Last Wednesday night I told Sanctus1 that I would be leaving at the end of this year. It's been a difficult decision for me to make, but there are many reasons that I think that it is the right time for me to leave. One major concern that I have with the emerging church is that each church seems to be closely associated with one particular person, and, IMHO this is not healthy for the church locally or the church catholic.
I hope that through my leaving Sanctus1 grows in responsibility for itself as it recruits a new leader and also becomes bigger that being closely associated with me.
There are a number of reasons that I am leaving, but firstly I believe that I will be leaving Sanctus1 in the best possible place that I can. If all goes to plan there will be:
1 - A five year Bishops Mission Order in Place,
2 - A person appointed for five years with funding from both the Anglican and Methodist Churches,
3 - A home and missional opportunity in Nexus Arts Cafe,
4 - A local leadership team in place,
5 - A growing vibrant community that is in the most positive place that it has been for 3 years.
Sanctus1 is also a deeply personal story for me and as my vocation has evolved so Sanctus1 has evolved. This summer I will be ordained as a Priest and be able to lead communion within Sanctus1. When I break bread and share wine for the first time, it will symbolically mark the end of my journey of leading Sanctus1 into church. In many ways this will be 'job done' for me. I was employed to explore new ways of being church in the city centre and that moment will personally mark the closure of that phase in our life and the start of a new phase.
As you can see Sanctus1 is very much tied in with my story and for a Church to grow in maturity it needs to be bigger than the person who started it. I have nurtured Sanctus1 and, with a great deal of support and help from the leadership team, got it to where it is but there is a moment when I have to step back and let Sanctus1 go, I think that moment is this year. There are many, many gifted people in Sanctus1 and now it is their chance to take more ownership of Sanctus1 as it goes into this next phase.
We're going to start the recruitment process soon and the aim is that I'll do a three month handover period with them. They will take charge of both Sanctus1 and oversee Nexus arts cafe from September.
This has been a tough decision for me but I do believe that it is the right one. I'm still in negotiation as to what I do next, I'll still need to do about a year of my curacy at Brunswick this will be 50% of my time but will be exploring with the diocese what to do with the other 50%....I've got some ideas, such as a sabbatical!
Tags: BenEdson, Sanctus1, Emerging Church
