[Magdalen] Diocese of Virginia - regions & changes

[Judy Fleener]

Sounds like you have a ton of work at hand.  We (Western Michigan) just
changed from 5 deaneries to 3 regions.  The Diocese will be hiring 3 canons
missioner (or canon missioners the fight continues over that one.) to
reside in each region and aid the increasingly large number of parishes
without full time clergy.

On Wed, Feb 28, 2018 at 10:47 AM, Grace Cangialosi <gracecan at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Cady, that’s a terrific summary of the whole history of our regions! I’ve
> never seen it put so succinctly!
>
> There has been much conversation over the years about the need/purpose of
> regions—whether it’s just one more layer of hierarchy to deal with. But
> some regions, like yours, have wonderful cooperative ministries that
> couldn’t be done by single churches. Our Region has a thrift shop, which
> provides all kinds of funds for outreach, but that’s the only region-wide
> project. Some churches do things together, but those aren’t regional
> projects.
> I’m glad they’ve reconfigured the regions more by geography. The region I
> was in before was 100 miles from top to bottom, and pall churches but one
> were small. Folks did not like traveling for regional meetings!
>
> You and Ben Shelton will make a great Dean-President team!!  I’ve supplied
> in most of those churches, and they are a great group of folks; I wish you
> every blessing!
>
> Grace
>
> > On Feb 28, 2018, at 8:52 AM, cady soukup <cadyasoukup at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > For the past 2 years, I've been the president of Region 13 of the
> > Diocese of Virginia (similar to convocations or other regional
> > groups).
> >
> > Thumbnail history: The diocese formed regions in the early 1970's by
> > deciding that each region should have roughly 5,000 communicants, and
> > assigning churches into regions until that limit was reached. This
> > meant that urban regions had fewer churches, and were closer together;
> > rural regions had up to 22 churches and were further apart. Regions
> > are to provide communication with the diocese (the Executive Committee
> > is formed of individuals appointed by each region), geographical
> > communication between churches to share ideas, support, resources and
> > missions, and collegiality amongst the clergy (the region Dean
> > schedules clericus meetings) and the lay members.Region 13 has
> > initiated many ministries throughout the decades, from substantively
> > supporting returning missionaries during their transition to
> > congregational ministry in the US, planting a LatinX congregation, St.
> > Gabriel's Church in Loudoun County, to an ongoing ministry in the
> > rural mountains of Haiti.
> >
> > In 2017, the diocese updated the regions, moving from the original 15
> > regions to a new set of 16 regions (map at
> > http://www.thediocese.net/who-we-are/regional-structures/). Our rural
> > church (Mike Mahoney and I attend Trinity Episcopal Church in
> > Washington, VA; we sometimes see Grace Cangialosi there as a supply
> > minister) moved from Region 13 (parts of Culpeper, Loudoun, Fauquier,
> > Prince William and all of Rappahannock county) to the Culpeper Region.
> > We have moved from a region where the largest church had >800 ASA and
> > the smallest had 34 ASA (for a rough total of 4500 members) to a
> > region where the largest church has about 220 ASA, the second has
> > about 140 ASA, Trinity has about 80 ASA, and the others are smaller.
> > Some are much smaller. My estimate of the total Culpeper Region
> > communicants is under 1000.
> >
> > The 10 churches are historic, rural, small churches. Some are a few
> > miles from others. One has no email or web presence (other than the
> > default diocese web site). Most face immediate challenges related to
> > low member numbers, aging buildings and mandatory maintenance (a tower
> > nearly fell down).
> >
> > The diocese contacted me to ask if I would serve as the lay President
> > of the new Culpeper Region. Newly-appointed Region Dean (St. Stephen's
> > Church, Culpeper - Benson Shelton), newly-appointed Executive Council
> > member (St. James' Church, Warrenton - Ben Maas) and I met and
> > scheduled the first Culpeper Region meeting on April 10th. I am
> > sending out email to most of the churches and mailing letters to all
> > the churches. We walk in hope that this new region will work.
> >
> > May g-d find us where we are,
> >
> > hugs anyway - Cady
>



-- 
Judy Fleener, ObJN,SSH
Western Michigan