An enthusiastic church-planter forced to take drastic action after being cynically frustrated by his liberal bishop. Viewed from afar, this is how many evangelicals might well see the recent events within Southwark diocese. However the fact that well over thirty evangelical clergy from within the diocese have been happy to add their names to a letter supporting the action of Bishop Tom Butler suggests that those much closer to the scene have a rather different perspective. I was one of the clergy who signed the letter in support of Bishop Tom's action against Rev Richard Coekin and value the opportunity to explain something of the local perspective that led to so many of us taking this decision.
The basic problem with the church planting of Mr Coekin is in the destructive effects of its separatist agenda. The roots of this lie in the status of Emmanuel Wimbledon as a Proprietary Chapel which has led, among other things, to the church and its plants being able to avoid making any financial contribution to the diocese. Emmanuel, Dundonald and their other plants fund their clergy directly and this also goes for the training costs of their ordinands. A significant effect of this is that built into the Dundonald psyche, therefore, is the very un-Anglican norm that contact and collaboration are only necessary with those Christians with whom they wish to have contact and collaboration. Unlike most evangelical Anglican churches, Emmanuel, Dundonald and its various plants have been able to make themselves impervious to any external influences other than the ones that they select. Officially Anglican, they have in practice become a federation of independent churches with a genuine commitment of unity only towards those churches that share their precise theological standpoint.
This ideological background has had a huge bearing on the way in which Mr Coekin has developed his church planting strategy since collaboration with any group or church that might influence the nature of these plants has been out of the question. Non-evangelical parishes have therefore been targeted for most of Mr Coekin's plants precisely because their theological distance from Dundonald rules out any real collaboration from the start. The clergy of these churches have generally been happy to agree to these plants because they rightly see no real competition with what they are offering. Where problems have emerged, however, is with those evangelical churches that have bordered on these parishes. It is these churches that have perceived Dundonald's plants to be "cherry picking" from their members and generally undermining their ministry. Paradoxically the convention of parish consent has facilitated Mr Coekin here because his plants have been outside the parishes of those churches upon which they have had the most destructive effect, allowing them little recourse to appeal. Whatever the claims of Mr Coekin, genuine collaboration in the setting up of these plants, has thus been completely avoided. Staying largely within the letter of the diocesan guidelines on church planting, Mr Coekin has entirely departed from the spirit of these stipulations.
The true nature of this approach became apparent when official "collaboration" was declined by the parish targeted for another plant in Kingston. In that case, Mr Coekin went ahead anyway, getting around the diocesan guidelines by establishing the plant as a non-Anglican church. The justification offered was that he was assisting the activities of a Free Evangelical Church in the area rather than establishing an official plant of Dundonald. Needless to say, the evangelical Anglican clergy of that area, have seen the reality as another attempt to grow a church at the expense of their ministry. There are one or two similar stories in other parts of the country with the plant within St Nicholas' parish in Durham being a notable example.
The major complaints about Mr Coekin, therefore, have come from evangelical churches who have perceived his efforts as a systematic attempt to undermine their ministries. Far from being anti-evangelical, the resistance that Bishop Tom Butler has shown to ordaining clergy for these plants, has grown out of genuine concern for those evangelical churches he sees as being undermined by this activity.
The deadlock over these ordinations, which has lasted three years, has arisen, in my opinion, through Bishop Tom's hope that Mr Coekin might move towards a genuinely collaborative approach to his ministry. In fact it has been precisely from evangelicals that he has been under pressure to end this forbearance and act more sternly. The correct way through this impasse would have been for Mr Coekin to have accepted that a more genuinely collaborative approach to his activities was needed. Instead of this, he manufactured a casus belli out of the House of Bishops' response to the Civil Partnerships Act to engineer the "ordination" of his charges.
Bishop Tom's attitude towards church planting has been demonstrated by the encouragement that he has given to other, genuinely collaborative efforts that have crossed parish boundaries in Southwark. One such venture is the OXYGEN youth project spearheaded by one evangelical Anglican church in the Kingston area and planted into another, with its full cooperation. Nearly all the Anglican churches within the local Chapter and the churches of several other denominations have worked together in providing finance for this project and input into its direction. Where he has been confident of genuine respect and collaboration, Bishop Tom has also actively encouraged other plants and "grafts" by evangelical Anglican churches within the diocese.
My contention, therefore, is that things are not always what they seem when viewed from a distance. The clash between Bishop Tom Butler and Rev Richard Coekin is far from the liberal versus evangelical conflict that many would present it as. In reality it is an ecclesiological clash brought about by the aggressive, separatist agenda of the Dundonald group of churches. And this is why as a committed evangelical Anglican, I and many other evangelical clergy, have been so determined to support Bishop Tom.
Stephen Kuhrt is Vicar of Christ Church, New Malden.