HE WORD WHO IS LIFE: Bishop Richard’s Consultation
Report of Crawley Deanery 17.01.2018
Summary of responses received to the five questions
The consolidated responses below are compiled from those received from parish groups; some of the groups had opportunity to consult their local parish communities, whilst others responded as representatives of their communities:
- Given the Mission which has been entrusted to us, what three things do you think we most need for Mission-effectiveness?
- A genuine desire for change focused on a clear vision for increased conversion and discipleship.
- This must be expressed regularly to raise the awareness of the whole community and to generate an optimistic excitement for the mission itself.
- Evangelii Gaudium (para 15): We “cannot passively and calmly wait in our church buildings”; we need to move “from a pastoral ministry of mere conservation to a decidedly missionary pastoral ministry”
- EG 25: A “pastoral and missionary conversion” is called for “which cannot leave things as they presently are.”
- The status quo is not an option and we pray that this consultation is an essential first commitment to the need to progress the mission as a matter of urgency.
- 2030 is 13 years away but, more importantly, it is only 5/6 years away from the entry date for any future priest who completes training by 2030. This 5/6 year window is the first target. A revitalised and outgoing Church will create a deeper and larger pool from which applicants can be drawn; even if the current demands of celibacy and seven years preparation remain.
- To focus only on the number and distribution of priests will condemn the mission to failure before it begins – reduced priest numbers are only a spin-off from the much more important and pressing goal of bringing, or returning, the wider world to Jesus — our mission mandate
- Faith-filled, fully collaborative, welcoming and outward-looking Eucharistic communities, calling for attention to:
- Evangelising the baptised (forming intentional disciples) – the provision of effective adult catechesis and formation for mission – increasing understanding of, and participation, in Mass & Sacraments
- Given its centrality to the whole mission, the ‘attractiveness’ of the Mass for all parishioners must be addressed – clearly retaining the Eucharist as the pinnacle of our lives, while developing the environment within which it is offered, eg, music, welcome, children’s liturgy, a range of Mass settings, etc.
- Development of truly collaborative ministry with fully involved laity, requiring increased understanding and willingness to participate of both clergy and lay faithful
- Ensuring that parish communities are invitational and truly inclusive – actively welcoming and providing for all marginalised groups, newcomers and ‘enquirers’ – being a known active part of the local district community
- Ensuring that parish communities are outward-looking: socially-aware and attentive to those in any kind of need – equipped and willing to proclaim the Gospel, directly as well as by good example – being ecumenically aware and active – applying Catholic Social Teaching in daily life
- Effective leadership, teaching, formation and support from the clergy in pursuance of the mission activity of the lay faithful.
- What roles in this Mission belong to the Priest?
In terms of the baptismal mission of all the faithful, few things “belong” to the priest that do not belong to the lay faithful also. Insofar as the practical distinction be made that it is the role of the lay faithful to take the Word of God to the world, the role of the priest is then to build up the lay faithful to prepare, equip and support them for their role. The three key duties of the priest so define his role:
- Teaching – ‘Making present, in the bewilderment and confusion of our times, the light of God’s Word’ ( Pope Benedict XV1). The homily offers the key teaching for most parishioners and should be of high quality and relevance, but attendance at other opportunities for evangelisation, catechesis and formation must be encouraged
- Sanctifying – Ensuring that the sacramental life of the Church is strong and invitational.
- Governing (leading) – Within the mission, the leadership of the priest should reflect the servant leader model made visible in the life and teaching of Jesus. ‘Feed (not rule) my sheep’. The priest must be the animator of, and collaborative worker with, his people.
- What roles in this Mission can be best carried out by the lay-faithful?
The responses received from the parish core groups make it evident that whilst there is good awareness of the potential role of the lay faithful in sustaining and supporting the parish itself, there is currently very little awareness or understanding amongst the lay faithful of their being called to any proactive sense of ‘mission’. All but a very few comments in response to Q3 have related to activity within the parish (though prayer for vocations gets mentioned). In this situation, attention needs to be given to:
- Moving from ‘ministry within the parish’ to ‘intentional discipleship’: Given the core purpose of the Church, the key role for the lay faithful must be to take the Gospel to the world. If they are valued, trusted and supported they can ‘take on’ anything other than ‘ordained’ roles, but they cannot pass on what they do not themselves have. A great deal of adult formation and sacramental preparation has already been successfully organised and implemented by the lay faithful and this should be built upon if the mission mandate is to be realised.
- Ministry: The lay faithful already demonstrate an ability and willingness to support important roles/tasks across the parish (including tasks of an admin nature). Organisations and committed individuals offer ministries in a range of ways and energy and support must be given to broaden and deepen this work even further (e.g. in marriage preparation, in which there can often be a strong evangelisation/missionary dimension)
- Witnessing to faith in everyday life: The primary role of lay people is to live daily lives with God at the centre of all that they do. In their everyday lives, they encounter people in all sorts of needs and distress and thus have many opportunities to witness to their faith in the way in which they respond, at work, within their families and within the wider social context.
- What factors, do you think, have brought about the present situation that we are having to address in our Diocese?
From the responses it is clear that there was some confusion as to whether the question is about ‘shortage’ of priests or about a general decline of Mass attendance and parish life. However, the two overlap since many of the factors mentioned relate, at least indirectly, to both:
- Cultural: individualism/celebrity cult – unwillingness to commit – children no longer simply follow their parents’ Mass attendance – generally cynical/hostile media and society – materialist/secularist society – events-dominated family life displacing regular Mass attendance – ‘pray, pay and obey’ not enough.
- Quality of faith/church life: Lack of regular Mass attendance (by all but the elderly) – insufficient encouragement to young men to consider vocation – weakening of ‘domestic church’ – shallow spirituality – lack of attention to evangelization – women’s gifts and potential underutilised – frustration from too little responsibility being given to/taken by lay faithful – lack of adult catechesis/regular formation for the evangelised (many still have ‘primary school’ knowledge and expectations of faith) – failure to engage with youth – few Catholic school leavers are ‘intentional disciples’ who practise their faith.
- A battered perception of the Church: scandals and the Church’s response to them – priesthood qualification (celibate, male) too restricted, and priestly life not seen as attractive – an apparent desire to dilute the opportunities presented by Vatican II – a reversion to ‘rubric, ritual and vestment’ – apparent desire to retain a hierarchical approach to leadership
- Lack of meaningful mission / outreach to the whole range of non evangelised – from many existing church goers to the lapsed and the un -churched.
- Too much ‘shifting of deck chairs’ rather than effective management and implementation of necessary change
- A lack of formation in vision and leadership for many of those given the pastoral care of parishes.
- If we were starting the Diocese today, with 25 priests, where would you place them? (Note: the diocese currently has 89 parishes, comprising 128 churches and 12 chapels.)
- In centres of population – where the Church can best be centred to effect the greatest fruitfulness in mission – especially in socially deprived areas – where there are largest Mass attendances – places accessible by public transport – where there are Catholic schools
- Group priests in regional ‘hub’ presbyteries – key/well-placed outlying parishes to be developed as community-led outreach centres – we would not be starting from scratch: there is an existing network of communities which need to be respected and promoted.
Appendix: “The Wider Context”
The Statistics
The bishop has provided a ‘priest to Mass attendance ratio’ of 1:427. Looking at our current ratios for the Crawley Deanery as a whole, we will see from the breakdown in the tables that follow that this pastoral area does in fact have a priest to Mass attendance ration of 1:431. There are, however, deviations above and below this ratio, that if left unaddressed, will begin to cause difficulty as we move closer to 2030 and the forecasted ratio of 1:737. For instance Horsham currently has a ratio of 1:873, whereas Henfield and West Grinstead have the lowest ratios of about 1:135.
Perhaps before we speak of 2030, there needs to be a consideration as to whether there needs to be a balancing out of the pastoral provision and a serious deanery wide consideration of the Mass provision so that each priest is saying each Mass for a steady and healthy average number of people.
The Problem of speaking in Ratios:
A ratio of 1 priest to 427(2018) or 737 (2030) are exceedingly good ratios, but it is only helpful to speak in ratios if that priest, having celebrated his 3 Sunday Masses, has been able to celebrate Mass for at least that number. The more Church buildings we have to serve the harder it is for a priest to celebrate 3 Masses for anything like 737 people; this is certainly true in the Crawley Parish which fragments its Mass population over six centres.
As the ratio of priests to Mass attendance increases to 1:737, the mathematics suggests that a priest would need to celebrate each Mass for about 250 people. Ideally there would even be centres where the priest celebrates his three Masses for significantly more than 737 people, so that some Mass centres can continue with smaller congregations or because that priest has other chaplaincy or diocesan obligations.
From the statistics for the 2017 Parish Returns in the Diocesan Ordo:
The Crawley Deanery as it stands has the following Sunday Masses:
| Parish | Churches | Priests | Masses | Vigils | Day | Eve | Attendance | Ave per Mass |
| Crawley | 6 | 3 | 8 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 1716 | 214 |
| Horsham | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 873 | 291 |
| E Grin | 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 389 | 130 |
| W Grin | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 144 | 72 |
| Henfield | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 127 | 127 |
| Horley | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 288 | 96 |
| Worth | 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 342 | 114 |
| Totals | 14 | 9 | 23 | 7 | 14 | 2 | 3,879 | 168 |
Other Language Masses:
| Parish | Polish | Italian | Portuguese | Other | Total |
| Crawley | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0.5 | 2.5 |
| Horsham | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| E Grin | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| W Grin | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Henfield | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Horley | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Worth | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Totals | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 4.5 |
The Crawley Deanery has the following weekday Masses:
| Parish | Churches | Priests | Masses | Day | Eve | Sat AM | Weekly Chaplaincy / School / Convent |
| Crawley | 6 | 3 | 8 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| Horsham | 1 | 1 | 5 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| E Grin | 2 | 1 | 6 | 5 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| W Grin | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Henfield | 1 | 1 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Horley | 1 | 1 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Worth | 2 | 1 | 11 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 0 |
| Totals | 14 | 9 | 43 | 32 | 6 | 4 | 2 |
What is the purpose of the weekday Mass?
- The devotion of the priest and the devotion of the faithful?
- For the retired?
- To give working people an extra chance to attend Mass?
- To facilitate Requiem Masses for the faithful?
Missing Questions from the Consultation?
The bishop said to us that, along with his five questions, we might identify other questions that are essential to the Mission to which the Lord has called us. Here are some areas of the Mission that should also be considered:
- Diocesan Vocations Strategy
- We have 42 Deacons in this diocese; in what ways do they play an important role in the life of the diocese?
- Many parishes still have parish sisters; in what ways do they play an important role in the life of the diocese?
- Other Chaplaincies: All the talk on the ratio of priests to Mass attendance forgets the other special areas that priests are currently asked to engage with:
- Hospital Ministry
- School Ministry / Governorship
- Gatwick Airport
- Gatwick Detention Centre (effectively our Deanery Prison)
- Places of Special Concern: what provision can be made for the following places of special concern within our Deanery:
- Broadfield (Ecumenical Partnership and Low Income Area)
- West Grinstead (Shrine Church)
NB: the further a priest has to travel it reduces both the number of Masses he can celebrate as the travel time must be included in the ‘transaction time’ for how long it takes to celebrate a Mass; and it reduces his availability for other missionary activity.
If we were starting the Diocese with 25 priests where would we put them?
If we were starting the Diocese with 25 priests where would we put them?
The starting point, if we have been talking in ratios, suggests that the majority of the priests would be situated in the urban centres. It may be that we need to first reduce and restructure our deaneries – perhaps from the current 13 to 4 (Surrey, West Sussex, East Sussex, Brighton & Hove). This seems to suggest that we would see a breakdown of the 25 priests as something akin to:
- Surrey – 9 priests
- West Sussex – 8 priests
- East Sussex – 4 priests
- Brighton & Hove – 4 priests
Current Deaneries might then become the new parishes. We understand that in 2030 there will be still be 25 priests over 65, but we must acknowledge that by 2040 they will also be retired. These Retired Priests still offer valued ministry, but in fairness to them we cannot take them for granted and as such we do not plan our operational resource on retired priests, but hope that they are able to offer supply. If we are resourcing the diocese with 25 priests then the Crawley Deanery may only have 2 priests by 2040.
Where would Masses be celebrated in 2030?
American Model – the Mega Church
The Crawley Deanery potentially has a mega Church at Worth Abbey (although it is currently non-diocesan – which would have many administrative and financial issues to unpick). If Worth could be utilized to its full potential it would greatly take the strain off other communities and allow Masses to be celebrated in smaller more rural centres where transport links are less reliable. This assumes that people would travel to Worth, but if there are too many local Churches nearby the incentive to use the mega Church might be reduced.
The “Urban Model” – use the Principal Church of the Town
The largest centres of population would seem to be Crawley, Horsham and East Grinstead, but even in these centres of population the seating capacity is not extensive. What could be done to extend, re-build, re-model these Churches which would be realistic in terms of Parish and Diocesan finances? This model would most likely see the end of small satellite Churches of these urban parishes.
The “French Model” – the rotating Mass location
In this model, there would always be a Mass in the Urban Centre, and then Mass(es) moves around the existing satellite communities. The People would need to check the newsletter, bulletin board, website to see where the Mass is each week.
Some closures are inevitable
The Diocesan 201t returns in the new directory says that there are 126 Churches, 12 Chapels and 1 non-Catholic Church. If there were 25 priests celebrating 3 Masses (in 3 different venues) each week, then the maximum number of Churches that could be sustained is potentially 75 if Mass is to be celebrated in the same churches each week (though the “French Model” would allow otherwise).
Towards 2030:
The danger of speaking of 2030 is that this might reduce the sense of urgency. There will need to be a step change towards 2030.
What immediate changes should be made in 2018 / 2019?
- Are there any Churches not viable today?
- Are there any Masses not viable today?
What are the intermediate changes (towards 2025) that should be made?
- The closure of any remaining non-viable satellites and chapels of ease
- Which Churches need to be re-modelled / extended to increase capacity
- What further changes are needed to make sure that 2030 plans are ready by 2028?
