March 2025
Monday May 20 2024
The Very Rev David Cameron, convener of the Assembly Trustees. Pictures by Andrew O'Brien
The Church of Scotland Assembly Trustees were today (Monday) told to bring proposals that will mean the Church is breaking even financially within four years.
The motion, introduced by the Rev Scott Rennie and passed by a wide margin, urges the Trustees to bring proposals to next year’s Assembly which will deliver the Church of Scotland Unincorporated Entities (the national charity which includes the church’s central services, Faith Action programme and CrossReach) a balanced budget by the end of 2027.
The instruction followed a report from the Assembly Trustees which warned that, on current trends, the Church’s available reserves will be exhausted by 2032.
Mr Rennie said that although the Trustees had made ‘remarkable progress’ so far in delivering reform, he felt the wider Church still did not appreciate the urgency of balancing the budget. “We need to go back to our congregations and parishes and let them know the reality of the financial challenge,” he said. “This General Assembly is the church and the body with ultimate authority and responsibility. It’s this body that should be decisive in urging the Trustees to get a hold of the finances. I want this assembly to make explicit what’s implicit in the report.”
Much discussion this morning focused on the fact, revealed in the Assembly Trustees’ report, that 71% of the charges in the Church do not contribute enough to cover their ministry costs, and are supported by the other 29%.
Convener of the Assembly Trustees, the Rev David Cameron, said that it was ‘a key illustration of the challenge we face as a Church’. He said that the majority of the reforms instructed from 2019 had now been delivered, with new presbyteries in place and initial savings targets met at the National Office. However, he said that ‘we have a way to go, because the hard truth is that limited resources are becoming ever scarcer’.
The Rev Christopher Rowe, minister in a Priority Areas parish in Milton, Glasgow, said he feared that a review of Priority Areas (the church’s mission to the most deprived 5% of areas in Scotland) was a euphemism for cuts, and called for people experiencing poverty ‘to be at the root of any consultations taking place’.
“It’s very much harder to start something again than it is to keep something going,” he said. “Priority to the poorest feels as though it is part of our denominational DNA. I want to thank the 29% who support the 71%, because that includes the bottom 5%. Presbyterial planning has been brutal, but without that foot on the ground it’s hard to see how the work can continue.”
However, there were also calls for the 29% who do pay for their ministries, and more, to be protected. The Very Rev Prof David Fergusson said that his own Edinburgh congregation was contributing enough money to the centre to pay for three ministries, but was not itself allowed to call a minister, with the ‘predictable result’ that it was ‘losing members and money’.
“Support for the poorest and most remote congregations is necessary and desirable, but it was never envisaged that this number would include 71% of our charges,” said Prof Fergusson. “The 29% are crucial to our future.”
The Rev William Wilson said that the Church must ‘allow congregations which are thriving to thrive’.
The Rev Dr Doug Gay called for more powers to be devolved to the local level: “We need to transition into a new era of local sustainability. We need to move to situation where decisions about local ministries and local buildings are taken by local congregations who have greater rights and greater responsibilities.
“If we empower local congregations I think we will be surprised by the way in which new resources will appear.”
The Assembly also passed an amendment to the rules of the Seeds for Growth fund which will allow it to be accessed for work in existing congregations, as well as establishing new worshipping communities.
Post Tags: general assembly 2024
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