In 2001, when I was 50, I began my ministry training at Harris Manchester College, Oxford and, as part of this training, undertook a BA degree in Theology and Religious Studies at The University of Winchester (formerly King Alfred’s College).  It was during the final year of this programme that I began my part-time development ministry for the Cirencester Unitarian Fellowship. 

 

In 2004 I added a much larger part-time ministry, that of to The Cotswold Group of Unitarian Churches – consisting of the congregations in Cheltenham, Evesham and Gloucester - to my commitments.  None of my congregations are large and none are particularly formal in the way that ‘organised religion’ is often perceived. 

 

In this context, and to my mind, the minister’s role today has two distinct aspects which I call leadership and service. 

 

Leadership, of course, includes leadership in worship, but leadership in ministry extends much further than taking services.  And I don’t mean being “in charge”, or being in a position of special authority, because ministers are not ‘special people’.  I mean enabling people to achieve their full potential in their own spiritual lives, the life of their congregation or fellowship and its worship, in the wider denomination and in their lives more generally. 

 

By service I mean that the minister should be the principal contributor to the development of the congregation and be able to co-ordinate and articulate its views, actions and concerns within, and outside, the denomination.  

 

In the course of our ministry, and this means the ministry of all our members and not just our professional ministers and lay leaders, I believe that we must above all be open to new insights and always be ready to welcome anyone who might wish to share our search for spiritual and religious truth.