Colin Podmore reports on recent developments
News from The Society
At the request of the Council of Bishops, a new Vacancies section has been added to the Society website: www.sswsh.com/vacancies.php. The intention is that all vacancies in parishes under the oversight of a bishop of The Society will be listed there, to give Society priests an overview in one place of the positions that are currently advertised. For each vacancy, there is a link to the advert on the relevant diocesan website. (Advertising in NEW DIRECTIONS will continue to be a good idea, as an advertisement here will also reach priests who are not actively looking for a move.)
Over the summer, other areas of the Society website have been re-organized and streamlined. Further information has been added to the About Us section. The material is now presented in a more user-friendly way, in an increased number of pages, which are accessible from a drop-down menu.
The new Priests and Deacons page (www.sswsh.com/ Priests-and-Deacons.php) has links to the forms which permanent deacons of both sexes and male deacons preparing for ordination to the priesthood can use to register as Deacons of The Society.
The Dioceses and Parishes section includes lists of all the churches in each diocese that are affiliated to The Society. (At www.sswsh.com/parishes.php, click on the name of the diocese to get to the diocesan page, on which there is a link to the list of churches.) For each church, the listing includes the postcode of the church building and links to the parish’s pages on www.achurchnearyou.com and the parish website.
Forward in Faith information
In some areas there is confusion
about membership of Forward in Faith. Only those who pay a subscription to Forward in Faith nationally are members of Forward in Faith. Worshipping in a Forward in Faith registered parish does not make someone a member of Forward in Faith. Some branches ask for a contribution to cover their costs in mailing newsletters and other communications (where these are still sent by post rather than email). Those who pay such a branch contribution are not members of Forward in Faith unless they are also paying a national subscription. Equally, those who pay a national subscription cannot expect to receive mailings from their local branch unless they are contributing to the cost of such mailings.
The news from The Society above was published as a news release on the Society website and a Forward in Faith ‘breaking news’ email alert was issued to draw attention to it. It is repeated here because the number of people who have signed up for FiF ‘breaking news’ emails is less than half the number of recipients of New Directions. If you would like to receive news from Forward in Faith as it is published, please go to www.forwardinfaith.com/news.php and click on the link at the top of the page. On average, a news item is published once a month, so the number of emails will not be onerous, and each email includes a link to enable the recipient to unsubscribe.