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| Partnership and Ecumenism | 20th Feb '07 |
| How different parts of the Christian Church relate to each other ... |
The C scale of ecumenical relations
How different parts of the Christian Church relate to each other can be mapped by a series of words all beginning with the letter 'C'.
Originally there were five but others have since been added. Today it could read:
- Conflict:
'Unity must be ordered according to God's Holy Word, or else it were better war than peace!' (Bishop Hugh Latimer, martyred 1555) - Competition:
'There aren't many of us ... but at least we're a few more than that lot down the road!' - Coincidence:
'We're in here and they're down there. So what?' - Co-operation:
'What are we going to do for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, Women's World Day of Prayer, Lent Course, Good Friday procession, Christian Aid Week, Remembrance Sunday and the Carol Service?' - Commitment:
'We believe God wants His Church to be One and we're not going to let our differences divide us!' - Conciliation:
'Our remaining diversity is a treasure we share as we celebrate together what each has been given.' - Communion:
�We who are united with Christ, though many, form one body, and belong to one another as its limbs and organs.' (St Paul to the Romans)
Other words could be added such as Complementarity, Covenant and Consummation. Churches can map where they are on the scale and see what might be done to move them onward to the next step.
The benefit of partnerships and working ecumenically
The modern ecumenical movement began with missionary societies recognizing that there was no point in them competing with each other. The result was comity agreements in which different societies or Churches worked in different parts of a country. Solving one problem, it created another where today tribalism is now sometimes reinforced by denominationalism.
In the tough mission field which is 21st Century Britain, the needs are beyond the resources of any of the Churches working alone. Mere efficiency demands that the Churches plan together to avoid duplication. But there are more advantages to partnership than efficient use of limited resources. Visible unity in reconciled diversity is a model of social cohesion which contemporary society desperately needs to follow. A true local ecumenical partnership can demonstrate how people with deep differences which previously divided them, even violently, can nevertheless work together for the benefit of all.
Some examples
When Plymouth City Council was planning a large new estate it said to the Churches 'there will be one site for a church building; you decide which of you will have it.' Fortunately there was the vision and commitment to respond to this need and opportunity together. The result was the ecumenical plant of Christ Church, Estover, a partnership of the Roman Catholic, Church of England, Baptist and Methodist Churches to which the United Reformed Church later joined as a fifth partner Church. Situated next to a prominent supermarket, it is known locally as 'St Asda-by-the-Trolleys' and is a beacon of light in a community with many deep social needs.
The city of Milton Keynes is forty years old and has shown innovation in ecumenical partnership from the beginning. It was the first to combine the functions of an Anglican deanery, a Methodist circuit and a URC district, with active support from the Catholic diocese and the Baptist association, in a single Mission Partnership. Some ecumenical partnerships have grown around long-established Anglican parish churches. Others have been planted in new estates in creative ways such as Stantonbury, where the Church of the Cross and Stable is part of the campus of the largest secondary school in the city. In the current development plans, the city population is set to nearly double and new methods will be needed to respond to the mission opportunities.The Mission Partnership has appointed a Development Chaplain to monitor and engage in this process.
Guidelines
 The Churches Group for Local Unity has produced resources to support and develop local ecumenical engagement. Growing Together in Partnership is a rough guide to forming a Local Ecumenical Partnership for those who are setting out on an exploration. Ecumenical Notes also includes a model constitution for a single congregation local ecumenical partnership with an agenda to follow and a worked example. The Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales has also issued a set of leaflets for Catholics engaged ecumenically.
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