In 2011, the management thinker and educator Charles Handy was one of a three-person team charged with examining the future of the Church in Wales. He, I and Patricia Peattie, the former chair of the Episcopal Church in Scotland, travelled across the country listening to crowds of people willing to share their views.
Charles was sceptical about any report ever being enacted, but he could be reassured on this count. Our starting point was that: “The parish system as we have known and loved it for a thousand years is no longer viable.”
In a report the following year we recommended that while local congregations would remain with local leadership they would be part of large ministry areas each served by a small professional team. The Church in Wales began to put this into effect years before the Church of England began to think about it.
