On not speaking/singing in church

A further thought on the Jeremy Corbyn/national anthem 'incident'. Each time I take a baptism service, I make a point of saying that if we come to some words in the service people don't agree with, that they should feel free not to say them. There are already plenty of people who don't join in the songs anyway, and I don't want people to feel compromised, that they're being asked to say things they don't really believe. 2 things prompted this:

 - Sitting down for a pint after one christening with a godparent who informed me he was an atheist. Work that one out.

 - Getting a trenchant email from someone who'd attended a baptism at our church and accused me of brainwashing people and imposing religion on them. (As an aside, the Anglican church has such an effective record of brainwashing that 90% of people who attended Sunday school aren't adult members of any church, so that's gone well. And my personal record in brainwashing is so stunning that 99.8% of baptism guests never return).

I don't want a repeat of the email, but more importantly I'd like people to think about what's actually being said and to speak with integrity. So guests at a baptism are encouraged to choose the Corbyn option: supporting the family and the occasion in a respectful way, without feeling they have to join in with words they don't agree with.

Random Jottings: Bishops, Bad Weather, Baptism and Byyyy Eck Lad

Wells MP Tessa Munt has written (presumably at taxpayers expense) to the CofE to ask why the Bishop of Bath and Wells will no longer live in the Bishops Palace. "One of the charms of the palace was the possibility that one might just run into the bishop or his wonderful wife in the grounds, and in my view, it is a great shame that the chances of being blessed in this way are reduced almost to nothing. Unless Ms Munt is happy for her constituents to wander around her front garden on the off chance that they might bump into her, I really can't see what the problem is. The Palace will remain, the Bishop will still work there, it will still be open to visitors. And the Diocese will benefit from having a bishop who can get some proper time off, rather than living over the shop trying to avoid politicians.

The Sun once again shows its contempt for ordinary people. I don't imagine its much fun living in Mulcheney at the moment, using it as a backdrop for a cheap publicity stunt is pretty dire. Maybe they'll be sending a page 3 girl to a Syrian refugee camp to cheer people up there? I'm sure that'd work a treat.

In other weather related news. Hell has frozen over. I guess a lot of other stuff will happen now.

Delighted to find out I'm still a Northerner, even though I've now been in Somerset longer than I lived in Yorkshire.

I've been trying to avoid getting too far into the kerfuffle over the provisional, experimental, temporary baptism prayers: various links to opinions here, and this is a good piece. And this is the only revision that would be acceptable to the Daily Mail.

Was really encouraged by this, the amazing diversity of God's church in the UK. And here's an article on our little corner of it, due in the local paper tomorrow, weather permitting.

In case you missed it, Dave Walkers cartoon advent calendar kept me amused for most of December, and it sees him restored to rightful prominence in the Ebuzzing blog list.

If you're looking for some new blogs to browse for 2014, The Church Sofa has some suggestions. I'd want to add the excellent Cookies Days, which along with Quarentia was my most fruitful source for good links and inspiration last year.

UK Snapshot: post-christian christenings, faith-based politics, changing churches.

1. The BBC has a piece on '10 ways christenings have changed', in advance of Prince Georges baptism later today. The last 2 of the 10 are an improvement, but I'm not sure about the rest! One thing is certain, we've moved on a long way from the original idea of godparents as potential surrogate parents who would step in if a childs birth parents were martyred for their faith.

update: one of the trends - increasing numbers of godparents - is followed religiously (if that's the right word) by Prince George, who has 7. That makes for an interesting precedent: the most I've ever agreed to is 6 (bartered down from an original 16!), and I encourage people to aim for 2-4. 

2. Labour MP Stephen Timms highlights a recent Demos report (free download) which argues that faith groups are more likely to be sympathetic to left-wing perspectives than those of the right, and that "faith is a very good starting point for politics, and for progressive politics in particular, because faith inspires, on a large scale, exactly the values that can make politics work: responsibility, solidarity, patience, compassion and truthfulness."

3. Christian Today has an interview with Phil Potter, new national head of Fresh Expressions for the Anglican church. "my vision is to see the culture of the church itself change. That change would see it becoming a culture which welcomes and embraces an ongoing cycle of transformation and renewal for the sake of the Gospel." You might almost suspect he's been talking to his boss. The CofE has tended to change in nausea-inducing lurches, we don't seem to be able to celebrate anything good without erecting a Grade 1 listed monument over it. 

To review, decide, plan and change on a daily, weekly, monthly and annual cycle is a good spiritual discipline both for the church, and for individual Christians. The irony is, we have the resources in our tradition to do this: from the Catholic side, Ignatian prayer (with the practice of a daily 'examen of conscience', a spiritual review), and from the Protestant side the idea of 'semper reformanda' (such fun we still cit it in Latin) - 'constant reformation' as the guiding principle of the church. But it's our attitude to those same traditions, our idolisation of them, that makes change such hard work. 

Justin Welby on Baptism & the Prince

Vid specially produced by the ABofC for Prince George's baptism.

"God's love is offered without qualification, without price, without cost, to all people in all circumstances always."

Interesting what isn't in here. Both the cross and the baptism in water are marks of death as well as new life. Even the future king needs to be born again to see the Kingdom of God. Surprisingly, it's down to the Guardian to point all this out.

But it's worth watching the clip to the end, the final words are excellent (see below), I might start using them in our services.

There's a baptism enquiry evening at our place tonight, wondering if there'll be a sudden influx through the West Country rain. (update 2: no rain, no influx. Having said that, we do encourage people to come along on Sunday first and meet one of the clergy, and that would have been quite tricky to manage between 9am and 7.30pm on a Tuesday. I did have an enquiry about a renewal of marriage vows at a school parents evening though, not sure if that counts.)

update: here's the text of that closing prayer
For you Jesus Christ came into the world

For you He lived and showed God’s love

For you He suffered the darkness of Calvary and cried at the last “it is accomplished”

For you He triumphed over death and rose to new life

For you He reigns at God’s right hand

All this He did for you,
   though you do not know it yet.

Been to any good funerals lately?

It's good to hear that the CofE is extending the work it did on the Weddings Project to baptisms and funerals. There's a (false) assumption that, just because vicars do a lot of baptisms, weddings and funerals, that we're good at them. Now the CofE is to find out what people really value (or otherwise) in the way we handle these important and sensitive times in people's lives.

The Independent has a slightly more jaundiced take on it. Yes of course, if the church starts doing things better, one side-effect may be an increase in demand, but I hope that's not the main reason. With around 140,000 baptisms and 175,000 funerals done by churches each year, it makes perfect sense to look at how we can do better, and identify 'best practice'.

It would also be fab if some decent new baptism preparation resources emerged from this. There is precious little out there at the moment - I've long since given up on the CPAS baptism video, and am still experimenting with different approaches to help people talk about what baptism means to them and what kind of faith they have.

Having a third party gather feedback will be invaluable - I try to find out how people engaged (or otherwise) with the services I lead, but to be honest you're not going to tell the vicar to his face that he was awful are you? Are you?

PS in respect of the title, I think you can have a 'good funeral', and that's its possible to die well and grieve well. All of it is painful, but it can be an occasion for grace too. I'm not sure where exiting the crematorium to Tom Jones singing 'Sex Bomb' falls in all of that, but I certainly remember it...

Adoption Blessing

It was a great joy last week to baptise the adopted baby son of some friends of ours. I suggested to the family that as well as baptising him, we pray for God's blessing on them as a family unit. Having searched in vain for a family blessing for an adoptive family, I came up with my own. Those familiar with Patricks Breastplate and the CofE Marriage service will recognise some of it.

We stood with the family in the centre of the church, and everyone facing in towards them, the congregation joined in the first and last paragraphs. Thought I'd post it in case anyone else would find it useful.

Family Blessing

Christ be with you, Christ within you
Christ before you Christ behind you
Christ on your right
Christ on your left
Christ above you, Christ beneath you
Christ around you, now and for ever.

Blessed are you Lord our God for you have created joy and gladness, pleasure and delight, love peace and fellowship.

Pour out the abundance of your blessing upon n......... in their new life together. Bless them at work and at play, awake and asleep, in joy and in sorrow, in laughter and tears.

May they love one another, encourage one another, defend one another, bless one another. May their home be a place where n.............. can grow in love, character and goodness, in mind body and spirit.

Heavenly Father, from whom every family on earth receives its name, who has adopted us into your holy family through your Son Jesus, bless and watch over this family, that they might know day by day that they belong to one another, and that they belong to you. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

Baptism Merchandise

Scouring Tesco online for some world cup themed tat*, I came across this, one of several items in their range for baptism/christening parties. Tesco are savvy enough to have tabs both for 'Baptism' and 'Christening' in their menu, even though both link to pretty much the same stuff. It's the same event, but it's called 'baptism' by church people and 'christening' by everyone else.

There's also an attempt to jump on the bandwagon of new wedding traditions by selling baptism themed 'favours' - presents that guests are given simply for turning up (? never really understood this). There's also some interesting 'table decorations', including confetti in the form of tiny crosses. It's an odd thing to be throwing about at a party, considering what it symbolises, but like baptism itself the cross has been detached from its moorings in history and meaning and has become, like St. George's flag, a 'nice' symbol to be wheeled out on appropriate occasions.

I guess it's all reasonably tasteful, but I'm slightly twitchy about it too.

* I'm looking for something to give to all the blokes in church which isn't flowers (too girly) or beer (too pricey/potentially controversial). Sunday's Fathers day talk will be on a football theme, focusing on a Dad's role as striker, defender, goalkeeper and midfielder. And the need to stay in touch with the Manager. But that's another story.

Ooops. What the L is going on?

In a busy day for worship bods at Church House, some new guidelines are also out on how to combine marriage and baptism services. Peter Ould has already spotted some problems with them, but there's another. Here's what the full paper says, and this is a direct quote from page 3:

In the Church of England, Baptism is normally administered on Sundays at the best-attended act of pubic worship, so that the congregation may witness the newly-baptized being received into the Church (see Canon B 21).

I know we're a broad church, but I've never yet held an act of 'pubic' worship, and hopefully never will. Baptism is clearly not the only thing that would be witnessed at such an event, but I'm not even going to go there. If the devil does live in Church House, then I think I've just found him in the spellchecker.

(For the record, when couples come to be married and already have children, it is a good idea to include them in the marriage service. However, if you're creative with the service itself, I'm not sure a whole extra section is needed to offer thanks for the gift of children. The prayers already cover that. It would be good to hear a bit more from Tim Sledge, quoted in the CofE main article, about how a combined marriage/baptism works. I guess at the very least it lowers the carbon footprint for clan gatherings - 1 instead of 2.)

Baptism Preparation: What to Do?

Baptism evening last night - we have one a month where we explain to families who are interested what baptism is about, how it works, and start sorting out dates with them. After 11 years I'm still tinkering with the formula. Here's what we currently do:

- if a family contacts the church, we encourage them to come on a Sunday morning to speak to one of the clergy. Families which want to bypass the church and just have the christening tend to get weeded out at this stage! However, with Sunday working, there are some parents who have to book time off work simply to come to church at all.

- after the Sunday morning meeting, we invite them to the baptism evening (see above). At present we use 'First Steps' from CPAS, a 10 minute vid/DVD which explains 'what baptism is really all about' (a phrase it uses about 10 times!!) It's ok, but as far as I can see it's the only video-based resource on the market. It's also rarely enough to get people talking and asking questions, so I've stared using The Christ We Share, a pack of pictures of Jesus from different cultures, and asking folk to pick the picture of Jesus they relate to most and talk about it. We also use the CofE glossy leaflets on baptism and godparents.

- follow up visit at home to talk through the baptism service, explain a bit more of the Christian faith, and explore where the parents are coming from.

- baptism itself (normally separate from our main service. Partly logistics - we can't get more than 90 into our church and it's full most weeks. Partly practical - with 40+ baptisms a year it's hard to give the church proper teaching and worship if you're constantly thinking about a big group of guests who don't really want to sit through most of what's happening!)

- welcome into the church family, at a main Sunday service following the baptism, including giving godparents cards, and a carved cross made by someone in the church.

- all this against a backdrop of a couple of midweek groups for parents and children, and a creche facility at each Sunday service.

Issues:
1. Even within Anglicanism, there's a wide spectrum of views about baptism. Some churches won't do it unless they see real Christian commitment on the part of the parents. There are a whole cluster of theological and mission issues clustered here which I can't even begin to unpack in anything short of a book (or maybe I just don't want to).

2. How to engage with people. I'm frustrated at the lack of media resources available, and it's hard to steer a course between cramming people with theology and trying to connect with their own sense of God and where they are in terms of faith.

3. How to help people make progress - we regularly offer Alpha, and have just started using Emmaus for our confirmation course, which has picked up 2 parents who came into the church through baptism. A large number of others come monthly to our cafe service, but don't get much further into the pool than that.

I'd love to know what other people do, what works, what you struggle with, and any good resources that you've found.......

update: when it comes to the baptism itself, this is surely the best way. Ht 2churchmice

Manure and Mission

Had a couple of meetings with people yesterday enquiring about baptism, one adult, one family seeking baptism for their children. In both cases it was the first time I'd met them face to face, and an image came to mind whilst all this was going on.

In our garden, stuff grows. Some of it is moss and weeds, others are things we've planted ourselves. If you want something to grow, and it's in the very early stages (seed, small shoot), then two things will kill it. One is complete neglect - no water, no soil, no sun (unless it's a mushroom). The other is overkill: drenched with a hosepipe every hour, and a couple of bags of multipurpose compost dumped on it from a great height.

Many of the baptism enquiries we get, especially for children, come from people who aren't of solid and committed Christian faith. It feels a bit like being presented with a small shoot: it has the potential to grow into something bigger, and potentially take root and start producing fruit, but that day is a long way off. Most clergy have at their disposal an entire warehouse of compost, and a sizeable lake of water - what we've learned, Bible knowledge, personal experiences, outlines of the gospel, books to lend, courses to encourage people to go on, questions to get people thinking, church groups/events which could help people make the first step towards being part of the church, how to pray & read the Bible etc. If we opened the gates on all of this stuff at once, most of the people we meet would be blown away by it. They'll probably go through with the baptism, but that will be the last we see of them.

The skill is to give the shoot enough water and nutrients to help it to grow without killing it. Not enough - a watery skim-through of the Christian faith and a bit of vicary niceness - will see it wither. Too much will overwhelm it. Then when the plant has grown a bit, it's ready for more. In a way this isn't 100 miles from Lawrence Singlehurst's model of 'Sowing, Reaping, Keeping' - of seeing the journey to faith as a series of steps, and providing regular opportunities for people to take the next step. One or two folk who came to us for baptism in the last couple of years are now looking at confirmation. The shoots are growing.

But so as not to get carried away:

1. Is this a valid image, or am I just trying to justify a fuzzy Anglican approach which compromises on personal commitment?

2. Isn't it our job to deliver the gospel, whether or not we judge that people are capable or recieving the entire package, and to trust God?

3. Do we devalue baptism by not insisting on committed Christian faith in those who seek it for their children?

Church of England 2001-7: Baptisms, Blessings and other stats

For the sake of completeness, here are the figures and changes for some of the other Church of England data released this week.

Figures are totals for 2007, with the percentage change (in brackets) since 2001.

Infant baptisms 88,400 (-17.3%)
Child baptisms* 40,300 (+5.2%)
Adult baptisms 10,200 (+25/9%)

Infant thanksgivings 4,700 (-9.6%)
Child thanksgivings* 1,700 (+6.3%)

Confimations 27,900 (-16.4%)

Marriages 54,600 (-5%)
Blessing of marriage 4,500 (-26.2%)

Funerals in church 96,500 (-7.3%)
Funeral in crematorium 98,700 (-20.3%)

Easter day/eve attendance 1,469,000 (-7.8%)
Christmas day/eve attendance 2,656,800 (+1.8%)

*i.e. ages 1-11.

Comments:
1. The process of change away from 'Christian Britian' continues: from 1900-1950, roughtly 65% of children born in this country were baptised, and 1/3 of those went on to be confirmed. That figure is not less than 20%, with 1/6 going on to be confirmed. Of course, the Church of England is not the only show in town, but it's generally smaller churches (Pentecostal, black-led churches) which have grown in this time, whilst larger ones have shrunk.

2. Marriages and funerals are becoming more secular. Though funerals (thankfully) aren't now a marketplace for venues in the way that marriages are, more are being taken by non-religious celebrants.

3. Marriages, Baptisms and Funerals are becoming a smaller part of the clergy workload, though with a reducing number of clergy, there's probably the same number per head as there was 10 or 20 years ago. This is a double-edged sword: on one level it means fewer pastoral contacts outside the church for church leaders, but on another it means there's more time to do proper preparation and follow-up for the people we do have contact with, or time freed up to be more pro-active.

Fathers Day resources

Wingclips has a selection of video clips related to Fathers day. Or if you have grumpy dads, they've just put a few up from the new Hulk film.

My favourite clip on fatherhood is from The Incredibles - go to 6mins 18 secs of this excerpt:



Meanwhile the CofE has done a survey on how dad's see their role:
Nine out of every 10 fathers feel responsible for the souls of their children, research commissioned by the Church of England has revealed. More than eight out of 10 mothers feel the same responsibility. By age, those feeling most responsible were people aged from 25 to 34 years, according to the survey.

surprise, surprise (not), the survey in turn is tied in to a new publication, in this case a baptism prayer card aimed at dads. If anyone out there is working on baptism resources, what we really need is a new DVD resource - the only thing on the market is CPAS's 'First Steps', which is ok but quite dated and tells us what baptism 'is really all about' at least 5 times in as many minutes. It's probably ok if you're seeing it for the first time, but after a dozen baptism evenings it does start to get a bit wearing!!