The Parish Church of St John-at-Hampstead

APCM REPORT
The Annual Parochial Church Meeting was held on 25th April this year in the Moreland Hall.
Peter Ginnings was re-elected Church Warden and Sarah Knight was elected to replace Nicki Siddall, who retired. Nicky was thanked for all her work during her four-year term, special mention being made of her work in developing children’s work and her tact in reducing the baby noise at the back of the Church on Sunday mornings.

The electoral roll stood at 466 names; 40 people had joined the roll during the year, 3 had died and 1 had moved away.

The Vicar drew our attention to some of the highlights of the Annual Report for 2004, noting in particular the preparation of the Mission Action Plan and the creation of working parties to implement its initiatives. The appointment of Philip Wells as Pastoral Assistant had been a success and he had been selected for Ministry and would start training next year at Mirfield. Matthew Woodwood’s curacy was acknowledged as another success; among many other achievements the Vicar mentioned the establishment of the Mother and Toddler group, which arose out of the Lent Course. Matthew’s licensing as Priest in Charge of St Saviour’s, Pimlico, had been very splendid affair. The Hampstead Christian Study Centre was celebrating its 30th Anniversary with suitably eminent speakers. The Vicar introduced Dorothy Paton, who would be taking over Judy East’s role as Administrator, working 2 ½ days a week and overlapping with Judy, who would now be Sacristan. Judy was, unfortunately, unable to be at the meeting; Alan Goodison delivered an encomium which was printed in the last edition of this magazine.

Inigo Wolf, who had been our treasurer for twenty-five years, presented the accounts for year 2004 and his budget for the current year. He emphasised how reliant the Parish was on the regular giving of its members; the church had very little inherited wealth; and what it had was used for the fabric, rather than running costs. Shortfalls in income had, in fact, been covered by opportune legacies (notably those from Joan Barton and Dionys Moore), but these should be put to more permanent use and the Parish still needed to encourage its new members, especially, to come in to the stewardship scheme and give more generously. Steps were being taken to achieve that. Because the Charity’s income now exceeded £250,000, the accounts had to be audited rather than examined. Anthony Berryman was thanked for his work over a number of years as independent examiner. Robert Ashdown’s audit report was gratifyingly short and noted in particular the excellent records kept by the Stewardship Secretary (Robert Welsford).

At the end of the formal business, Gill Perrin thanked the Vicar, on behalf of Parish as a whole, for his commitment, enthusiasm and vision over the year.

The meeting was then addressed by Nick Mercer, the Diocesan Director of Ministry, who reported about Curates’ training. He prefaced his remarks by noting what an exciting time it was to be in London, where for the first time in many years church rolls were growing and the Diocese had managed to balance its budget.

He explained that training was a partnership between the curate, the Parish, the incumbent and the Diocese/Bishop. There were always tensions in these relationships, but they were usually positive and evidence of growth and maturity.

The subject matter of the training was spiritual growth, notably in three fields; gaining the knowledge needed to be a priest (e.g. the learning the law of marriage), gaining experience and expertise in priestly functions (e.g. how to take a marriage service) and third, personal spiritual development (e.g. an insight into the spiritual meaning of marriage). The most obviously important relationship was with the incumbent, for whom a new curate was an mixed blessing; while extra shoulders to bear some of the Parish burdens were welcome, the time and effort needed to teach and encourage the curate was a burden in itself. Hampstead, as a Parish, had along and successful history of taking curates and the latest, Matthew , had been a notable example. The Parish should remember, however, that curates learnt their trade in other places as well and that Sarah Eynstone might have very different interests and talents from Matthew. What they all needed, however, was love and support from their parishioners in addition to the pastoral, practical and academic support provided by the Diocese.

He ended by quoting statistics for ordinance in the London Diocese, which showed a slight preponderance of women and a strong bias towards the evangelical wing of the church.