Synod Standing Committee Update 30th September 2022

Posted in News

Interim General Secretary and Associate General

  • The Position Description for Director UnitingCare was approved and will now proceed to advertising.

  • Updated By-Laws: The following By-laws were updated and have now been placed on the Synod website UCA SA - Synod by-Laws:
    • Admission of Minsters By-law 19.1
    • UnitingCare By-law 13.1.

  • The 2023 stipend and allowances were approved as detailed in Schedule A 2023 Approved Schedule A 2023 pdf.pdf (uca.org.au).

  • Mr Mark Waters was elected to the Synod Covenanting Committee effective from 1st October 2022.

  • It was agreed to withdraw the Noarlunga Parish Mission Council designation and recognise the re-establishment of the Noarlunga Church Council effective from 1st October 2022. (Reg. 3.9.1 (e)).

  • Further to the Task Group Review of Position Descriptions, Table Groups considered questions around qualifications, leadership, governance and organisational skills, experience, relatability and the complexity of the role of General Secretary.

UnitingCare SA

The report from UnitingCare SA contained:

  • Amendments to the constitution of St Andrew’s Hospital
  • Appointments to boards and committees of the Resthaven Inc., Uniting Communities and Uniting Country SA Ltd.

Mission and Leadership Development Board

Updates were given to various aspects of the future of Uniting College for Leadership and Theology (UCLT) and staffing including:

  • Endorsement of the Positions Descriptions for:

    • Director of Leadership (1.0FTE)
    • Director of Biblical Studies (New Testament) (1.0FTE)
    • Lecturer in Systematic Theology & Church History (1.0FTE)
    • VET Coordinator (0.8FTE)
    • Academic Dean (0.5FTE).

  • Dr Merryn Ruwoldt (on secondment from the Australian Lutheran College) was commended for her outstanding contribution.

  • Rev Prof Vicky Balabanski was thanked and commended on her work and congratulated in relation to her recent appointment to Professor.

Engagement Ministry Centre

Executive Officer, Bridget Ransome provided a verbal update in regard to the Engagement area of the Synod advising:

  • Staffing – with the recent loss of a Graphic Designer – the recruitment process has commenced to replace this position.

  • The Congregational Website Program currently has 62 websites within the program. These websites have been built and are monitored on a daily basis by Engagement. Four more new websites are currently under construction.

  • A risk was recently identified whereby if we host other people’s websites we may, by default be responsible for any material on websites that is considered defamatory or in breach of copyright. As a result of this the Congregational Website Program agreement forms have recently been updated and will be sent out to all website users to re-sign. The amended amended agreement now includes a clause in relation to hosting of material on websites.

  • Engagement staff are now working on a range of design materials required by congregationa leading into the Christmas season.

  • The EO Engagement advised that she will shortly be attending the PROK visit to South Korea. Whilst on the trip she will be undertaking a range of communications activities to promote and lift the profile of international mission within the church.

Presbytery Decisions

The following Presbytery decisions were noted:

Generate Presbytery

  1. Agree to recognise the new church community (campus) at Kurralta Park as a faith community and a new church plant under the oversight of Seeds Uniting Church from 1st July 2022 (Reg 3.9.2. (a)).
  2. Agree to recognise Mark and Joy Elford as the Pastors of this church plant.

Presbytery of Southern SA

  1. It was decided that Presbytery of Southern SA endorse the new name of the new congregation at Victor Harbor and Pt Elliott as ‘Newland-Pt Elliot Uniting Church’ as of 1st October 2022, and that it will officially open in November 2022.

  2. The Murrayville Cowangie congregation has closed and the property has been sold and settled as of 13th September 2022 - advised by Vic/Tas Synod.

Wimala

Recognise the International Prophetic Pentecostal Congregation as a Faith Community of the Uniting Church in Australia for a period of five (5) years, commencing 1st January 2022, subject to development of a Memorandum of Understanding (refer Wimala Presbytery Rule WPR 1.11).  WP2022_02_1 (26 Feb 2022).

Synod Standing Meeting Dates 2023

3 February

30 June

1 December

31 March

11 August

 

5 May

1 September

 

2 June

3 November

 

 

 

 


More from News

Subscribe to receive News articles by email >


Comments

Comments (3)