The Rev Oliver Coss column: New Ministry

There are all sorts of new faces in public life at the moment. Sir Keir Starmer slipped up in Parliament the other week by speaking of the Prime Minister as someone else, suggesting that even he is getting used to things. In the Church of England, the summer months are often the time where we add new ministers, new priests and deacons, to our parishes. In many churches and cathedrals throughout England, there will have been special services of ordination celebrated by our bishops, at which ordinary men and women are taken and created gospel ministers to serve the Church of God.

In our church, once it has discerned with you that God is calling you to a new way of serving him in your life, you generally undergo a number of years at a college or on a course, being formed and prepared for the task ahead of you. Ordination is both the culmination of this initial training, but especally the beginning of new, public ministry in whatever place you are being sent. New ministers will most often become ‘curates’, working with another experienced priest for 3-4 years, initially as a deacon and then as a priest, before being sent to their own parish or chaplaincy.

In Peterborough Diocese there are six new deacons and twelve new priests working in the towns and villages of (mostly) Northamptonshire. It's been some 34 years since there was a curate at All Saints’ Church, but with great joy, on the evening of 18th July, we welcomed a new curate, Father Nicolas Boisson, to serve in our parish and the wider town of Northampton. This will be a very special time for him as he gets to know and love the town, it’s people, and especially those who worship at All Saints. As a deacon he takes a particular role in church, proclaiming the gospel, helping to distribute holy communion, and caring for those who are in need. He will already have been visible to many already who have seen him in worship, talked to him at other times, or perhaps seen him walking through town, enjoying our coffee shops, and occasionally sampling Northampton’s excellent night-life. Next year, God-willing, he will be ordained priest where he will take a full part in leading the worship of the church.

I know that he will be made very welcome here, because I have been made to feel very welcome during my brief eight years here, but I also hope that he will be well used by our townsfolk for his wisdom and compassion, and what is already a warm, understanding, and pastoral heart.

Sometimes all we read in the press is about the church’s inexorable decline. In so many places, however, that is far from the truth, and not least is that true when we consider the many young people who still come forward each year to set aside their old life in order to enter ordained ministry. If you do, please pray for them, and for Fr Nicolas that his offering in this place might always be pleasing to God.