General Synod Election Candidates 2026

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Revd Charlie Skrine
Rector All Souls Langham Place

12 Weymouth Street, W1W 5BY
0207 580 3522
[email protected]

Proposer: ​
Revd. Louise Cathrow
(St James the Less, Pimlico)
Seconder: ​
Revd. Henry Eatock-Taylor
(St. Michael, Cornhill)

Background
I was brought up in an inter-church family (my dad was a curate in Sunbury-on-Thames and my mum
is a Roman Catholic), and spent my childhood in a mix of Roman Catholic, Anglo Catholic, Evangelical
and more Central churches. I’ve settled as an evangelical but I have found my experience helpful in
building personal links across the divisions that have played out in Synod. I have been in London
Diocese since ordination 23 years ago. I served with a café-based church for those commuting to
work near Covent Garden, and in training and leading Christianity Explored courses at St. Helen’s
Bishopsgate for those looking into Christian faith. For ten years I was curate with responsibility for
student ministry at St. Helen’s, then Associate Rector with responsibility for the long-term church
family congregation. I was also involved in Euston Church (a BMO in Camden Deanery) and latterly
Priest in Charge of St. Michael’s Cornhill, a Prayer Book Society parish with a strong choral tradition.
For the last five years I have been Rector at All Souls Langham Place.

Other Diocesan Experience
Diocesan Synod since 2006, and I’ve been involved in London Open House for City Deanery, in the
2012 Ambassadors project, in Pray For 7 as part of Capital Vision, and on the planning group for the
London Shared Conversations on Human Sexuality. I have always been excited by the chance to work
together to do things none of us could do alone in our parishes. For me, that’s also the reason to be
involved in General Synod.
I was an ADDO for Two Cities from 2016-2021. It was a huge privilege helping a wide range of
women and men explore their vocation, and has informed some of what I have given time to on
General Synod.

General Synod Experience
I was elected in 2015 and have loved getting to know all the people involved from across the country,
and the ways in which Synod operates. I have given particular attention to vocations, and to ministry
with young people.

Vocations: During the last Synod we have moved from an improving and healthy position on new
ordinands to a situation of serious concern. While there do appear to be some green shoots of
recovery, particularly in London, we are facing a national shortage of clergy unless barriers to
vocations can be addressed. Many of these barriers boil down to a lack of trust in the national
church, and a lack of confidence that the basic role of incumbent to a parish will be sufficiently
resourced and supported in the future.

There is positive experience from London to share in co-operation across traditions, in resourcing of
training, and in the tailored pathways to selection via the Elizabeth and Peter streams.

More funding for clergy in general, and for ordinands in particular has been offered but there is work
yet to do to fully secure this. In the next Synod there is likely to be a major review of funding to TEIs
and the challenge of how to balance distinctive traditions, with comprehensive preparation for a
changing Church of England, and falling numbers of ordinands.

Ministry with young people: Despite some progress in transparent publishing and analysis of data
that I have been glad to be involved with, and despite some serious funding initiatives at national
level, I remain concerned by the decline in attendance of children and young people over the last
decades, and at the continued lack of understanding of the national picture. While some Dioceses in
the last year are showing growth among young people, there remain far too few children in church
for the continued health of our parishes, and they continue to be concentrated in too few places.

I was elected to the committee of the Evangelical Group of the General Synod, and also to the Church
of England Evangelical Council as one of the representatives from General Synod.
I have served on several of the working groups connected to LLF/PLF, and also on the House of
Bishops Standing Commission on the 5 Guiding Principles, initially covering the complementarian
episcopal vacancy in Maidstone/Ebbsfleet. It has been a privilege to seek to build relational bridges
across differences of conviction. In reality this has been possible on the 5 Guiding Principles because
there is clear, consensus agreement among the Bishops that they need to be made to work, but it
has been less easy on LLF.

Aims & hopes for this Synod
Finances: There are significant decisions to be made about how the money of the Church of England
will be allocated and stewarded in the future. Parish and Diocesan income is dangerously stretched
in many places, while there remain significant capital assets. The Church of England instinct seems
always to be to centralisation and to grand but short-term gestures as opposed to long-term, local
ministry. I think we need to maintain a prayerful confidence in God for the future, along with a
conviction that parishes can grow, people will come to faith, and young people can be drawn into
whole-hearted service of God’s mission in the world.
I have acted as a Patron’s representative in small rural parishes since the mid-90s and have seen the
dangers of central over-reach against the rights of PCCs and incumbents. The demographic
challenges of the next decade will pose real risks to these local rights.

PLF: Huge energy and time has been spent, at huge personal cost to those on every side of these
debates but with little real resolution so far. The House of Bishops intend to bring new proposals in
perhaps three years time but without a sense so far of what will be different or what will enable
consensus. On Synod I have sought to build bridges with those on every side of the debate who
want to avoid the disastrous litigious splits seen in the Episcopal Church in the USA. The only hope
for any kind of resolution between those of very different convictions in the church is real honest
engagement with how deep some of these disagreements are.
I support the church’s current affirmation of the biblical pattern of chastity and marriage; I have been
involved with the development of the Alliance; my background is in involvement with CPAS, Renew
and Church Society.

Thank you for reading this; I hope it has given you a sense of where I’m coming from. Please be in
touch if you’d like to know more.

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