General Synod Election Candidates 2026

GENERAL SYNOD ELECTION ADDRESS

House of Clergy · Quinquennium 2026
–2031

The Revd James McCluskey · Rector, St James the Great & St Paul's, East Hill,
Colchester, Diocese of Chelmsford
Proposed by: Reverend Mark North, Vicar of St Thomas, Brentwood
Seconded by: Reverend Paula Preston, All Saints, Chigwell

An Incarnational Faith for a Fractured World
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, In my early
twenties, long before ordination, my career was as a
professional Class 1 Heavy Goods Vehicle driver.
Travelling nationwide, I witnessed deindustrialisation
systematically dismantling heavy industry: coal
mining, Welsh steel, Scottish shipyards, Bradford’s
mills, Liverpool’s docklands, and Southwestern
mines. In Essex, I saw working livelihoods erased
through the contraction of Tilbury docks and the
decline of engineering powerhouses in Colchester and
Chelmsford—Paxman,
Hoffmann
Bearings,
and
Marconi. Today, that loss still scars the social fabric of
local communities, and I see that same top-down
management culture threatening our parishes. As
General Synod passes motions affecting our Church’s
very structure, we must remember that the Church
must remain a living, physical presence in every
parish. Just as ordinary lives were fractured by
industrial demise then, so they are affected by national
church decisions today. People matter—and they
matter to God. As my young family grew, I moved into
manufacturing and logistics and later trained for
ministry at the College and Community of the
Resurrection in Mirfield and at Leeds University.

Ordained deacon in 2003 and priest in 2004, I served
my curacy at St Mary’s, Swanley, in North Kent,
followed by thirteen years as Vicar of St Luke’s,
Southend-on-Sea. Since 2018, I have served as Rector
of St James the Great & St Paul’s, East Hill, Colchester,
sharing the life of the parish alongside PCC members
and volunteers—in evangelism, sacraments, pastoral
care, schools, and buildings. God is my strength; my
wife Katy, of 38 years; our four adult children; four
grandchildren; and prayer keep me grounded in daily
parish ministry, visiting the sick, preparing to preach,
and sitting with people in their darkest hours. I
understand, from the inside, the weight of what I am
asking Synod to consider.

WHY I'M STANDING AGAIN
General Synod is not a debating society; it is where
Church law is drafted and the resources that keep local
ministry alive are allocated. I am standing because the
parish priest's voice—forged in the daily labour of the
cure of souls—must be clearly heard when those
national decisions are made.
Every day, parish clergy carry the actual weight of
frontline ministry: administering the sacraments,
preaching the Word, supporting our church/schools,
serving the poor and marginalised, and standing
alongside people in their darkest hours. True church
renewal will not come from top-down schemes that
treat the parish as an administrative cost rather than
the heart of our mission.
“Stand firm, as an anvil when it is smitten.”
— St Ignatius of Antioch, to Polycarp
My working life before ordination was spent
navigating logistics and accountability under real
pressure. That background taught me that genuine
authority on Synod is not won by talking the loudest—
it is earned through diligence and preparation:
•
Doing the work: Scrutinising every paper and
financial report before the debate, not after.
•
Persistence: Following commitments through
from one group of sessions to the next,
ensuring promises are kept.
•
Accountability: Asking the direct, practical
questions about budgets and policy that need
answering on behalf of our parishes.
I stand to ensure that the voice of the parish priest—
and the faithful volunteers who serve beside us—
remains steady, constructive, and unyielding in the
councils of our Church.
SAFEGUARDING COMES FIRST
Safeguarding is our paramount sacred duty and the
absolute foundation of institutional integrity; without
it, all gospel ministry is compromised. We must
uphold the highest safety standards to protect the
vulnerable and support victims and survivors with
unyielding, active care. Given the solemn trust placed
in those exercising the ministry of reconciliation and
hearing formal confession, mandatory, high-quality
certificated training must be required for every priest
in this role. Clergy must be thoroughly equipped to
distinguish formal confession from general pastoral
care, ensuring standard statutory reporting protocols
apply swiftly and without ambiguity everywhere else.

FUNDING THE PARISH, NOT THE CENTRE
The Church Commissioners hold an endowment of
£11.6bn, and only 8% of their planned annual
distribution is currently ring-fenced for parish
ministry. Dioceses employ, on average, one central
member of staff for every 3.5 parish clergy — against
a charity-sector average of one to eight. That is not a
funding problem so much as a priorities problem, and
it is the issue. I support SAVE the Parish, and with
them will keep raising the voice until we see the
following changes:
Restore the Commissioners' endowment to its
founding purpose — sustaining stipendiary priests in
parishes, especially the poorest — rather than funding
strategic projects and central staff.
Direct the parish share itself toward mission and the
cure of souls, not toward servicing a diocesan centre
that keeps growing while parish clergy numbers keep
falling.
Reform the draft Mission and Pastoral Measure, so a
parish facing closure or merger keeps its right of
appeal and proper legal representation.
CLERGY
WHO
ARE
CARED
FOR,
NOT
MANAGED
I know what an unsustainable benefice looks like: I see
the strain on our clergy as we are asked to stretch
across more and more parishes. Full-time stipendiary
clergy have fallen to a historic low of 6,295, down 28%
since 2000, and in 2025 more priests resigned than
retired. That is not a recruitment problem; it is a
Church burning through its own priesthood.
— Stipendiary cuts must stop being used to plug
budget deficits — job security is a baseline, not a
luxury we can no longer afford.
— Benefices capped at a size a single priest can
actually know and be known in — no more than
five parishes.
— Ministry judged by whether people are visited,
buried, and cared for well, rather than by growth
metrics.
TRUSTING OUR VOLUNTEERS
Parishes cannot survive without their laity, yet we
reward their dedication with an ever-growing
mountain of bureaucracy. I will champion a firm cap
on new procedural requirements, demand a clear
distinction between genuine legal obligations and
mere diocesan policy, and call an immediate halt to
prolonged vacancies left open to save money — our
churchwardens and volunteers deserve far better.
HOLDING TO WHAT WE'VE RECEIVED
I hold to the historic understanding of Holy
Matrimony set out in Canon B30, and I hold that
conviction with grace toward everyone, whatever
their own view.
GROWING THE CHURCH
Real church growth is a theological reality, not a
managerial metric, yet national funding is routinely
directed into top-down schemes rather than local
parishes. True growth relies on three fundamental
primacies:
•
Evangelism:
Proclaiming
Christ
as
our
primary task. 1 Corinthians 9:16
•
The Holy Spirit: Trusting God for growth,
rather than central engineering. Acts 1:8
•
Leadership:
Delivering
clear,
intentional
discipleship on the ground. Matthew 28:19–20
My conviction is forged in daily parish life—where
leading weekly school Eucharists, assemblies, and
securing a distinctively Christian ethos for SIAMS at
St James the Great reveals what actually builds faith in
families. This is how we grow the Church young:
through steady, physical presence and regular
sacramental life, not short-term central initiatives. At
Synod, I will bring this frontline reality to national
debates, voting to bypass central bureaucracies and
strategic schemes to deliver funding directly to parish
stipends where real ministry happens.
IF YOU ELECT ME
If You Elect Me: Standing on Ordination Vows At
my ordination, I swore before God to serve His
Church, preach the Word, and uphold the faith set
forth in Holy Scripture and the catholic creeds. I stand
for Synod not to play politics, but to honour those
vows with bold courage.
In the words of St Ignatius of Antioch: “Stand firm, as
an anvil when it is smitten.”
If elected, I will maintain contact throughout the
quinquennium—not just appearing every five years.
My service will be governed by three principles:
•
Fidelity: Upholding inherited doctrine and
proclaiming Christ without apology.
•
Fortitude: Standing firm against central
bureaucracy and the dismantling of the parish
system.
•
Frontline Stewardship: Directing resources
and stipends to the parish clergy and
volunteers sustaining daily ministry.
I ask for your prayers and your first preference vote—
or a second or third preference, as high as you can give
me, please. In the Cross of Christ.
The Revd James McCluskey. St James the Great & St
Paul's Church, East Hill, Colchester
[email protected] 01206 860419

accountability,benefice,catholic,church commissioners,church growth,clergy numbers,curacy,dioceses,discipleship,doctrine,evangelism,fidelity,gospel,mission,ordination,parish share,pcc,prayer,sacramental,safeguarding,save the parish,scripture,stewardship,stipendiary,survivors,victims