by Robert Forsyth

“I think I have been misled,” said a very able but still new rector to me the other day. He was referring to the message he believes he received both at College and from great ones in Australia and overseas that the ministry was just ‘really getting on with the business of teaching the Bible and praying with people’ and the other matters were, frankly, relatively unimportant. Now reality was hitting home.

My friend was struggling with big issues of his leadership in the parish. He was facing the reality that building and leading the church, though based on teaching the Bible and praying with people, involve many more activities and skills. In particular there was the task of helping the people in the church and his staff team come to good decisions about directions, money, programs, policies and getting things done.

He reminded me of what I heard at a recent Moore College Open Day. One of the presenters spoke of the challenge of being a rector in a parish in eastern Sydney.

He drew attention to the high expectations placed on a rector and the broad expertise he needs today in everything from money, building, public relations, technology, human relationships, Scripture, music and spirituality. And to the depth of the brokenness and neediness of people that exists in Sydney today. It was a powerful moment.

It is important to realise that the ministers in charge of our parishes have one of the most remarkably complex and difficult jobs around. On top of significant social change in Sydney there is the challenge of increasing regulatory expectations as well. The coming of the GST certainly has revolutionised the business of parish accounts. And on top of that there are many other issues of Child Safety and Protection, various insurance liabilities and now new Occupational Health and Safety regulations.

(In fact, the recent letters from the Diocesan Secretariat outlining the new Occupational Health and Safety obligations on our churches ought themselves to be regarded as a high risk for occupational health and safety for the churchwardens or minsters who read them, so onerous are the obligations contained therein.)

Even administration is in the long run quite important. I don’t mean filling out forms so much as the process of enabling people and ministries to work well. Good administration, after all, means properly caring for people. Sloppy administration means people get hurt.

There is no simple way around these challenges, but awareness, support and training of our key frontline men in their important task of building Christ’s church is something we all need to be committed to.