A new report We Are Family: The Changing Face of Family
Ministry by Gail Adcock, Karen Garry and Polly Goodwin has been recently
published. It was a report commissioned by the Methodist Church and
Consultative Group on Ministry Amongst Children. It is an interesting report
which is strongly rooted on exploring what is happening on the ground
ecumenically, and within Methodist Churches more specifically.
There are a range of directions I could take writing about
this report and initially I was going to review it in detail. However, the more
I read the clearer it became that this report has something really important to
say to those of us who are worship leaders and local preachers and I want to
flag this up, encouraging others to read and think about the challenges it lays
down. A visually attractive, easy to read summary of the report is available as
well as the more in depth report.
The first thing is it underlines something we already know
that family types in the UK are changing. The report makes the point that we
need to take this on practically as well as intellectually. The one question
which respondents gave 100% affirmation the one which related to having single
parents amongst those they were working with. That means every single families
worker spoken to has single parents amongst those they are working with.
A sizeable number also had same sex couples within those
within the contexts they were practitioners in. Although there was not the same
level of certainty on this question.
Cohabiting couples are also going to be increasingly part
of the two parent heterosexual couples being worked with, as the report
highlighted.
A number of children were also adopted or in care.
Another aspect which was drawn out is something which is
not new but needs to be recognised, many people come to church with
grandparents or others who are not their parents.
The families workers spoken to were primarily working with
families who had children aged under 11. This crossed over with the fact many
were involved in Messy Church initiatives which as recent Church Army research
has shown is likely to be lay-lay led, i.e. led by lay people who have no
formal training or authorisation of role beyond being given responsibility
locally for this work.
So what has all this got to do with local preachers and
worship leaders?
Well I want to argue quite a lot.
1.
If you
are asked to lead a children’s, all age or family service what definition of
family do you have in mind?
“What do we mean by family?” is something the report
indicated draws a wide range of responses from both individuals and the
churches they are working in. Being asked to do a family service in the modern
context needs reflection upon what do we mean by family and who is likely to be
there. The answers need to be wider than those we might feel used to working
with.
2.
What
terms do you use within worship and particularly to children with regards to
the adults who are with them?
We have now moved on to using
parents or carers as terms, being sensitive to looked after children. Yet, if
we know the congregations we are working with we use the more specific terms. I
want to ask how often we include the grandparents who may often bring them?
3.
What
impact might these findings have on our leading of Mothering Sunday or Father’s
Day services?
There might be differences
between what has traditionally been done and what is actually contextually
appropriate. The worship leader or preacher should be able to reflect on this
and work out how to incorporate tradition in a more appropriate way. This may
involve looking at different cultural contexts and understandings of family as
well as family types.
4.
What
passages do we choose to use and how do we use them to talk about family?
Regular readers will know I
get very up tight with the fact that we do not include the story of Hagar in
the lectionary. Hers is the story of a single mother which I believe strongly
we can use much more in white majority churches to talk into a range of
situations linked to single parents.
5.
What is
our understanding of intergenerational church & how does this impact our
service planning, content of our preaching?
Many of our congregations may
be predominantly older but they may contain a handful of young people too. Do
we manage to embrace all or do we set them up against each other in terms of feeling
that we cannot integrate material for all within one service? Similarly do we
compartmentalise and so the first 15 mins is child friendly excluding the over
10’s and the rest is aimed at the over 70’s excluding the rest of the
congregation? Or do we work so hard at incorporating new material from Singing
the Faith which the 30-50 age group will probably be more familiar with that we
end up excluding practically everybody? I exaggerate….but only slightly.
6. How well do we know the contexts we are
going to preach in?
The
first part of this is a big problem for many preachers and goes beyond thinking
about family ministry. Particularly if we have not been in the circuit long
what do we know about the contexts we are going into and are we able to adapt
what we are doing at short notice if we find out there are important things
about the context we are not aware of already? How do we get the information
which helps us to be contextually aware? I think this is where local preachers
meetings can have a helpful role in where people can talk about the context of
different churches to ensure people are aware.
7.
Do we
ever talk to those engaged in families work to find how we might be able to
assist them beyond the Sunday Service?
I ask this because we tend to think that
as worship leaders and preachers we are being trained to fill slots on the
Sunday plan. What about if we could be a resource to help families workers who
are leading a range of other activities. Perhaps by working with them on short,
bite size, culturally appropriate worship for the contexts they are working in.
