The President and Vice-President of the Methodist Conference are elected at Conference, and take up their year of office 12 months later. This ensures a degree of continuity with the previous year’s officers. The President is always a presbyter (ordained minister) and the Vice President is always either a lay person or a deacon (who is also an ordained minister….but let’s not complicate things!). This year’s President, Rev'd. Steve Wild, became a Christian at the age of 14 during a Cliff College Mission – later in life he worked at Cliff for four years as a tutor and director of evangelism. He has worked in circuit ministry, held posts as an evangelism enabler, and worked part-time for Westcountry TV, presenting programmes about Christianity. In 2008 he became Chair of the Cornwall District – you may have seen him in an episode of the BBC’s “An Island Parish”. Steve has a real heart for bringing people to know Jesus Christ for themselves. In his inaugural speech to Conference, he urged every Methodist church to “ ... take God seriously ... to put mission on the agenda ... to make one new member this year.” (A speaker at our District Synod in September described that as a ‘very modest aim’ – what are we going to do about it?!) Dr Jill Barber, the Vice President, is the wife of our own District Chair, Rev Peter Barber. She grew up in Kent and studied English and Librarianship at Aberystwyth University, where she met Peter. She has worked as a children’s librarian, a history teacher and an archivist. Since 2011 she has been Project Director at Englesea Brook Museum of Primitive Methodism, near Crewe (only small, but well worth a visit if you haven’t been). Her professional experience has shown her the importance of ‘telling our stories’ as a way of connecting with those outside the church. Speaking to Conference, Jill suggested that we need to re-discover as a Church what she called the ‘four Ps’ – Prophecy, Prayer, Passion and Protest - so that we can use our voice to speak out and make a difference. Certainly Jill’s passion for issues of justice shines out through her lively, bubbly personality. She was the lead signatory in a statement from the non-Conformist Churches in August about the refugee situation in Calais. Jill will be the guest preacher at a Chester and Delamere Forest Circuit service at Rowton on Sunday October 18th at 6.30pm. Why not join friends from across the Circuit on this occasion – Jill is well worth hearing. Liz Holmes
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“We want a fresh moral vision of the kind of country we want to be.” So wrote the bishops of the Anglican Church in February in a strongly-worded attack on Britain’s political culture in the run-up to the general election. And they called on all Christians to use their vote “even though it may have to be a vote for something less than a vision that inspires us”. The Saturday after the publication of this letter, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, was the keynote speaker at a conference in Coventry organised by the Joint Public Issues Team (JPIT) which campaigns on behalf of the Baptist, Methodist and URC churches, and which we (John and Elizabeth) were fortunate to attend. The conference was entitled ‘Love your Neighbour: Think, Pray, Vote’, and encouraged participants to bring their understanding of the gospel to bear on their voting intentions in May. The Archbishop gave an inspiring address, skilfully weaving his way through the issues without taking any sort of party political line. He encouraged us to be hopeful about our society, to celebrate the good things that have been done by recent governments, and to rejoice in the freedom that we have to discuss these issues openly. At the same time we should not be complacent, but ask challenging questions about how inequality is to be lessened and about how we become a fairer society, taking better care of the poor and vulnerable. He said that as Christians, following a God of love and justice, “We speak out because loving our neighbour is in our DNA.” He urged us to challenge cynicism wherever we found it, (and was overtly critical of Russell Brand’s message of nihilism). He urged us not just to ‘think, pray and vote’ but also to ACT. By doing so we could ‘change the wind’ and help to bring about a fairer, more just and equitable society where all may flourish. The conference then broke up into workshops – choosing which two to attend was really difficult, as they all looked inspiring! We finally chose to go together to one on climate change first. This was a little disappointing, as it rather dodged the big scientific issues and homed in on the need to live more simply and sustainably (though that in itself was challenging). After lunch, John went to a workshop on poverty, and I did ‘Preaching and Praying Social Justice’. You may already have noticed that’s a bit of a hobby-horse of mine! Again, there was much to inspire and challenge. The day ended with Rev Ruth Gee, former President of the Methodist Conference, preaching on words from Micah chapter 6, verse 8 – “What does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” Elizabeth Holmes You may have read in the media that some fair trade producers have not been receiving their proper dues.
Whereas this may be the case in some less well regulated parts of the market, it is certainly not true of the Traidcraft network. As a Christian organisation, Traidcraft maintains very close links with its suppliers and ensures they receive a fair price for what they produce. There are inspections to ensure quality; occasionally producers are brought over to the UK to promote their products; Traidcraft runs ‘Meet the People’ tours that anyone can join to see the work first-hand for themselves. You can also see profiles of some of the producers in the Traidcraft catalogue. So when you buy from Traidcraft, you can really be sure that you are making a difference to the lives of the producers and their communities. By the way, have you tried the new household cleaning range, Clean and Clear, which contains the world’s first fairly-traded palm oil? Or the new Divine milk chocolate caramel bar - delicious! Elizabeth Holmes Palm Oil – Clean and Fair Palm oil is one of the most widely used commodities – hundreds of products in our supermarkets contain it, although it is often hidden by being called ‘vegetable oil’. So what, you might say? The problem is, in many parts of the world, under the influence of multi-national companies, vast swathes of natural rainforest are being cleared to make room for palm oil plantations – to the detriment of local village life and the wider global environment. Traidcraft is trying to reverse this trend by sourcing palm oil from small-scale farmers in Ghana, where palm oil grows naturally. They are working with nature rather than destroying it – and, even better, the growers benefit from the Fairtrade premium. The palm oil which Traidcraft sources is used, along with fair trade coconut oil, to produce a new range of cleaning products, Clean and Fair – the first ever such products to carry the Fairtrade mark. The handwash, washing-up liquid, laundry liquid and multi-surface cleaner all clean well, and are environmentally friendly, with no ‘nasties’ in them. So why not try one of these products from the Traidcraft stall at Frodsham Methodist Church, or at the Wellspring coffee morning on Thursdays at Main Street Community Church? Elizabeth Holmes 2014 marks the 40th anniversary of the ordination of women into the Methodist ministry. So it is perhaps appropriate that we should begin our series on Women in Methodism by profiling the current President of the Methodist Conference, Rev'd. Ruth Gee. In 1974 Ruth visited the Taizé community in France with a group of friends. One day she had been praying in a local Roman Catholic church when she felt very strongly that God was calling her to the ordained ministry, although she had no idea whether that was possible for a woman in the Methodist Church. What a coincidence that she should feel that call in the very year that it did indeed become possible! 59-year-old Ruth was born in Dorset and brought up in Wiltshire in a Methodist family (her father was a local preacher). She trained as a teacher of RE and English, and gained a degree in theology at Hull University. While there she met her future husband, Robert, at the University Methodist Society (Meth Soc - many Methodists will testify to what a good place Meth Socs were for finding future partners!). Robert is also a Methodist minister and they have two grown-up children, Andrew and Rachel. After some years in Circuit ministry, mostly in northern England, Ruth became Chair of the Darlington district in 2008. Her election as President makes her only the fourth woman to have held this position. The Conference is the governing body of Methodism in Britain, and meets annually in July. The President (always a presbyteral minister) and Vice-President (a lay person or a deacon) are elected to serve for one year only. During that year the President acts as the Church’s representative in the world - for instance this year Ruth attended the Remembrance ceremony at the Cenotaph in Whitehall. And, as John Wesley did, they travel the length and breadth of Britain, and overseas, preaching and visiting Methodist projects, and always encouraging and inspiring the Church in its mission. It is usual for the President and Vice-President to choose a particular theme for their year. A woman of deep spirituality, Ruth wants the Church to become an ‘expectant people’, expecting to see glimpses of the glory of God everywhere around us. God is in everything, even the most mundane. But this is not just a ‘religious feeling’ - her belief that we can recognise the presence of God everywhere leads her to a passionate sense of anger about inequality and injustice. In her Christmas message to the Church, Ruth quoted the first chapter of John’s gospel, "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us; and we beheld his glory", and called on us all to be generous with our time and our love in response. If you want to know more about what Ruth is doing in her Presidential year, you can follow her blog. Elizabeth Holmes |
Pastoral LettersWritten by the Minister & Members
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