General Synod Election Candidates 2026

CANDIDATE FOR GENERAL SYNOD: DIOCESE OF LONDON (CLERGY)
Revd Jenny Erber
Curate, St Mary’s Hanwell (Deanery of Ealing)
Email: [email protected]

Proposer: Revd Preb Helen Shannon | Seconder: Revd Karen Greenidge-Silcott

A Church Where Every Voice Belongs
"I am standing for General Synod because I believe God has called me to serve, and I care deeply about
making Jesus known in every community and generation. Our Church is strongest when its leadership and
resources reflect the social, cultural, and economic breadth of the people we serve."
ABOUT ME & MY MINISTRY
•
Frontline Estate Ministry: Ordained in 2025, I currently serve as a curate in Hanwell, Ealing. My
daily ministry combines traditional parish life with contextual, pioneering mission on a local
housing estate.
•
Deep London Roots: Born and raised in Brent, I have spent my life in this rapidly changing city. I
love its extraordinary diversity and see our evolving neighbourhoods as a profound, God-given
mission opportunity.
•
Lay & Ordained Experience: My ministry began long before ordination. I served for six years as
a children’s pastor, followed by context-based ordination training split between a standard parish
and a new estate church plant.
•
Life Outside the Collar: I come from a working-class background and grew up in social housing.
I am married to Lee, a mum of four, and our lively household includes a Labrador, two cats, and a
bearded dragon.
MY PRIORITIES FOR GENERAL SYNOD

1. Centralising Estates, Low-Income, and Unreached Communities

Having grown up in social housing, I have a deep passion for estates and underserved communities.
Mission cannot simply be something we do for these areas; we must go where people are, listen, and
build genuine relationships.
•
Resourcing the Overlooked: I will advocate for strategic national funding to reach both
emerging and historically overlooked, low-income neighbourhoods.
•
Raising Local Leaders: Gifted leaders are already on our estates, caring for families and earning
trust. We must recognize those gifts and nurture faith so that future church leaders increasingly
emerge from the very communities we seek to reach.

1. Reforming Church Finances: Funding Frontline Mission

The Church faces significant questions about its resources and future. We must honestly evaluate
how our money is spent. I will challenge top-heavy central structures that tie up resources in
administrative bureaucracies and instead lobby to push funding directly down to the frontline.
•
Creative Resource Deployment: We need radical, innovative ways of funding ministry that
prioritises contextual, flexible community mission over central maintenance.

•
Equipping Local Parishes: I want to ensure that national and diocesan funding structures are
agile enough to support local parishes as they adapt, create, and share the good news of Jesus
contextually.

1. Widening Voices & Removing Barriers to Leadership

I want leadership at every level—lay and ordained—to reflect the social and economic breadth of our
parishes, particularly people from working-class and estate backgrounds. At the 2025 London
working-class consultation, I heard our collective barriers echoed clearly.
•
Pathways, Not Roadblocks: I will challenge Synod to look honestly at how training, housing,
finance, and institutional culture block working-class candidates.
•
Character Over Accent: This is not about lowering standards; it is about recognising God-given
gifts. Calling, character, and gifting—not accent, income, or educational pedigree—should
determine who is enabled to serve and lead.

1. Sustaining Our Leaders: Preventing Burnout

Continuous structural overhauls and shrinking resources have placed immense, unsustainable
pressure on our frontline leaders. If we want our parishes to flourish, we must actively care for the
people leading them.
•
Robust Support Frameworks: I will champion proactive pastoral care frameworks at the national
level to tackle the root causes of ministry stress and prevent burnout.
•
Valuing All Ministry: Pastoral care must extend to everyone holding up our parishes. This
means safeguarding the well-being of stipendiary clergy and curates, actively supporting our vital
Permission to Officiate (PTO) clergy, and equipping our lay leaders who carry heavy operational
burdens.

1. Safe, Just, and Collaborative Governance

•
Safeguarding: The Church must continue to grow in transparency, accountability, and
independent redress, ensuring we listen thoroughly to victims and survivors.
•
Bridging Disagreement: I come from a charismatic evangelical tradition, and my faith is rooted
in Scripture and attentive to the Holy Spirit. However, I deeply value the full breadth of the Church
of England. Where faithful Christians disagree on relationships, sexuality, and marriage, I will
listen to understand. Deep convictions can be held with honesty and patience—disagreement
does not have to equal division.
HOW I WILL SERVE YOU
If elected, I will not just speak in debates; I will roll up my sleeves in committees and working groups
where the real legislative work happens. God has broken my heart for people and communities too
often overlooked or left at the margins. Those who know me know that I care deeply about justice
and will speak up when voices need to be heard, while listening carefully and working constructively
across differences.
I will bring the lived, messy, beautiful reality of London’s frontline parishes straight into Synod’s
conversations. I do not have all the answers, but I am ready to offer my conviction, energy, and
prayers.
I would be deeply grateful for your first-preference vote and support.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.

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