Minutes of Steering Committee Meeting on June 5th 2013

These minutes were taken with the flow of discussion, and have been recorded here in the same way.

The meeting opened with sharing.

Some Committee members have concern about completing the task within the time frame.

Many members of the congregation are holding on to issues of the past and not moving forward, it is not possible for us to fix what happened in the past. Many other blame having too many groups within the congregation for the "dissonance". We see it as an asset. There is still a lot of anger about Greg leaving.

Brace has had discussions with Lyn McDonald.

It is felt by some members of the Committee that we are seen as people to blame for the situation the Church is in. We are being attacked personally. We are not going to gain anything from this process the everyone else will not gain.

We are concerned that people are not reading the information that has been provided by the committee. What can we do about this?Some are saying there is too much, others that there is not enough.

Some discussion took place about "Cell Groups" as others have experienced within varying congregations. They are multi service, multi age groups that all members are a part of, looking after Bible Study, support and fellowship.

John will (an indeed already has) provide a timeline for the Congregational meeting, for the time leading up to the meeting, as well as for the meeting itself. The agenda for the meeting needs to be ready Sunday week (the 16th).

Our job ends when we hand over the proposal to Church Council (formally) by June 18th meeting. Needs to be approved in principle to go to the Congregational Meeting on July 1st. Thus we need to go to CC with a recommendation on the sizer of council. This will be 10 Councillors + 2 Coops + 2 ministry team representatives. In order to keep the council to a small size, and to minimize the time demands on staff, up to 2 representatives of the ministry team will be at each Council Meeting.

Do Elders who do not resign have to be on Council? The regulations suggest so, unless Presbytery authorises otherwise. This lead to a review of the conflict between Greg Crowes' interpretation of the regulations, and ours. John will follow this through to get a Legal verdict on this from Greg Crowe and the General Secretary of Syndod. It appears that we will invite people to stand down, but they are entitled to stay if they choose to. Untidy but true.

At the Congregational Meeting, the proposed new structure will be presented. There will be a call for nominees for the new Council (assuming the proposal is accepted), and before this Alanee will run her series of sermons on Discerning your Spiritual Gifts. Maybe also a forum/presentation for those who are considering nominating. Nominations will be called for as soon as the meeting has finished.

We really need to provide Position Descriptions for the new Councillors to consider. Regulations state the Council role very clearly, and this is to be bpresented at the congregational Meeting.

Nominations will close at the end of July, the election will be 2 weeks later (mid August), and the new Council will meet for the first time in September. It will be up to the Congregational Chair and Secretary to organise this, not us or Church Council/

Mission groups need to be given permission to evolve - this should be given a the Congregational Meeting (if proposal is approved)

Rosters etc to take place when possible - existing rosters are to continue until the new service groups are finalised.

Retired ministers may train Eucharist group etc.

We really need a champion for each Roster to keep things going in the interim.

Forum scheduled for Wed 19th of June, bring snacks

Next meeting June 26th, if needed.