Conference Report, June 1999
News from the AOCM Conference St. Albans UK, June 1999
In many ways it was business as usual, following the traditional formula of Matters Arising, Officer’s Reports and Issues raised by representatives.
Matters Arising
Here, a number of issues raised their familiar heads, notably the search for agreement over an amendment to the Constitution regarding the membership of AOCM and a proposed policy on Harassment for theological colleges. The former, which seeks to provide representation for accredited lay ministry in the Church of England, seems subject to further nit-picking as we referred it to the approval of the Ministry Division whilst the latter achieved a healthy (and, let us hope, decisive) consensus over definitions of harassment. It is hoped that these seemingly tedious proposals will be of benefit to documents of lasting value for those involved in theological education.
The issue of Ordination timing was raised. At the time of the conference, bishops were imminently expected to make a decision over whether or not ordinands would be given choice as to when they would like to be ordained.
On a different note, the conference heard how the Ministry Division were attempting to develop a code of good practice regarding disability in dioceses, selection conferences and training institutes.
Issues Raised by Representatives
As usual, a whole plethora of issues were raised, notably the propriety of bishops having final say over couples’ engagements; the jurisdiction of the TAP fund and the expectation that some couples should not have children during the period of training. Furthermore, there were calls for a standardised maintenance payment mechanism to allow ordinands and their families greater flexibility in their budgeting and for ordinands to propose their own rental costs rather than rely on (out of date) national guidelines.
It is hope that these issues will be addressed before the next AOCM conference at Mirfield in November. Stay tuned for further details.
Future Conferences
6-7 November, Mirfield
February 2000, St John’s Nottingham