{"id":140498,"date":"2025-10-14T17:22:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T21:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=140498"},"modified":"2025-10-14T19:27:52","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T23:27:52","slug":"church-times-new-congregations-liturgical-experimentation-is-a-problem-says-director-of-church-planting-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=140498","title":{"rendered":"(Church Times) New congregations\u2019 liturgical experimentation is a problem, says director of church-planting centre"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Congregationalism is being \u201csilently endorsed\u201d in the Church of England, a new report warns, because the leaders of new worshipping communities (NWCs) are writing\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/o\/xJxTw\/https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/holy-communionthe-eucharistmass\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">eucharistic<\/a>\u00a0texts for their communities without the theological support of the wider Church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The Communion Dilemma: The challenges of leading eucharistic New Things&nbsp;<\/em>draws on a survey of 63 NWCs across 20 dioceses. It reports that 39 per cent of them are using texts not authorised by the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/o\/xJxTw\/https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/general-synod\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">General Synod<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe problem is not just [that] new things are breaking the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/o\/xJxTw\/https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/topics\/canonchurch-law\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">rules<\/a>, but they are seeking to exist outside of the ecology of the wider Church, in which all can be benefit and learn from one another,\u201d the report says. One way forward would be to designate some New Things as \u201ccentres for liturgical experimentation\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The report is by the Revd Dr Joshua Cockayne, director of the Bede Centre for Church Planting Theology at Cranmer Hall. The term \u201cNew Things\u201d was used in an earlier report by the Centre, which found that dioceses had jettisoned the use of the word \u201cchurch\u201d in describing the various new worshipping communities being established in their parishes (<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/o\/xJxTw\/https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/articles\/2024\/16-august\/news\/uk\/new-churches-are-dropping-the-word-church-report-finds\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">News, 16 August 2024<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.churchtimes.co.uk\/articles\/2025\/17-october\/news\/uk\/new-congregations-liturgical-experimentation-is-a-problem-says-director-of-church-planting-centre\">Read it all<\/a>.<\/p><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Congregationalism is being \u201csilently endorsed\u201d in the Church of England, a new report warns, because the leaders of new worshipping communities (NWCs) are writing eucharistic texts for their communities without the theological support of the wider Church<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/KXm27fBSKs\">https:\/\/t.co\/KXm27fBSKs<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Church Times (@ChurchTimes) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ChurchTimes\/status\/1978072265905303695?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">October 14, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote> <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Congregationalism is being \u201csilently endorsed\u201d in the Church of England, a new report warns, because the leaders of new worshipping communities (NWCs) are writing\u00a0eucharistic\u00a0texts for their communities without the theological support of the wider Church. The Communion Dilemma: The challenges<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=140498\">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":[324,183,184],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-140498","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church-of-england","category-liturgy-music-worship","category-parish-ministry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140498","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=140498"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140498\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":140503,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140498\/revisions\/140503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=140498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=140498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=140498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}