Make a difference in 2010

The challenge to the people, schools and churches of the Diocese of St. Albans is : dare to make a difference in your lives, in your communities and in the world by living the words of Jesus.

You can register on the Challenge website www.challenge2010.org or through your parish;  ask your parish priest, church warden or other leader.

The verses, which are all from Luke's Gospel and record something Jesus said, will be sent by email or by text (for a small charge) or will be available through Twitter and RSS.   Alternatively the verses will be available to be downloaded from the website and you, your parish, your school or youth group can print them off.

The website will give further details and ideas about how to make the Challenge a shared exercise within your congregation, class, youth group or among your friends.   In particular you will be able to write comments on the website and upload short video clips, via YouTube, so that you can share with others what the verse means to you and how you are seeking to act on it.

As part of a recent training exercise a group of County Ecumenical Officers who were resident at High Leigh for their basic ecumenical training course organised by Churches Together in England, visited Radlett in Hertfordshire to hear the story of the Churches Together Group in this community. It’s an interesting and quite complex story.

At one time there were five churches in Radlett – The Anglican parish church of Christ Church, whose parish was carved out of neighbouring Aldenham in the late 19th Century to cater for the expansion of Radlett following the arrival of the railways. Tthen came Roman Catholic, Methodist and Congregational churches and finally in the 1950s Christ Church built a daughter church of St John’s to provide a chapel of ease for people living on the far side of the community.

Subsequently the Congregational church became URC and then united with the Methodists to form the Radlett United Free Church as an LEP, alternating ministers from the two denominations and sharing the former Methodist buildings. By this time there was a growing Jewish community in Radlett and the former Congregational church became a synagogue, one of two in the town.

Meanwhile the Radlett and Aldenham churches formed a churches together group which  began to bring members of the churches together in various ways. Later the Radlett churches formed “The Ecumenical Parish of Radlett” as  a covenanted LEP, but Aldenham did not feel able to commit to that degree of collaboration, though they remained in association with us.  

The “Radlett Ecumenical Christian Council” and its various sub-committees brought church members together in a number of collaborative ventures – ministers’ fraternal (weekly prayer meeting), Lent groups and Good Friday act of witness, joint Act of Remembrance (together with the synagogues) in November, quiet days and Advent lectures, an ecumenical magazine, shared Christmas carol services, social events and annual covenant service, lunch club, children’s and youth work, joint action for Christian Aid, One World Week, Women’s World Day of Prayer and more besides.

This seemed to be all moving further and further towards the eventual uniting of the churches which many people actively hoped for and even expected. However, especially over the last five years,  reduced clergy time  as  all churches have cut back on ministerial allocation, combined with the increasing business of so many lay members has meant it has become increasingly difficult to sustain so many joint ventures. The schedule of Sunday worship services in each church meant that ministers were so fully committed that it was rarely practical to arrange joint services, although there have been various experiments in that direction.

People  from outside the churches using the community facilities and events access what is on offer at different churches quite freely without concern for denominational boundaries, and there have been many examples of shared ministry on an ad hoc basis without the whole ministry of the churches ever fully coming together. As a result we have come now to the  realisation that we were functioning more as a churches together group than as a real LEP, and at the latest AGM have recognised this by discontinuing the LEP and forming “Churches Together in Radlett”, hopefully to be joined soon by Aldenham under this looser association.

For  many ecumenically minded members this decision has been a disappointment, though it seems a realistic one, but it is hoped that most of the things we already do together will be able to continue and that new initiatives will arise as time goes by, but this will be dependent on a continuing supply of church members willing and able to give their time energy to making things happen on a joint basis. The temptation just to get on with things or take new initiatives separately is strong and not easily resisted when time and energy are in short supply.

  Revd William Hogg (Team Vicar of Radlett  and Secretary of CTR)