Whatever next?

The regular readers of Circuit Circle will no doubt recall an article of mine published in the summer edition with regard to two earlier articles by Allan Gill and Gordon Terry.

I was later asked by a member at one of our churches when the next item would appear, he was expecting further comment from me on that hoary old subject of decreasing congregations and ageing membership, two things which seem to go hand in hand. Of course this was asked before the news of circuit reorganisation was announced. News which does not surprise me one bit, given that many of the other churches seem to be having similar problems to our own.

So whatever next for our circuit?

It would be easy to say and do nothing in the hope that it will all go away, but as we have found in recent years, such an option achieves nothing but the loss of churches and congregations being forced upon us. For my own part I still believe that if we take action positively then we can use it to our advantage.

I still believe that we have too many churches in the circuit and our position is becoming almost unsustainable. We therefore need to take action to, 1) reduce the number of buildings we have and 2) reduce the cost of maintaining what we keep.

Reducing the number of churches would be relatively easy, and most people I speak to agree, with the caveat, not my church of course. Being purely logical about the matter it would seem that we could close down some churches and finish up with maybe four covering the area.

If this were to be the case, then from a circuit point of view, it may well be appropriate for a new circuit covering North Kirklees to be formed. Thus matching our boundaries with the local authority and keeping a separate identity for the area.

This I am sure will be a topic of conversation for many in the circuit for a long time, I wonder what others think and where they see the future.

K D Lee