The church seems to have become obsessed with itself instead of with the love of God.
There’s a continuum of commitment and involvement of course and the further ‘in’ you are the harder it might be to see the view of those of us on the way ‘out’. I met a chap who told me he thought everyone should leave the URC. His reason was that if everyone left that would be one denomination fewer.
For most people ours is a post denominational society. The divisions between denominations mean nothing to the majority who can’t tell an Anglican from a Baptist from a Congregationalist and gave no idea why they exist anyway.
So is school Chaplaincy church or not and does it matter?
Sometimes it looks more like traditional church than at others. When we hold a service on a Sunday morning, like we did on Remembrance Sunday, most church goers would recognise it: hymns, prayers, Bible readings. Then the congregation is older than during the week but even so it has it’s experimental edge: the Remembered Bible and the majority of the participants being under 18.
During the centenary of WW1 I have been reading about the experiences of Chaplains to the British forces. Let’s be clear, although the former Headmaster called me Padre, I was not one in that sense. But the stories of those that have been often show how faith can be active in the most challenging of contexts.

In small strips of woodland around the Dark Peak I wander, wondering if this could be a space for Forest Church. Of course it already is as I stand or sit here praying, the boughs uniting above my head instead of stone vaulting. If the roof leaks here at least it is supposed to. A carpet of leaves to sink into, small creatures that share the welcoming space.
In four weeks time I will exchange the Chaplaincy for an even more unknown route. I am not obsessed with the ‘is it Church?’ question and have already decided to leave denomination behind at that point. Over the last 8 years ecumenism has come to mean a whole lot more than a shared bowl of soup once a year. I thank my fellow members of the Lay Community of St Benedict for welcoming me into something quite different, much more alive.

When the URC Yorkshire Synod decided not to continue its involvement in the school Chaplaincy it used many churchy arguments. But I have seen no evidence that God has taken the Holy Spirit from us. We are the church. We don’t need a denominational stamp, or permission to use the name, anymore than we need a lot of paraphernalia that currently bogs down so much of the rest. What we need we have: the story of the love of the Creator, the example of the Son and the Gifts of the Holy Spirit.

In our life and our believing

The love of God