Our AGM & Annual Service of Thanksgiving & Rededication of Chaplains
happened on Thursday May 12, 2011,
at St Nicholas Cathedral, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne
The Leader and Preacher was Bishop Frank White
Chair's report 
Census forms had to be returned recently. I hope you’ve done yours.
There were those who just didn’t return questionnaires:“What’s a census? I never received a form.” Or “Oh, I just binned mine, I didn’t think it was important. What, a £1000 fine if I don’t! Do you have another one, please?”There were those who might get round to it eventually, but it wasn’t a priority: “Yes, I will do it but I’m too busy now so you’ll have to come back another time.”There were those who couldn’t return the form: “I can’t do the questionnaire because I’m dyslexic. I’ll need help to fill it in. Do you want to come in and do it with me?” Then there were those who just wouldn’t fill it in: “No, I haven’t filled it in because I don’t believe in it. It’s a waste of money and I don’t want the government to know my business. They’ll put all my details on a disk and then lose the disk.”You’ve no idea how many times I wanted to tell them: “Look, mate, pregnant Mary and Joseph had to travel to the other end of the country on a donkey to get their questionnaire in. You get it delivered and collected on your doorstep!”
Quite a few people needed help to fill theirs in and a lot of them ticked the box “No religion”. Not just NonReturners but NonBelievers. ‘NonBelievers’. Not a very helpful term for a very complex response to religion. Tongue in cheek, Peter Fleetwood, a Liverpool priest, listed 4 types of unbelievers: Don’t-Believers, Might-Believers, Can’t-Believers and Won’t-Believers.
Don’t-believers. Census collecting, I got the feeling that these were the most common non-believers. “Now this one is optional; you don’t have to answer it. What’s your religion?” “None, really. No religion.” They’re not opposed to religion. Religion just isn’t an issue. They’ve never been baptised. Religion hasn’t mattered to them.
Might-believers: are quite open to the possibility of God’s existence. They’re spiritual, willing to listen. Maybe their family and background have been only nominally religious. Last week I preached at the Workers’ Memorial Day held by the North East Shop Stewards Association. Most of them probably didn’t attend any church, but they came with their banners, their stories, their respect.
Can’t-believers: are people for whom the idea of a loving God just doesn’t stack up with their experience. If they think there’s a God at all, He doesn’t care about people. And they know, because bad things have happened to them.
Won’t-believers: they hate religion, blame religion. Religion is unworthy of thinking beings, an insult, the root of most evils. War? Religion’s fault. Poverty? Blame religion. These are your Dawkins & Hitchens.
NIM chaplains meet all of these “Non-believers” as they minister in the workplace. It may seem a daunting task till we remember that it’s not they who reveal God’s presence. Moving people from saying “God is NO-WHERE” to saying “God is NOW-HERE” is the job of the Holy Spirit. And I often think that, paradoxically, that’s a job more easily done at work than at church. It was George Bernard Shaw who said “Beware of the man whose God is in the skies.” God comes to us from below. Jesus dwelt among us and revealed God to us through his human face. Liberation theologians speak of ‘history from below’. In fact, revelation and salvation come from below.
And today is the opportunity we relish each year to thank our chaplains for being the earthenware jars that carry this amazing treasure in the workplace - where ‘mission’ happens, where ’evangelisation’ crackles: in the family and on the shop floor, in the prison and hospital, airport and Asda, through ordinary relationships and everyday experiences. God comes from below. I can report that this year again our chaplains have gone from strength to strength, and while we’re delighted to welcome Dorothy Dryden, who we hope will be looking at rural issues, we thank those who have moved on or left – Fr Simon Lerche and David Gray from the Airport, and Pat Briscol from Royal Quays.
We also hosted a number of students on placement with us from Cranmer, the Wesley Study Centre and Lindisfarne. NIM’s Management Committee has welcomed 2 new members: Mr Iain Ogilvie who works for Northumberland County Council, and Father David Tanner who is Parish Priest at Whittingham and brings vast rural experience to NIM. However, we shall miss Chris Knights who left to take up his new ministry in Scotland. My personal thanks go to them, but especially to the Executive Committee who oversee the day-to-day management of NIM: Fiona, Terri, Douglas, Charlotte and Joan.
Last year we launched the Annual Report at the MetroCentre; this year we’re changing the way we present the information: instead of a single annual booklet, we’re going to produce periodic newsletters and a new website. The Annual Report has been NIM’s major publicity tool over the years but this year Fiona Usher has produced a new 4 minute DVD to promote NIM’s work primarily to local congregations. When you see it, I’m sure you’ll agree with me that it is both moving and evocative. Next year we celebrate the 45th anniversary of NIM. So I want to give you advance notice of the first of our celebrations for NIM’s 45 year – a Service led by Rev Leo Osborn on Monday, 13 February – venue to be confirmed. 45 years!
However, we cannot live in the past because things are changing ever more rapidly. Prof Lynda Gratton, ranked as one of the top 20 business thinkers in the world today, has a book published this month called “The Shift – the future of work is already here”. She says something we really need to think about. She says that the forces now at work will, over the next decade, fundamentally shift much of what we take for granted about work, workers and organisations. She predicts that this decade will produce a schism with the past equalled in magnitude only by the Industrial Revolution. The drivers of this change won’t be iron, coal and steam; they’ll be technology, globalisation, demographic trends, need for a low carbon economy and deep societal changes. The cost of computing will drop rapidly; 5 billion people will become connected, creating a global consciousness never before seen. Mega-companies will span the globe, millions of smaller groups of micro-entrepreneurs will emerge. China and India will become the ‘back office’ and ‘factory’ of the world, and companies will look to them for their engineers and scientists.
In the midst of this massive shift she nevertheless expects more choices and opportunities to be available to us in the UK than ever before “to craft work in ways that bring value, meaning and purpose. The challenge is to embrace these changes and transform work both for individuals and for organisations.” Now, there’s a challenge!
Paul Southgate, Chair NIM
