A FUTURE FOR THE URC? Winter 2017 Winter toFree Believe CONTENTS Thoughts on the future of the URC 3 The future of the URCy Martin Camroux 17 Reflections on the theme Anthony Tucker Marian Tomlinson Roger Wilson Michael Powell David Parkin Adrian Skelton David Bedford David Coaker Peter Varney John Bradbury Gethyn Rees David Lawrence Andrew Kleissner The PDF version of Briefing can be downloaded from the Free To Believe website http://www.freetobelieve.org.uk Edited by David Lawrence (
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[email protected]> 2 THE FUTURE OF THE URC Martin Camroux’s paper was the spark for the responses printed in this edition of Briefing. It draws on the many months of study and thought he spent in writing his book Ecumenism in Retreat An ecumenical church The United Reformed Church came into being in 1972 by uniting the Congregational and Presbyterian Church with the aim of breaking the ecumenical log-jam and initiating a move towards wider unity. This hope failed leaving the Church with long-term problems of identity. At the time of union Arthur Macarthur had warned that without the hoped-for wider unity, “Any union between the Congregational Church and ourselves would result in a united church confused about its pur- pose and unable to find a role”. In 1997 he wrote: “I sometimes feel the chill of that prophecy”. There were 3 main factors militating against the ecumenical dreams: • Apart from the Methodists no-one else was willing to dissolve them- selves into a wider union.