General Synod Election Candidates 2026

The Revd Dr Sarah Archer
Specialist generalist
Edmonton Area Director of Ministry
Portfolio lead for Continuing Ministerial Development
Working as a Training Incumbent and Area
Director of Ordinands while serving as a
suburban Vicar also taught me about the
pressures
of
carrying
extra-parochial
responsibilities alongside parish ministry. My
current
role
in
the
ecclesiastically
and
ethnically diverse Edmonton Area has further
widened my perspective on the Church of
England and deepened my respect for the gifts,
challenges and faithfulness of its local churches.
My responsibility for CMD in the diocese has also
helped me to grasp the challenges faced by both
clergy
and
dioceses
when
they
seek
to
implement necessary change.
The Church of England is facing crises in
vocations, in funding for theological training
and parish ministry and in clergy morale and
retention; all set within the wider context of
national and global challenges such as the rise of
extreme ideologies and the impact of global
warming.
My 26 years of ordained ministry have
similarly trained me as a ‘specialist
generalist’ priest. I have served in both
stipendiary
and
self-supporting
ministry, in urban, suburban, city and
rural parishes, and in larger churches
and cathedrals. I have been a Bishop’s
Chaplain and lived on community at Lee
Abbey
in
Devon.
Finally
I
have
experience
of
the
wider
Anglican
communion through short and mid-
term locum chaplaincy in Europe and
the USA, and surveyed non-stipendiary
ministry in the Diocese of Wellington,
New Zealand during my 2025 Study
Leave.
Why I am standing
A Time of Crisis
Contact Details
+44 7356 283580
[email protected]
https://tinyurl.com/377jdpcv
https://tinyurl.com/3ceyhm7h
36 Causton St, London SW1P 4AU
To train as a General Practitioner, I
completed
posts
in
Psychiatry,
Paediatrics, Accident and Emergency,
General Medicine and Obstetrics. Like
my colleagues, I became a ‘specialist
generalist’. We learned how to treat a
wide range of conditions and recognise
when to refer. We learned to hold the
whole person in view.
I am standing for General Synod because I believe
the Church of England needs people who can
hold together parish commitment, theological
breadth, pastoral realism and Gospel hope. My
wide experience means I truly value the local
parish as the place where people are welcomed
and
included,
faith
is
found
and
formed,
communities are served and the national Church
becomes visible in ordinary lives.
A Wider Perspective

That is why I would bring to Synod a strong commitment to renewing and resourcing
parish ministry. I place great value on the local church, and would support efforts to protect
pastoral provision and resist approaches which treat parish life as expendable. For me, this is
not nostalgia. It is a conviction that the parish remains one of the Church of England’s
greatest gifts to the nation: local, accessible, incarnational and capable of serving people
who may never otherwise cross the threshold of church life.
I am also clear that parish clergy need greater support and encouragement to be able to
prioritise evangelism and growth over the ever-increasing demands of governance and
maintenance.
My own formation has made me instinctively ecumenical and committed to the full
breadth of Anglican life. I grew up in my local middle-of-the-road Anglican church where I
now serve most months, but my faith was nurtured through the Roman Catholic chaplaincy
at university and later kindled at a charismatic evangelical Methodist church. Before
ordination training I was part of an ecumenical healing team and ran an ecumenical Alpha
course. Today, while I prefer more formal and sacramental worship, I treasure the
friendships made through the New Wine network and would describe myself, only half-
jokingly, as a committed anglo-catholic charismatic evangelical.
If elected, I would want to speak and vote for:
encouraging church growth through parish evangelism and mission;
growth in lay discipleship including an emphasis on stewardship;
sustainable support for parish ministry including simplification of governance and
safeguarding and practical help with HR and policies and procedures;
good theological formation for clergy and lay ministers;
and would pay keen attention to matters of morale, retention and ongoing clergy
training.
I feel a genuine sense of call to General Synod and would be grateful for your vote to enable
me to fulfil my desire to serve the Church in this way.
However, there is also much to celebrate and it is not hard to find signs of God’s work in
people and parishes across the land including:
growing numbers of young people turning to Christ,
burgeoning vocations in some dioceses across all kinds of churches, but particularly
those from deprived areas,
confirmation and ordination candidates who have journeyed to the church from all
over the world and from many different faiths,
the growth of new monastic communities like The Nazareth Community,
imaginative and sacrificial approaches to poverty and the cost-of-living crisis in so
many churches including debt counselling, night shelters and foodbanks.
Causes for Celebration

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