Scilly's Churches to work more closely
The Isles of Scilly’s Churches will move towards a closer working relationship this weekend.
The Church of England and Methodist Church on the islands will sign a declaration of intent to "do more together", which Canon Perran Gay called a further step "along the path towards Christian unity".
He said: "We've been working together very closely for lots of years, there are lots of friendships between us, particularly the Church of England and the Methodist Church, but also with our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters. "What we're going to do on Sunday is take a further step towards working together. The Methodist Church and the Church of England are going to sign a declaration of intent, which promises that wherever possible, we'll try to do things together in our planning and resourcing and so on. It's not a massive change in the way we operate, but it's a different way of thinking."
He added: "The things which unite us are vastly more in number than the things which divide us. It's good to have different ways of worship, different ways of expressions, but it's awful if we somehow think the other ways aren't just as important and just as wonderful. Sometimes it doesn't make sense for two groups to do the same thing in parallel when we can do it so much better together."
Local Church leaders will be joined by Bishop Chris, the Acting bishop of Truro; Steve Wilde, chair of the Methodist district; and a senior priest from the Catholic community representing Bishop Mark, who is currently in Rome. The Methodist National Ecumenical Officer will also attend.
There will be a joint service on Sunday, starting at 11am in the Parish Church for the first half, after which the congregation will march to the Methodist Church for the second half.
Weather permitting, local and mainland church leaders will visit all the other churches on the islands on Saturday, say prayers together and meet some locals.