BEING elected to lead the Uniting Church in NSW/ACT has brought excitement, sadness and a definite appreciation of the challenges ahead for the minister of Southside Uniting Church in Tamworth.
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Reverend Simon Hansford was chosen at the church’s annual synod meeting to serve as moderator – a position of leadership equivalent to that of an archbishop but with “less power and fewer pointy hats” – and will start in September next year.
Reverend Hansford will spend three years in the role, which he described as “a moderation between voices in the church and the community”.
“Let’s say, for example, we want to engage in the challenge of asylum-seekers – as we have been – the role of the moderator is to find that middle voice and say to the community or the government, ‘We think this’ and to speak to the church and say, ‘We’re doing these things’.”
Reverend Hansford said one of the biggest challenges he foresaw was helping to lead “a large and diverse church ... in a changing community and a changing world”.
“There are going to be a number of challenges for the church which will be forced upon us to talk about – conversations about issues that are hard and challenging, like asylum-seekers, same-gender marriage, coal seam gas issues and environmental things,” he said.
Another issue would be sustaining the church in a declining rural community.
Also, he said, the Uniting Church had “a strong and wonderful history of being engaged in serving in the community” – including on issues of justice, ageing, poverty, children and families – “but how do we link that to what we believe?”
“Balancing what we do with what we say ... I want to be able to marry both of those things together in a really constructive and helpful way,” he said.
Reverend Hansford said his feelings were somewhat mixed because being a full-time moderator meant he would no longer be the Southside church’s minister.
“It’s twofold: One is the honour, the excitement and the challenge about being elected, he said.
“The other half is that I don’t want to leave Southside. I’m really, really happy here.
“We both (Reverend Hansford and wife Fiona) love and feel very loved here, and if on the weekend I’d not got the nomination, I’d have come back here happily and carried on.”
Reverend Hansford said he had “about 1000 goals” he’d like to achieve, and a tough act to follow in the current moderator, Reverend Myung Hwa Park, “an amazing woman” who speaks four languages and has been a powerhouse of action and representation for the church.
Reverend Hansford has been minister of Southside Uniting Church since 2012 and has worked in the New England North West for 10 years.
He has spent the past 25 years ministering in rural areas.
