Our presbyteries

AS of the last census, the population of the city of Edinburgh was about 520,000. The population of the neighbouring county of West Lothian is around a third of that, and its largest town, Livingston, has around 57,000 people.

So one of the first tasks when the presbyteries of Edinburgh and West Lothian united was to reassure the members of the smaller presbytery that they were not just being absorbed into the larger one.

“There is always the risk, when you have a larger group merging with a smaller one, that there is a sense of takeover,” says the Very Rev Dr Derek Browning, minister of Morningside Parish Church and convener of the new presbytery’s business committee. “But I am not picking up any of that feeling. We have been very intentional about including everybody and the committee structures are well represented by both former presbyteries.”

His vice-convener, Lynne McEwen, an elder from the former West Lothian presbytery, concurs. “If a convener is from Edinburgh, the vice convener is from West Lothian and vice versa. The first in-person meeting was held in St Michael’s Linlithgow (in West Lothian) and the first Presbytery Moderator (the Rev Julia Wylie) was from West Lothian. The former West Lothian people feel included.”

Sensitivity about inclusion aside, Derek describes progress in the new presbytery as ‘fairly steady’, as they come to grips with a body that covers everything from a major city, with some of the country’s wealthiest addresses but also some of its most deprived, suburbs, small towns and villages and significant areas of rural farmland.

It also includes some of Scotland’s most historic and high-profile churches: not just the Edinburgh icons of St Giles’, St Cuthbert’s and Greyfriars, but also St Michael’s in Linlithgow, which has a history going back to the 12th century and witnessed the baptism of Mary Queen of Scots.

Along with completing the union formalities and getting to know each other, the largest piece of work so far has of course been in completing the Presbytery Mission Plan, which has now been agreed. As with every part of the Church of Scotland, that has included some hard decisions, although Presbytery Clerk Dr Hazel Hastie insists the scale is not as great as has been reported: “The general public seem to think we are going to close lots of churches, but the reality is it won’t be that many.”

The hope now, Hazel says, is to move the presbytery on to a more missional footing: “We’ve approved the plan and we’re moving forward with that, and working with people hopefully in a much more missionally directed way. We stopped doing local church review during lockdown and the union, but we’re hoping to reintroduce that and hopefully by the end of this year that will give us much more missional focus.”

A ‘significant’ mission fund has been established and will be spent in projects that Derek says are making a difference across the presbytery. “A lot of the projects are not necessarily ground-breaking, but they would be missed if they weren’t there.” One more innovative project that he points to is the Workplace Chaplain at the Gyle shopping centre, which the presbytery has taken on after Work Place Chaplaincy Scotland was wound up in 2022. “The chaplain has been doing tremendous things reaching out to people who use the Gyle and also those who work there. This is emblematic of the kind of thing we are hoping to be able to do in the presbytery.”

He also highlights ecumenical working, for instance in providing funding towards the city’s nativity scene, which was brought back last year. “We don’t just always look at our own needs as a Church of Scotland presbytery, but also we see the role we can play alongside our sisters and brothers in the Roman Catholic and Episcopal Churches and other denominations too.

“And of course we have a very lively interfaith community across the presbytery and we maintain good friendships with our Jewish and Muslim communities.”

A major challenge and opportunity for the new presbytery is that the population of Edinburgh is projected to double within the next three decades, along with major expansion in the surrounding areas including West Lothian. For the Church, that will mean working out how to establish a sustainable presence in the new communities.

One positive sign is that the Church has established communications with the City of Edinburgh Council and is hoping to be involved in the discussions as the council develops what it is calling its 2050 Vision. “We recently had a very brief meeting with the Lord Provost,” says Hazel, “And we had the chief executive of the council come to talk to us four or five years ago. It all kind of got knocked on the head during Covid, but we have asked if we can have a seat the table for those discussions.

“We also need to liaise with equivalent partners in West Lothian Council to see if we can get a seat at the table there.”

That may involve very different challenges from Edinburgh, where the vision envisages ’20 minute cities’, where people can reach every amenity they need without a car within 20 minutes. As Lynne says, there are areas of West Lothian that are not served by bus, especially on a Sunday.

Whatever the challenges, the emphasis is not on claiming a privileged position but on demonstrating that the Church can earn its place through the help it can offer, whether that is in working with the schools, providing community facilities, or working with people living with dementia.

“I don’t think any of us can expect a place at the civic table,” says Derek, “But we need to be clear that we do bring something to the table. We have to be flexible and think about how we place ourselves within the infrastructure of developing communities. We do have a voice, and we contribute considerably to wellbeing and welfare of the whole community we serve.”