I'm about to go on ordination retreat. So, yes, this Sunday I will be ordained into the Church of England as a Pioneer curate. According to your point of view, I will be either:
1. showing my age and finally succumbing to the genteel temptations of establishment, compromising my principles along the way
2. courageously serving this wonderful institution as it fulfils its vocation to the entire nation
...I'd like to think there are alternative conclusions but the impression is sometimes that these are the two responses one gets. I've been intrigued by the discussion on the institution between Jonny Baker and Kester Brewin and I may chip in at some point. However, in the meantime, here's a little piece that I'll be taking with me this weekend, given me by Ray Gaston:
"We are not ordaining you to ministry; that happened at your baptism. We are not ordaining you to serve the Church in committees, activities, organisation; that is already implied in your membership. We are not ordaining you to become involved in social issues, in ecology, race, politics, and the search for justice and peace; for that is laid on every Christian.
We are ordaining you to something smaller and less spectacular; to read and interpret those sacred stories of our community, so that they speak a word to people today; to remember and practice those rituals of meaning that address people at the level where change takes place; to foster in community, through word and sacrament, that encounter with truth which will set people free to minister as the Body of Christ.
We are ordaining you to the ministry of the word and sacraments and pastoral care.
God grant you grace not to betray but uphold it, not to deny but to affirm it, through Jesus Christ our Lord."
Amen....
Best wishes for your ordination and the stage in your ongoing ministry that it represents.
Posted by: Jonathan Evens | June 30, 2010 at 12:53 PM
Our prayers are with you as you seek to help people to get to that encounter with the truth. Be blessed and encouraged! Must try to get to see you this summer... Andy & Claire.
Posted by: Andy West | June 30, 2010 at 02:14 PM
We all inhabit institutions, even those in the hegemony of thinking they are outside institutions. So great to see you inhabiting this institution with that wonderful imagination. And that is something far grander than the disparagement of 'institutions' which is a feeble place to stand.
May this weekend be all the Ray Gaston has invoked in you, and may you carry our blessing as part of the body of Jesus into that mission and ordination.
Posted by: Jason Clark | July 02, 2010 at 09:40 AM
Best wishes and God bless.
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We are not ordaining you to become involved in social issues, in ecology, race, politics, and the search for justice and peace; for that is laid on every Christian.
Posted by: Payne | November 22, 2011 at 08:48 AM
God grant you grace not to betray but uphold it
Posted by: Kenneth | November 25, 2011 at 08:50 AM