The plans now have to be presented to the diocese. There is still a long way to go but we should all pray that Kairos would enable us to discern what God is calling us to do.

Steve Cross, Mission Convenor

Kairos is the new name for the strategic review process to help re-shape our diocese.

There is more information on Kairos on the Diocese of Portsmouth web site.