On the eve of the 2010 General Synod the Church of Ireland’s Church in Society Committee ceased its existence to make way for a new Board of Social Theology in Action, combining its work and that of the Church’s Boards of Social Responsibility in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

The former Chairman of the Church in Society Committee, the Rt Revd Dr Michael Jackson, Bishop of Clogher, spoke to Church of Ireland Press Officer Paul Harron about some of his recollections of the Committee’s work over the years.

Why the conclusion of the Church in Society Committee?

+MJ: The Board of Social Theology in Action which will be launched this year points the way imaginatively and practically to a radical re-thinking of the ways in which Committees can combine strengths and look to the future in fresh ways with new personnel. The Boards of Social Responsibility in the Republic of Ireland and in Northern Ireland have come together with the Church in Society Committee in a new joint effort to renew the connection between the centre and the local and to breathe new life into both. As a Church we are called regularly and repeatedly to engage with who people are and what they do. While the Church in Society Committee has ceased to exist, the engagement of the Church with society and the huge variety of complex societal issues and challenges which face us all as human beings very much continues.

What has your involvement with Church in Society been, how has it operated and what are your lasting impressions of its work?

+MJ: I began my involvement with the Committee in 2002 and throughout the timeframe I greatly enjoyed the new method of engaging people in the Church of Ireland with interest and expertise in a wide range of social, political and environmental issues with a theological perspective.  

The committee was given considerable freedom from the outset to work with independence and to say things in its own name as well as on behalf of the Church of Ireland. If the Church of Ireland wished to express as its own a statement or an idea which had originated in the Church in Society Committee, then it did so by adopting such either through the Standing Committee or through the General Synod.

There were seven panels of the Committee: Environmental; European Affairs; Medical-Scientific-Technological; Social-Theological in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland; and Political-legal in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The most engaged way of working was when a panel chairperson worked within a community locally to explore a big issue. This gave depth and resonance to the findings, the reflection and the recommendations. This might have been a group of healthcare experts; it might have been a group of parents and teenagers; it might have been people involved themselves in political policy-making. It was always confidently Church of Ireland in being ecumenical.  

How did the Committee communicate its work?

Throughout the lifetime of the Committee the dedicated staff in Church House, along with the Communications Department, were consistently helpful in doing this, as indeed were Church of Ireland Publishing. At times we worked in partnership with other Committees and at times to a brief given us by the Standing Committee.  

We produced a broad-ranging series of printed publications and other useful material went on to the Church of Ireland website. I think, for example, of The Guidelines for Interfaith Events and Dialogue, which was produced together with the Committee for Christian Unity and the Bishops of the Church of Ireland – we are the first Province in the Anglican Communion to have done this work in this way.

We were quick to provide pastoral guidelines in the recession in 2009 (on the seats of General Synod!) – Pastoral Care in the Recession – and this year we have produced a further booklet on the restoration of trust in Ireland, Broken Trust, again on the seats for Synod Members. In this way we have tried to facilitate people in the Church of Ireland in coming to their own positions in terms of living discipleship regarding issues which are happening in the world around us.

Other publications have included, Pastoral Care in the DigITal World: A Reflection for the Church of the Third Millennium (2009); Embracing Difference: the Church of Ireland in a Plural Society (2007); Local Partnerships: A Theological and Pastoral Reflection (2006); and Go and Do Likewise: Impacting upon our local communities (2005).

Several of these publications are still available via Church of Ireland publishing and there will be an archive of them available for future reference.

Finally, are there particular highlights you care to recall?

For me, highlights from the Committee’s work included the statement issued on cluster-bombs when there was an international meeting on this issue in Dublin in May 2008; our detailed paper on the future of healthcare provision in NI; and responses to a consultation document on assisted dying last year. We also made a joint statement with the Methodist and Presbyterian Churches on the Lisbon Treaty in 2008; provided a detailed response to the Report of the Consultative Group on the Past in 2009; and worked constructively on the impact of the digital age in rural Ireland. Last but not least, it has been a highlight to have been at the heart of Church of Ireland involvement with the eco-congregation movement in Ireland, since the launch of Eco Congregation Ireland in 2006.

For anyone interested in these areas of activity, the Church of Ireland website’s Church in Society Committee News section provides more information. Visit www.ireland.anglican.org.

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