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Interview: Sue Parks Lambeth Conference Organiser
Posted On : July 20, 2008 3:24 PM | Posted By : Webmaster
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I?m bringing together all the planning and organisation of the Lambeth Conference to make it happen. It?s like putting the pieces of a great big jigsaw together, with a little team of three other people.

We started off with a blank sheet of paper, about three years ago - although the University of Kent had been booked as the venue some time before that - and we?ve been working with an enormous number of committees and individuals.

It?s been a three-year full-time contract for three of us, and we were joined by a fourth person in January. I won?t be doing it again. I?ll be too old by the  next one.

My background is in working with Christian mission agencies. I was the director of SPCK Worldwide, and Feed the Minds, which meant I had a lot of experience of working and travelling around the Anglican Communion, which I thoroughly enjoyed. The Archbishop was keen to have someone who knew and was known in the Anglican Communion.

My job has been to take all the ideas and vision of the design group, working with Archbishop Rowan, and to mould it into a programme, and deliver it.

In fact, it is really two conferences, because there?s the spouses? conference as well. And then there?s the transport side of it to organise - getting all those people here, especially those who are travelling on a bursary.

I suppose one of the worst moments was when the events manager of Canterbury Cathedral looked at the long-range weather forecast for the summer and saw lots of rain predicted. Today [last Friday] we?re putting up a marquee to hold 1500 people, because the university doesn?t have a venue big enough to hold everyone.

But the organisation hasn?t been too terrible. There has been an enormous amount of good will, and I?ve really enjoyed working with such a wide range of people. I?ve travelled round the world talking to bishops and some spouses, and encountered a lot of good will there, too; so there?s that side of things, as well as delivering the Conference.

The sheer volume of minutiae has been overwhelming in recent weeks: tying up people?s travel arrangements and enquiries. Three-quarters of the people coming will never have been to a Lambeth Conference before. Still, we?ve had a great deal of fun along the  way.

We didn?t know from the start what was happening about numbers and politics, but once Archbishop Rowan?s invitations had been sent out, and the replies started to come in, and we saw we had enough beds filled to make the Conference viable, we just tried to make the best Conference we could for the Archbishop. We could see from early on there was a huge  take-up.

There is an irony, because I?m actually from the diocese of Sydney. The fact that my own bishops aren?t coming is a disappointment.

It?s been our policy not to comment on numbers. It?s been amazing to see what appeared in the press, because only three of us knew who were coming. Now it stands at 650 bishops and 570 spouses - but each day we get more registrations. Some of that?s cultural, but some have changed their minds since GAFCON. Only one has pulled out because of GAFCON.

None of us have had a lot of time off since January. And hay fever in Kent is also an issue. 
. . But I?m going away in September, and will be going to New Zealand for a month in December to stay with some good friends.

I don?t know what I?ll do next. I?ll look for something after the Conference is over.

I wanted to be a social worker in my teens, to help people; but I somehow ended up studying the wrong subjects at school for various reasons. So the world has probably been spared that.

I ended up in education, though. I studied librarianship and worked in all aspects, from pre-school to teaching librarianship at university level. I?m sad that I?ve lost touch with much of children?s literature, because I?ve always enjoyed it: it?s very nuanced and fun.

Because I?m travelling so much these days, crime fiction has become my mainstay. And, like half the world, I really enjoy The No. 1 Ladies? Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith. From my travels I can say it rings very true to life.

I?m on my own in Britain. My family is in Australia. I have strong friendships in both, and I make a strong investment of time and energy to bridge my two worlds. I don?t have any big regrets - but the distance between my two different worlds means I have to find ways of trying to bridge that gap.

I suppose my most important choice was choosing to take a full-time job in Britain. That?s what started me off in this second career.

?She did what she could, and was a reasonable human being?  - that?s about the level of my aspirations for an epitaph.

Monica Furlong was an inspiration to me. I got to know her in the early ?80s when she was in Australia, and she was one of the few people I knew in Britain when I first came here. I spent a lot of time with her, and I miss her intellect, her conversation, and the reading she gave us all.

All the catering at the University of Kent is Fairtrade, and Canterbury is a Fairtrade city. We?re also doing our best to be environmentally friendly at the Conference and not to leave too big a carbon footprint. We?ve identified two projects in Bangladesh and Burundi which people will be invited to contribute to through Christian Aid, to offset their travel. I buy Fairtrade coffee to use at home, but I don?t have a favourite brand.

I?ve always found joy and solace in the Psalms, particularly the ones in praise of God and creation.

> I really enjoy relaxing with friends.

Injustice is what makes me angry: seeing what people do to each other, whether it?s hearing this morning that another young person has been knifed by some others, or what systems do to brutalise people.

I tend to pray about situations of injustice, because I?ve travelled extensively for the last ten or 12 years, and seen how people live in different parts of the world. Then there are people I know whose lives I?m in awe of, in terms of what they do and are. I see both together ? situations of despair, and people living according to Kingdom values and doing extraordinary things because of their faith. They are humbling. They are signs of hope.

I want to pass on the question of who I?d like to get locked in a church with. Well . . . I?m sad that people from my home diocese aren?t coming to Lambeth. I?d like to ask them, what are they fearful of about engaging with this? What could they bring from their own experience of faith?

Article from Church Times by Terence Handley MacMath