Declining numbers worry Presbyterians

AMONG the matters to be discussed at the Presbyterian General Assembly in Belfast next week will be declining church numbers, a report urging members to re-evaluate their attitude to the Republic, and a response to the North commission on parades.

At a press conference in Belfast yesterday, it was also disclosed that the church's new Moderator will be the Rev Dr Samuel Hutchinson, clerk of the general assembly since 1990. He will address the assembly when it opens on Monday evening. It continues to the following Friday, June 6th.

More than 1,200 ministers and laity are expected to attend at Church House in Belfast, and to debate and vote on approximately 200 resolutions. Most (95 per cent) of Ireland's 297,205 Presbyterians live in the North, with presbyteries in the South located predominantly in Dublin and the Border counties.

The report on the Republic, prepared by the retired managing director of Brown Thomas in Dublin, Mr George McCullagh, describes the South as a place undergoing "very significant and extraordinarily rapid change", where Presbyterians have experienced "a real generosity of spirit" from the Roman Catholic Church.

The assembly is called on "to recognise and welcome" many of the changes taking place in the republic and to see in them "opportunities for the greater good of the whole population of Ireland".

A major concern of the church has been its declining population, which has been dropping by 1 per cent a year. Although its revenues continue to rise - income was over £14 million last year - there has been growing anxiety about this. A special assembly to discuss decline, entitled "Twenty-Twenty Vision", will take place at Coleraine between August 11th and 14th.

A resolution to be debated at the assembly on Wednesday (June 4th) urges the British government to take the North report on parades "seriously" and to put in place "as a matter of urgency" whatever mechanisms are necessary "to ensure that the marching season can be carried through in a more peaceful manner this year and in the future". There is also a plea to those involved in parades, and those protesting against them, "to give thoughtful and generous consideration to viewpoints other than their own".

A report on prisoners notes that the conditions in which they are held in Britain can differ "radically" from what pertains in the North.