As you will know the General Synod meets this week. On Wednesday the Synod will reflect in small groups on GS 2055 on Marriage and Same Sex relationships after the Shared Conversations and hold a take note debate on the report.
If you haven’t yet read the full report you can find it here.
Please do pray for the General Synod meeting this week and especially for those representing the Diocese of Oxford. A suggested prayer is below.
I would encourage all of us to be mindful of and careful for those who will find this continued debate challenging or difficult either for themselves or out of concern for those they love. The report touches on intimate and personal questions of identity and conduct. This is a season for kindness and gentleness and bearing one another’s burdens as sisters and brothers in Christ.
I will write more on the outcomes of the debate and ways forward in due course.
With love and prayers
+Steven Oxford
Father of all mercies and God of all comfort
Send your Holy Spirit to refresh and renew your holy and beloved people.
May the members of our General Synod clothe themselves continually
with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness and patience.
Guide and lead us into all truth as we seek your ways together.
Help us to bear with one another, to forgive as we have been forgiven.
Above all bind our lives together in love for Jesus Christ your Son and for your world.
Make us a means of consolation, reconciliation and healing in the earth
https://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/synod.jpg36485472Steven Crofthttps://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-blog-logo-300x117.pngSteven Croft2017-02-13 11:08:482017-02-13 11:08:48A prayer for the General Synod
Twice in the first chapter of John’s Gospel we read the words “Come and see!”. Two disciples follow Jesus. He turns and asks them: “What are you looking for?”. They ask him where he is staying. Jesus replies “Come and see!”. Jesus is inviting them to explore becoming disciples.
Then in the next few verses another disciple, Philip, also begins to follow Jesus. Philip tells Nathanael he has found the Messiah. Nathanael gives his scornful reply: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip replies: “Come and see!”
This is one of the times of the year when the Church needs to make “Come and see” our song. We need to issue the same gracious invitation to all those whose hearts have been stirred and shaken in recent months.
There was once a Bishop in North Africa called Augustine. He lived in a small town called Hippo. He was a bishop in the days of the early Church when, like today, the Church was called to make Christ known in a marketplace of religions and ideas.
Every year in this season, Augustine would preach his sermons especially to those who were on the very edge of faith and looking in: those on the very threshold of the church. There were many every year. Over these weeks between Christmas and the beginning of Lent, Augustine would urge them to “Come and see!”: to commit to further and deeper exploration of the Christian faith and to baptism at Easter. The whole of the Church year was developed as a way of teaching Christian faith.
Augustine’s sermons would be taken away and discussed by his community. They in turn would encourage family and friends, those for whom they were praying, to come and see: to learn about faith from the beginning and explore becoming a disciple of Jesus.
This ancient annual pattern has lessons for us as a Diocese. Through the autumn, many thousands of people have come to Church for the festivals of harvest and Remembrance and Christmas. Thousands more have attended school services and nativities. As a Church we have ministered to many people over the last year at the most significant moments of their lives following a birth or at a marriage or through funeral ministry.
This is the season – between Christmas and the beginning of Lent – where we need to say to all those people in whom faith is stirring, who are on the threshold of faith: “Come and see!”. Come and look and explore and learn and come know this Jesus, in whom is all the wisdom of the ages.
We need to be clear that we are not simply inviting people to come to church services. We are inviting people to come and learn through something arranged especially for those on the threshold: a Pilgrim course, or Alpha, or Start, or Christianity Explored, or something tailored for your own situation.
There will be some people on the threshold of faith in every place. We are called to support them, to work with them, to encourage them and give our best resources to welcoming and helping people see Jesus in our midst.
I continue my journey across the Diocese this month. In January I’m in the Deaneries of Buckingham, Claydon, Witney and and Amersham. In February I’m looking forward to visiting Wallingford, Bradfield, Sonning, Wycombe and Bracknell. In every place I will be asking especially what churches and parishes are doing to welcome those on the threshold of faith, to say to one and all: “Come and see!”.
I began a new part of my journey across the Diocese of Oxford last week. In October there were four Welcome Eucharists, one in each Archdeaconry. In November, I’ve travelled across the city of Oxford, visiting incumbents in the Cowley and Oxford deaneries (my own episcopal area).
In December I begin a much bigger journey: a day in every deanery of the Diocese to explore some of what God is doing in Church and community. Abingdon was first on the list on a cold and clear November day.
I found the Church in the Deanery in very good heart. We began at noon with a Eucharist for the clergy in St Helen’s Church in the centre of Abingdon. I spoke on hope and the river of life from Ezekiel 47. Lunch with the clergy followed. We talked together of the challenges and joys of mission and church life.
By 2 pm we were at the Abingdon Food Bank. The food bank opens twice a week and gives out 18-20 food parcels for the most deserving. It’s run by volunteers and a wide range of churches support with gifts of food and toiletries. Like most foodbanks, the clients come only for a short time when they are most in need but the need itself is ever present.
On then to Peachcroft Christian Centre, an ecumenical church plant on newish estates to the North of Abingdon which has grown steadily since its foundation. The Church is gearing up to cook Christmas lunch for fifty or so people on Christmas Day who otherwise would be on their own. Fifty volunteers from the church family are prepared to give up part of their own Christmas Day to help and support as cooks and drivers.
Kingston Bagpuize next: an ancient church; an expanding village; a group of Christians wanting to share their faith. They told me about their first Mission Action Plan and how helpful they had found the process. The Church is looking forward to a Festival and to faith sharing in the spring with a team from Wycllffe Hall. The big issue in the village, as elsewhere across the Deanery is the influx of new homes and how the church will engage with all those who move in. So far, every new person has received a home visit and a welcome pack.
Then onto Fyfield to meet members of two smaller communities in an ancient and beautiful church with no running water. They make excellent cake in Fyfield. I heard about the church’s plans for a building project; about the nativity play; about longing to do more to engage with children in the villages.
To Marcham Vicarage for a short break with Richard Zair, the outgoing Area Dean and then an evening meal with an invited group of lay people from across the Deanery: a local mayor, a senior charity worker; a headteacher; a youth leader; a street pastor; the lay chair of the deanery; a university lecturer – all people of influence in the community. We talked of the challenge of new housing; of communication; of cuts in services; of the positive contribution the Church is making.
Finally back to Christ Church, Abingdon for an evening meeting. Great refreshments (once again). People from across the deanery. A short time of worship. I spoke and then an open question and answer time. We ranged widely over church and society.
I came away very well fed and also inspired and encouraged by the people I met and the rich conversations through the day. I’d seen just a snapshot of life in the deanery: I could have returned the next day and the one after that and still be learning new things. The clergy and the lay people I spoke with were, indeed, full of hope, looking outwards, grappling with serious questions but not defeated by them.
Thanks be to God for the Church of Jesus Christ across Abingdon. The journey continues next week in Newport.
https://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/IMG_3313a.jpg13643380Steven Crofthttps://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-blog-logo-300x117.pngSteven Croft2016-12-07 14:43:432016-12-07 14:50:10A day in the Abingdon Deanery
From time to time, I try and write a new hymn. Some are better than others. I’m not a musician so I write them to an existing hymn tune. For the last few years I’ve tried to write a new hymn as the verse on my official Christmas card. I send several hundred cards as a bishop so they go far and wide.
Here is this year’s offering. It’s loosely based on Psalm 96: O Sing to the LORD a new song.
I’ve pondered Psalm 96 for most of this year. It was the text for my final sermon in Sheffield Cathedral and also the text for my sermon at four Welcome Eucharists across the Diocese of Oxford.
The psalm is a call to all the earth to hope, to joy and to worship: to sing a new song which has the power to change the world.
That is a message the world needs to hear especially at the end of 2016.
The words are written for the well known tune, Jerusalem, by Hubert Parry. Permission is given to reproduce the words in any context. Let me know how it goes.
Whatever is happening the world over, the Church must never cease its praise and worship. Sing to the Lord a new song!
Sing songs of hope, new hymns of joy. Sing to the Lord in all the earth. Let lays of love all fear destroy, The Church’s anthems of new birth.
For Christ is born in Bethlehem. The kingdom comes, the Word takes flesh. And so we sing of love come down Of mercy, peace and tenderness.
This song is life to all who mourn, To rich and poor, for young and old. Our song breaks locks and bars and stone The breath of life to hearts grown cold.
Let heav’n be glad, let earth rejoice The Lord has come and justice reigns. Sing to the Lord, earth, with one voice, Jesus the name above all names.
Steven Croft, 2016 After Psalm 96 Suggested tune: Jerusalem (Hubert Parry)
https://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/carols.jpg10001500Steven Crofthttps://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-blog-logo-300x117.pngSteven Croft2016-12-05 14:20:072016-12-05 14:20:37Sing songs of hope, new hymns of joy
Some of you will be aware that on the day of my inauguration as Bishop of Oxford, there was a small demonstration outside Christ Church by two survivors of sexual abuse who go by the names of ‘Joe’ and ‘Michael’. Christ Church welcomed them with great care, and I spoke with Joe for a few minutes before entering the Cathedral to assure him of my prayers.
I’d never met Joe before, although I know Michael well from my time as Bishop of Sheffield. Over the last few months he has made complaints against me and against several other bishops. There have been reports in several newspapers, and he distributed leaflets by post and in person on the day of the inauguration. Most recently, Michael gave an interview to BBC South Today, which was broadcast yesterday.
I’ve been very hesitant to comment publicly on his allegations against me thus far. This is partly because there is an ongoing police investigation. But just as importantly, I recognise that Michael has said openly that he is very distressed by the situation and I have not wanted to make life any more difficult for him by publicly disagreeing (as I do) with some of his claims. However, it felt important to take up the BBC’s invitation of ‘right to reply’ this week. You may have seen the piece when it aired.
For the reasons above, I can’t go into any more detail about the specifics of the case. But I thought that it might be helpful to set out my approach to safeguarding issues so that there is no misunderstanding
1. The care of vulnerable people
First, I want to make it quite clear that the care of vulnerable people and those who are survivors of sexual abuse and exploitation is a high priority for me, and for the Church of England as a whole. As a society we have all learned a great deal in recent years about the appalling prevalence of sexual abuse. We can be in no doubt at all about the profound and long lasting suffering experienced by survivors.
Like all bishops, I have had to deal with a significant number of instances of sexual abuse. I was involved with others in helping the wider community in Rotherham respond to the child sexual exploitation scandals from 2013 onwards.
I am committed to providing support and pastoral care, both to survivors and, where appropriate, perpetrators. I know we do not always as a Church get things right. I don’t always get things right as a bishop. We need to be constantly listening to the experience of survivors, learning lessons for the future and improving our practice.
2. Transparency
There are sometimes suggestions that the Church attempts to cover up abuse. To our shame, there are examples in our history as an institution where this has indeed happened. This is utterly unacceptable, and completely contrary to my beliefs and values. But while we must never be complacent, I am confident that we have radically improved our policy and practice around safeguarding in recent years.
The Diocese of Oxford has robust policies and practices. Like many dioceses, we are currently increasing our investment in safeguarding support. By the end of 2017, every diocese will be independently audited by the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) which I entirely welcome. These reports will be published, along with a follow-up action plan.
3. Training
A new national training strategy has been agreed and is now being implemented. This aims to ensure that all those with responsibility for children and adults who are vulnerable are equipped with the knowledge, skills and confidence to identify the potential abuse and report it to the appropriate person. This will mean additional training and regular updates for clergy, licensed lay ministers and volunteers. Please take this very seriously.
Policy and practice guidance is continually evolving in the light of experience. I welcome these developments and am committed to playing my part alongside the National Safeguarding Team and our diocesan staff.
4. Lessons for the future
Recent events have made me even more determined and committed to listen well to survivors of abuse in the future and to help the wider Church do so as well. The Church is committed to learning and improving practice across the board in relation to survivors of abuse, and to seeking justice for all those involved in such cases.
Finally, I would encourage any survivors who are yet to speak up to do so, through the church locally, via my office or by going directly to our Diocesan Safeguarding Adviser. Please be assured that we work in close co-operation with the police and other agencies to ensure that all allegations of abuse – however long ago the events took place – are thoroughly and appropriately investigated by the statutory authorities. We can also put you in touch with ‘authorised listeners’ who are specially trained to provide confidential support.
Finally, I would ask that you keep in your prayers all those involved in this particular case and in this important area of work around safeguarding.
A message for all those leading groups for enquirers and new Christians
I write this message on St Luke’s day to everyone in the Diocese of Oxford and beyond who is involved in planning or leading groups for enquirers and new Christians this autumn. Thank you. This is a wonderful ministry we share together. Through this ministry, wherever it happens, lives are changed and a continual stream of new Christians come into the life of the Church helping us to grow and be more effective in serving our communities.
I write as well to everyone across the Diocese and beyond who wondering whether or not to become involved in this ministry. I want to encourage you to do so.
One of the themes at the core of Luke’s writing is, without a doubt, teaching the faith to enquirers, forming disciples in preparation for baptism. The name for this discipline in Christian theology is catechesis.
Luke begins his gospel by setting out his purpose. It is written so that we may know the truth concerning the things about which we have been instructed. The word is, literally, catechised (1.4).
Luke ends the gospel by painting a picture of Jesus as catechist on the road to Emmaus, drawing the first disciples into an understanding of Christ through walking and listening and asking questions, through teaching from the scriptures, through the breaking of bread and through sending out in mission (24).
St Luke’s day is therefore a very good day to invite you to reflect on your own habit and practice of catechesis: the way in which you welcome and teach the faith to enquirers, form new Christians and prepare them for baptism.
Many people who read this will be involved in Alpha courses, others in Christianity Explored, others in using Pilgrim. Still others might be using Start or Emmaus or material you have developed yourself. Different material works well in different places. What matters is that we offer something in every place, every year.
I have a particular interest in the development of Pilgrim. We celebrated the third birthday of the material last week. 130,000 books have been sold. It is being used in homes and churches, in prisons and pubs, with existing Christians and with enquirers. There have been 25,000 views and 6,000 downloads of the free video materials in the last year. Pilgrim is now being used in Denmark, Canada, Australia, the United Arab Emirates and in the USA (through the Church Publishing Inc version).
We have developed a Pilgrim catechism in digital and print form which will be published by Easter 2017 and Youth Pilgrim is in development.
The materials we use can be a real help. But more important is the way we use them.
A long time ago a bishop in North Africa, Augustine, wrote a short book on Instructing Beginners in the Faith. I’ve been reading it again recently. Augustine does pay careful attention to what we should teach. But he pays even more attention to the way in which we set about the task. The most distinctive and important thing, he says, is that our teaching is marked by joy.
“Our greatest concern is about how to make it possible for those who offer instruction in faith to do so with joy. For they more they succeed in this, the more successful they will be….
For if God loves a cheerful giver in matters of material wealth, how much more is this true in matters of spiritual wealth” (2,4)
Joy is also a theme in Luke’s writings: the gospel begins with singing and ends with resurrection joy.
Pay attention this St Luke’s tide to your teaching and instruction with faith. Plan in faith and look forward to a harvest. And above everything else, offer all of your teaching with joy.
I did a couple of television interviews on the morning of my inauguration service on 30th September. At the end of the second interview, Emma from ITV asked me a question which should have been very simple: “What’s your favourite film?”
My mind went completely blank. There was an awkward silence. Then I remembered Ann’s favourite film (Notting Hill). I’ve watched it so many times, I couldn’t in all honesty claim it was my own. In the moment I couldn’t think of any films I liked enough.
But the question stayed with me through the day of the service. Thanks to all who came and all who worked so hard to make it happen.
The question stayed with me through the weekend. Finally, late on Sunday afternoon, after all the family had gone home, I had an answer to the question. At least, I’ve narrowed it down to two films.
The first is Jerry Maguire, directed by Cameron Crowe, released in 1996 and starring Tom Cruise and Renee Zellwegger. It’s a great romantic comedy and a good sports drama. I love it for the opening scene where Jerry Maguire, a sports agent, writes a long memo to his colleagues about the corruption in his industry. Everyone agrees with him then a few days later he is fired. The story is about his journey back and it celebrates integrity, truth love and putting people first.
My second is Invictus, directed by Clint Eastwood, released in 2009 and starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela, then President of South Africa and Matt Damon as Francois Pienaar, the captain of the South Africa rugy union team. The film tells the story of the 1995 Rugby World Cup hosted and won by South Africa.
I remember watching the match live on television. I love the film because of Nelson Mandela’s inspirational leadership, his perseverance in adversity and his ability to see good triumph over evil. The film’s title is taken from a short, powerful Victorian poem by the Englilsh Poet, William Ernest Henley, which helped Mandela in the darkest times on Robben Island.
“It matters not how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the soul
I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul”.
There is a moment in the film when Mandela invites Pienaar to tea. He speaks of the need for inspiration to take us beyond ourselves.
“In order to build our nation, we must all exceed our own expectations”.
The film is a summons to greatness in the face of immense challenges. We live in one of those moments in the story of the world where the challenges are great beyond our reckoning. The challenges of poverty, of climate change, of conflict are immense. We are called by God in our generation to rise to those challenges, to be the best we can be in confronting them.
We moved house a week ago and I write this in the midst of builders and packing cases. It’s been a good move and we are glad to be here. I’m looking forward to the inauguration of my ministry on September 30 and to the four Welcome Eucharists in each Area of the Diocese.
I’ve been learning all I can about the Diocese and the communities we serve but there is no substitute for getting out and about. That will begin in October and November with visits to clergy in the Oxford Area, regular services in parish churches and a programme of visits to deaneries across the whole Diocese.
A great deal of thought and prayer is invested in the appointment of a new Bishop. Those appointing take care to listen to the needs of the Diocese at this moment in its long story. When the appointment is made, the Archbishop sets out the priorities for the new Bishop’s ministry in the words of a charge, drawing on this long and deep process of listening.
This is part of Archbishop Justin’s charge to me, read at my confirmation of election:
You are to bring vision and life, creativity and energy to the Diocese’s mission and ministry enabling all, lay and ordained to realise the joy of the Gospel and the workings of the Holy Spirit through the Church, and you are to lead the Diocese and its people in navigating their response to their call to Christian witness.
You are to release the God given possibilities in people, teams, finances and organisation unlocking the potential for re-imagining ministry and mission.
You are to be an intelligent and articulate voice for the Gospel and Church reaching out locally, nationally and internationally.
You are to seize the opportunity to act as interpreter, prophet, advocate and convenor across the Diocese nationally and in the public square.
You are to enable the Diocese to live its diversity well and as a sign of a flourishing Church.
Our nation and the communities we serve face many challenges and questions. We are called as the Church in this Diocese to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ with love and hope and joy. We are called to be a blessing and a channel of God’s grace in every place where we live and work and serve. It is an immense privilege to be called to serve the Diocese of Oxford at this time. Please pray for me as this new chapter and new ministry begins.
Mine was full of good things. My youngest daughter Sarah became engaged. Her fiancée, Simon, proposed at sunset in Florence. I was able to spend two weeks with my grandson (mainly playing with trains and reading the Very Hungry Caterpillar). I was inspired by the British Olympic team. We said our fond goodbyes to Sheffield. I started to build a pattern of prayer for the Diocese of Oxford. I was able to read and think and plan in the midst of sorting out and preparing for the move. I took up running for the first time and learned how to make pies.
It wasn’t all sunshine and light, of course. I was deeply grieved by the suffering of close friends. I was moved to tears by some of the things I heard during the General Synod shared conversations in York. It was hard, as it always is, to take in the suffering in Aleppo, in central Italy and in other parts of the world. There were the normal frustrations and things which went wrong and the hard work of transition. The very best moment of the summer (apart from Sarah’s engagement) came as I stood near the front of a very big tent in Somerset. Our younger son, Andy, and our daughter in law Beth work for Soul Survivor, a large Christian youth ministry. Soul Survivor runs festivals for young people and students every year. This summer we were on site for two of the festivals looking after Josiah, our grandson.
Beth had a night off and so we shared in the first evening meeting of Week B. Simply to be in a large tent with over 8,000 teenagers sharing in worship is inspiring. They were all there as part of small youth groups and church parties, camping all across the Bath and Wells showground. After the worship and the talk and lots of laughter, Mike Pilavachi gave an invitation on this first night of the festival for people to come forward to pray and be prayed for if they wanted to become Christians. This kind of invitation to make a Christian commitment or to receive prayer ministry happens regularly during each of the festivals.
Scores of young people came forward (I think around 140 that night). As is the tradition at Soul Survivor, the rest of the tent cheered and clapped and celebrated this very public act of commitment and dedication of their lives to Christ. As I always do, I found the moment profoundly moving: holy ground. There we were, in a very big tent in Somerset, and young people’s lives were being reshaped by God’s grace.
The same thing will have been happening in many different places over the summer in different Church traditions and in many different ways: at Walsingham and Keswick and Taize and New Wine, on ventures and in holiday clubs and pilgrimages, or simply in quiet retreat and holiday: God meets us as we step aside and draws us more deeply into love and joy and hope. As the Church proclaims the good news of love and forgiveness and new beginnings, so men and women, children and young people, respond in faith.
Perhaps if you had been there (or even as you read this) you are wondering what these acts of commitment meant to these young people. I was wondering too. But my wondering is shaped by the fact that in recent years I have regularly baptized and confirmed young people who responded in this way at Soul Survivor or at other festivals. As I have talked with them it has been very clear: those moments of grace have been a key part of their journey to mature Christian discipleship and in the offering of their whole lives to God. Such a moment was part of my own journey when I was 15 years old.
26,000 young people came to Soul Survivor festivals this summer. Over 1,500 became Christians.
In Luke 15, Jesus tells three stories about the importance of that which is lost: a shepherd loses a sheep, a woman loses a coin, a father loses both of his sons (in different ways). In each story, what is lost is found. The common element in each story is joy.
“Rejoice with me for I have found my sheep which is lost”, says the shepherd.
“Rejoice with me for I have found the coin which I had lost” says the woman.
“But we had to celebrate and rejoice”, says the father, “Because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found”.
I hope that in your life, and in your summer, and in your church, there has been this kind of joy this summer.
Thank you for your various messages of welcome and for your prayers following the announcement of my nomination as the Bishop of Oxford. It’s an enormous honour and privilege to be appointed to this role and I look forward very much to serving the communities of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire in the coming years.
My Confirmation of Election as Bishop of Oxford was held on 6 July, and I have now paid homage to Her Majesty the Queen and resumed my place in the House of Lords. I will continue to meet with the senior team in Oxford and plan for the autumn.
Ann and I hope to move to the new See House in Kidlington at the end of August and I will be working to a normal diary in the diocese from early September. My inauguration is set for Friday 30September in the Cathedral.
There will then be four Welcome Eucharists at which I will preside and preach, one for each Archdeaconry:
Episcopal Area
Date
Day
Time
Venue
Reading
5October
Wednesday
19.45
Reading Minster
Dorchester
9October
Sunday
15.30
Dorchester Abbey
Oxford
12October
Wednesday
19.30
Church of the Holy Family Blackbird Leys
Buckingham
13 October
Thursday
18.00
All Saints High Wycombe
I would like to meet as many people as possible over the first few weeks in post so please put one of these dates in your diary and I look forward to seeing you there.
I hope to visit the parish clergy of the Oxford Area in October and November. I am also planning a series of Deanery Days from November to July to begin to get to know and to listen to the whole Diocese. During those visits I look forward to engaging with lay people and clergy and getting to know the wider community as well as the church. I also look forward to being out and about across the whole Diocese Sunday by Sunday.
You can discover something about me in advance from the Diocesan website, should you wish to do so. I was formed as a parish priest in Halifax. I was shaped as a thinker and writer in Durham and through travelling the country as Archbishops’ Missioner. I have been forged as a Bishop in Sheffield and South Yorkshire, seeking to recall the Church here and elsewhere to the mission of God.
I’m conscious I will have a much to learn in my early years in Oxford. Please pray for me: for the gifts of humility, wisdom and gentleness for this new ministry. Pray in the words of the ordinal that my heart may daily be enlarged to love this great Diocese to which God has now called me.
I’m looking forward very much to working with Bishop Colin, Bishop Andrew and Bishop Alan in the coming years and with the rest of the senior team. I’m conscious that the Diocese owes a particular debt to Bishop Colin for his care and leadership during the long vacancy.
Based on the listening I have done so far, I will focus my ministry across the whole Diocese in three areas in the early years: on engagement with children, young people and young adults; on enabling lay discipleship in the world and on engaging with the poorest communities across the Diocese. These priorities are not a new Diocesan strategy. That may emerge over time. They are initial themes for my own engagement with the whole Diocese and I look forward to taking them forward with you.
I believe that the Christian faith and the Christian church will become ever more central in the life of our nation and the world in the 21stCentury as people seek again for meaning, for values, for purpose and for hope.
God has called the Church to be a community of mercy and kindness, reflecting the nature of Jesus Christ and telling the good news of his love. Together we are called to be a community of missionary disciples: faithful, united, hopeful, creative and rejoicing in God’s grace.
I look forward very much to meeting you, to knowing you and being known and to working with you,
In Christ
+Steven Oxford
PS: I would be very grateful if this letter could reach as many people as possible and be reproduced in parish newssheets, on websites and in magazines. Thank you.
https://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Bishop-of-Oxford-Archbishop-of-Canterbury-2.jpg10241743Steven Crofthttps://blogs.oxford.anglican.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/2019-blog-logo-300x117.pngSteven Croft2016-07-21 13:51:472016-07-21 14:08:49Letter to the clergy and people of the Diocese of Oxford
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