The three Church of England churches in Barnes are legally joined as a Team Ministry. While we keep our own PCCs, finances and distinct ethos, the team structure gives us all, clergy and laity, extra strength for our mission and ministry from receiving and giving mutual support. The membership of the Team Council includes the Team clergy, Readers and Churchwardens with two elected lay members from each church. The three churches bring different but complementary styles of churchmanship and each church can learn from each other’s gifts. The Team Council seeks to develop the relationships between the churches, with opportunities to share in worship, and joint activities.
During the year our new Team Rector of Barnes and Vicar of St Mary’s was appointed. Lay representatives of the Team, with the vicars of Holy Trinity and St Michael’s and All Angels, formed the majority of the Patronage Board that was responsible for the selection of James. The Team Council under its new Team Rector has decided that a future key role of the team will be for the churches to support each other through the provision of resources. St Mary’s has recently held a course in good safeguarding practice and we were pleased that representatives of Holy Trinity joined us for that. We also anticipate that individual churches may own equipment that could be lent out to another church, rather than each buying their own.
The Team jointly own 52 Boileau Road, as accommodation for a team curate. Holy Trinity have now asked to sell their share. We had understood that the diocese would buy the share, and become joint owners with St Mary’s and St Michael’s. The house would then be available for a curate from the deanery, with preference for St Mary’s and St Michael’s. As now the house would be available for commercial let when not needed for a curate. The diocese is now saying that they do not have the funds to buy the share. So the way forward is now for the three churches to consider again. The annual accounts of the Team for 2019 show that the main item is income from the current letting of the house and the expenditure on repairs etc that falls to the Team as landlord. The year-end accounts show a figure of £50,339 as total current assets.
Peter Boyling, Secretary to the Team Council