Plenary, 20 Mar 2002

Meeting date: Wednesday, March 20, 2002

Official Report 480KB pdf

---

Time for Reflection

We welcome the Rev David Cooper to lead our time for reflection today. He is the synod secretary of the Methodist Church of Scotland.

I am, of course, anxious about leading this time for reflection. Like members, I cannot claim that I am unused to public speaking, but unlike some of you, I am not used to reading ministerial statements. I come from part of a Methodist tradition that values extemporary preaching and praying. My anxiety lies in being tied to a written text.

Throughout mainland Scotland and Shetland there are more than 70 Methodist churches, more than 30 full-time ministers and a large band of trained and approved lay people who lead worship and preach. We have been in Scotland for more than 250 years and our churches at Dunbar and Arbroath have been in continuous use since John Wesley's visits there. Our church members are part of British Methodism and we, in turn, are part of a worldwide Methodist family that has a membership of 34 million people. Within so great a number of people, across the continents and with differing histories, there is much variety of expression of faith, but there are family patterns that hold us together: a sense that God is for all people, not just some; and an awareness that holiness requires involvement in social and political issues rather than being shut off from the world.

I return to the aspect of our tradition that values extemporary speaking. In your experience you have to listen as much as speak, so you know who the star performers are. They are those who hold your attention with their grasp of the issues, present themselves clearly and engagingly, give a window into what makes them so motivated and convince you that you share their view. Some will achieve that by reading from a carefully prepared script, others will speak from notes of varying comprehensiveness and there will be those without a piece of paper to be seen. What makes the last possible for some Methodists is their reliance on being firmly grounded on a fourfold pattern: knowledge of the scriptures; awareness of church tradition; readiness to use reason; and the testing of all those by experience. That is our way of being who we are.

You have patterns, too: as an assembly, as parties and as individual members of the Parliament. There must be huge amounts of paper in circulation, as well as electronic communication. However, public speaking has its appropriate place, and I trust that we do it well, with or without notes.

Let us pray,

Almighty God,
you raised up your servants, John and Charles Wesley,
to proclaim anew the gift of redemption
and the life of holiness.
Pour out your Spirit,
and revive your work among us;
that inspired by the same faith,
and upheld by the same grace in word and sacrament,
we and all your children may be made one
in the unity of your Church on earth,
even as in heaven we are made one in you;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.