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Rector's Letter October 2006 Dear Friends, Today I went to Edinburgh. No big deal; it’s hardly a journey to the South Pole. However, there were engineering works in progress so I had to bus between Dunblane and Falkirk. Again, no big deal, except that I had gone down to the station the day before and, seeing no signs around that anything untoward was happening, had assumed it was not (happening, that is). As I am repeatedly told but never quite believe should be the case, ‘never assume anything’. It meant I was half an hour late for my meeting, which was quite unnecessary, as I could easily have left earlier. I had also assumed that I was going to a meeting of the Ministry Development Committee but again I’d assumed, not exactly wrongly, but not correctly. I’d not quite grasped that the meeting was with a larger number of folk and a facilitator, to try to sort out the structures, policies, theology and any number of other important issues to do with ministry, both lay and ordained, in the Episcopal Church. How do I get involved in such matters? In our own Diocese, I’m involved with facilitating the review process now under way. It’s been really interesting going to other congregations and hearing from them their hopes and fears for the future. However, I can’t even sort out the details of my journey from Dunblane to Edinburgh, so why does anyone think I can sort out the Diocese, let alone the Province? Perhaps I look intelligent. Must be the glasses. Anyway, at this meeting, which I found quite stimulating in some ways, I discovered a new word, which exactly describes my ministry and life in general – chaordic. According to Bishop Brian, it’s a mixture of chaos and order. You allow all manner of things to happen – to bubble up from the grass roots (or I suppose bubble down from the top, though that’s a less satisfactory metaphor). Well, there’s a lot of bubbling allowed to go on – chaos in other words. Only when everything is in a right state of bubbling, do you step in and try to order things a little (or a lot, if the bubbling is extreme). You thus bring order out of chaos; but the chaos is necessary and to be encouraged. The chaos allows the creative process to happen. Which brings me, in a somewhat round about way, to the point of all this. How do you, how do we in St Mary's view Mission and Ministry? There’s lots going on – should we just leave everything to bubble or are there structures that would be helpful? Do we expect or want the Diocese or Province to help, say, in training? Can we get ourselves better organised for mission outwith the Church and ministry, both to one another and to those who are sometimes described as ‘friends we have not yet met’? Are we listening to God’s calling in each of our lives or turning a deaf ear? Lots and lots of questions – are there answers, however tentative, bubbling to the surface? Janice |