Swiss Archdeaconry

A DAY AT SYNOD

Over forty people converged from all over Switzerland at Holy Trinity Church in Geneva on 25 January. Some had come long distances, from Lugano, from St Gallen. Others were from Holy Trinity itself, or had made the short hop from our Episcopalian sister church in Geneva, Emmanuel. We represented all the eight permanent Swiss chaplaincies, Geneva, Lausanne, Vevey, Montreux, Berne, Basle, Zurich and Lugano, and their daughter congregations, as well as our Episcopalian friends.

Also present were the Old Catholic bishop, Fritz-René Müller, and Klaus-Heinrich Neuhoff, Old Catholic pastor of Trimbach, near Olten. One of our themes was ecumenism - how churches could work together, and in particular, how we could cooperate more practically with our Old Catholic friends, with whom the Anglican church is in full communion. As Bishop Fritz-René said, we need each other, and in a Swiss context, we can demonstrate that "small can be beautiful." Fr Klaus-Heinrich described fields in which we were already working together. Anglicans and Old Catholics were attending each other's synods and pastoral conferences. The Willibrord Society had been formed, to probe new ways of cooperating. And the Old Catholics here were actively engaged in partnership with Anglican missions, in particular in the Congo.

On the theme of ecumenism, we also committed ourselves to membership of the Swiss Council of Churches, which we hope will take on a wider role in the coming years. And discussed our part in the Partners in Ministry initiative, which seeks to prompt us to think just what we really are doing for ecumenism.

Finance was the next theme. It was not as boring as might be thought. As well as supporting our archdeacon, Peter Hawker, in his ministry (the diocese contributes a significant amount to this), we run an annual retreat, a choir festival, and seminars. (You can see from www.anglican.ch what is on.) These cost money, and we were gratified to find that last year, they had cost us much less than we expected. This meant that we had money to spare, and we wholeheartedly agreed to make a donation to help develop the ministry further at Gingins, near Nyon, where the church planted from Geneva now needs its own chaplain and structures.

Next, we shared the experiences some of those present had had at the seminar the archdeaconry had organized last October. The theme had been "Growing Healthy Churches", and three members of the Archbishop's Springboard Team had come over from the Guildford diocese to pass on some ideas. A number of chaplaincies (including our own) had been excited by some of these ideas, and we heard how they were being developed in Lugano, in Lausanne, in Montreux, in Geneva and in Berne - this sharing of experiences is one of the valuable aspects of our synod meetings. We also discussed other training seminars which were being planned - on youth work, in Basle ("churches pay more attention to handling money than to handling children", I noted down) in January 2004, on putting our faith across, in Beatenberg, this May, on relations with the Roman Catholic Church in Lugano in March. And recalled that 2003 was the Year of the Bible, and we should be thinking how to make this real.

We paused to give thanks to God, in a Eucharist celebrated by Bishop Fritz-René (a "first" for Switzerland, said the Anglican News Service, to have an Old Catholic bishop celebrate an Anglican Eucharist), and to enjoy the hospitality of the saints in Geneva in the form of lunch.

After lunch, Derek Williams, the Diocesan Press Officer, who had come over from England, addressed us. His first exhortation was to "Send News to Derek" - we should all raise our profile, locally, nationally and abroad, and one way was to ensure that all "news" found its way to him, and from him onwards to the English church press (and beyond!) ("Why do elephants never forget?" he asked. ("Because nobody ever tells them anything."))

We sat in groups and discussed how a businessman over for the weekend would find our churches, and we discussed guidelines for effective communication. It's not easy. It's about people, not paper. It's a question of competing with others for attention. And it's a question of listening as much as talking (or writing) - receivers of information have different expectations to those who purvey it, and people conveying information need to be aware who their audience is. Information for the Council, for the church membership as a whole, for enquirers, for casual visitors, for local people in the city, needs to be presented differently. But all subject to the overriding considerations - be clear, be concise, be contemporary, be complete, and be eye-catching!

This led on to sharing our experiences on communications. The chaplaincies on the lakeside (not the Thunersee, not Galilee, but Leman!) have the advantage of local radio stations to share their message. How can we make people better aware of us?

A number of small items concluded our business. We heard some of the ideas that had been raised in recent Bishop's Council meetings - the question of appointing an adviser on women's ministry, the financing of our diocesan Training Officer, Ambrose Mason. And (no small matter!) we talked of inter-faith dialogue, and what was being done, for example in St Gallen, where a group was taking seriously Hans Küng's saying that there could be "no peace between nations until there was peace between religions." This was received with a mixture of enthusiasm, scepticism and hope. And with our thoughts thus provoked, we set off on our long journeys home.

Hector Davie Untitled Document