{"id":140191,"date":"2025-10-02T11:59:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T15:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=140191"},"modified":"2025-10-02T18:02:41","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T22:02:41","slug":"telegraph-the-next-archbishop-must-care-for-the-church-not-political-fashions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=140191","title":{"rendered":"(Telegraph) Bijan Omrani&#8211;The next Archbishop must care for the Church, not political fashions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>These works of local hospitality \u2013 flowers, music, refreshments, keeping the church warm \u2013 may seem simple, but they are fundamental to the church\u2019s mission: to draw people together in fellowship to hear the word of Christ. And whilst the works are simple, organising them isn\u2019t. A service like our Harvest Festival needs many to help: everyone from clergy to musicians and flower-arrangers. However, ever fewer are willing to volunteer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In recent decades, the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/o\/XWevq\/https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/church-of-england\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Church of England<\/a>&nbsp;has undergone a relentless programme of centralisation. Money and powers have been drawn upwards from parishes to dioceses and new bodies like the Archbishops\u2019 Council.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These central bodies are fixated on grand visions and political fashions rather than the practical work of local parishes. They are reluctant to spend money on paying for ordinary clergy and churches.&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/o\/XWevq\/https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/opinion\/2025\/04\/19\/letters-church-ditch-modish-obsessissions-back-to-basics\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Instead, funds are soaked up by growing bureaucracies<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/news\/2025\/10\/01\/the-next-archbishop-must-care-for-the-church\/\">Read it all<\/a>.<\/p><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">&#x270d;&#xfe0f; &#39;The next Archbishop must care for the Church, not political fashions&#39; | Writes Bijan Onrami<br><br>Read the column &#x2b07;&#xfe0f;<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/w0mDBc3HsW\">https:\/\/t.co\/w0mDBc3HsW<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/p2kGynnk50\">pic.twitter.com\/p2kGynnk50<\/a><\/p>&mdash; The Telegraph (@Telegraph) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Telegraph\/status\/1973629177522782400?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 2, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>These works of local hospitality \u2013 flowers, music, refreshments, keeping the church warm \u2013 may seem simple, but they are fundamental to the church\u2019s mission: to draw people together in fellowship to hear the word of Christ. And whilst the<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=140191\">Read more &#8250;<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":794,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67,389,635,437,435,184],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-140191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archbishop-of-canterbury","category-church-of-england-coe","category-coe-bishops","category-ministry-of-the-laity","category-ministry-of-the-ordained","category-parish-ministry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/794"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=140191"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":140194,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140191\/revisions\/140194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=140191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=140191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=140191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}