St John's Church, Chelford

Church Services October 2009

John Reader has now departed to take up the appointment as Vicar to eight parishes in Oxfordshire. We wish him and Christine well in their new location which, we hope, will be everything they would wish.

The question that is far from clear is what will now happen in the parishes of Chelford and Lower Withington (which are one for ecclesiastical administrative purposes). The short answer to that is that we do not know as no conclusions have been reached. There will be decisions to be made for the future of the parishes in consultation with the Rural Dean, the Archdeacon of Macclesfield and possibly, as was the case on John Reader's appointment, with the Bishop of Chester. One thing is very clear, however, which is that we do not have sufficient income to meet the cost of a full time Vicar and it could be that mergers with other parishes will be considered appropriate or some other form of part time pastoral care. That will inevitably mean that the laity will have to become even more involved with the running of the parish which, with effective leadership from the next incumbent, should not prove to be a problem. There are a variety of options available and when a way forward has been determined (which is some months away) it would be usual for the post to be advertised in the Church Times and at diocesan level and in other Church publications. We are now involved in an interregnum and are likely, as will be clear from the above, to remain so for some considerable time.
So far as the services at both churches are concerned, it will be "business as usual". At Chelford, we are fortunate in having the benefit of the assistance of two retired Vicars ---- Canon Ron Smith who took many of the services during the previous interregnum and Rev Barry Roberts who retired as Vicar of Hulme Walfield and its associated parishes. Essentially, they will conduct services on alternate Sundays with Ron Smith officiating on the first Sunday of the month at the 8am service. He has kindly said that he will make himself available after that service wherever possible to give home communion to those who are not able to get to church. Anyone wishing to take advantage of this offer should initially contact one of the Chelford Churchwardens so that they may contact Ron. St Peter's at Lower Withington is equally fortunate in having the services of John Ellis supported by Readers and others.

Funerals, weddings, baptisms etc will continue to take place and should be arranged through the Churchwardens.

At the time of writing, Christine Johnston is unfortunately in hospital and we pray that she will soon be fully recovered. As a consequence of Christine’s illness there will be no Chelford Sunday School for the time being. When the Sunday School starts again details will be published in this magazine.

Interregnums, unless there are special circumstances which there are not in this Parish, tend to last for some months which, to some, may seem to be unreasonable although there are good reasons for the length of the gap between appointments. That means, of course, that we will have to rely more on our own resources to keep the Churches running which is not necessarily a bad thing and can be a positive factor in determining talents that might otherwise not be evident. Furthermore, it is time for reflection and an opportunity to take into account the lessons to be learned from previous incumbencies and the methods by which our Churches are run

D P Couling