Working with others

The Scottish Episcopal Church works with others churches and faiths locally, nationally and internationally as part of our commitment to Christian unity, dialogue and shared service. We also have an active involvement in Scottish civic life.

Working with Other Churches

Given Scottish demographics, we are most likely to be engaged in worship, mission and service with Presbyterian and Catholic congregations, and where possible with Methodist and United Reformed, with whom we have a partnership agreement.

In places, United Free, Congregational Federation, Quakers or Salvation Army will join the mix, as they do nationally through Action of Churches Together in Scotland (ACTS), our national ecumenical body. Through ACTS we encourage and support local ecumenical partnerships.

We play a significant and active part in the life of the Anglican Communion across the four nations of the British Isles and of course internationally.

As part of this international involvement, we also work with Churches Together in Britain and Ireland and the Conference of European Churches.

As a founder member of the Porvoo Communion of Churches we have strong ties with Nordic and Baltic Lutheran Churches and, through other agreements, German and French protestant churches.

Another international focus of our ecumenical life is through our membership of and contribution to the life work of the World Council of Churches. This allows us to reach out to many denominations across many nations in ways that are mutually enriching.

Prospects for the future include finding ways of enhancing our fellowship with the growing Pentecostal and Independent churches that to date tend not to seek membership of local or national ecumenical bodies, and enlarging the number of Lutheran churches throughout the world with whom we share communion.

Interchurch Relations Committee

The Interchurch Relations Committee is responsible for promoting inter-church working locally and nationally with Local Ecumenical Partnerships, Action of Churches Together in Scotland and Churches Together in Britain and Ireland.

The committee also has wider relationships with the Anglican Communion, the Porvoo Communion, the Reuilly Agreement, the Meissen Commission and the World Council of Churches.

Related Publications which are available from the General Synod Office:

  • Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry
  • The Nature of Baptism and its Place in the Life of the Church

Working with Other Faiths

The Scottish Episcopal Church has a proud record of engagement in interfaith relations in Scotland. Principally this is carried out through involvement in the national body, Interfaith Scotland, and local interfaith groups (see Interfaith Scotland website for details of groups local to you). Interfaith Scotland works ‘to help ensure good relations between the diverse religion and belief communities of Scotland and also to share good practice in interfaith dialogue, education, engagement and training nationally and internationally’.

Interfaith Scotland also acts as secretariat for the Scottish Religious Leaders Forum ‘dedicated to improving relationships between Scotland’s religious communities.’ In September 2022 the Forum held its 20th anniversary at the Abbey on the Island of Iona. While there, they signed a Declaration of Commitment.

Scottish Religious Leaders Forum 20th Anniversary – the Isle of Iona Ⓒ 2022 The Rev David Coleman

Scottish Faiths Action for Refugees

The Scottish Episcopal Church provides regular grants to Scottish Faiths Action for Refugees. The website provides a number of helpful resources in the way of information, prayers and liturgies, as well as strategies for individuals and churches in providing support for those seeking safe sanctuary. More information is available at www.sfar.org.uk

Interfaith Relations Committee

Our Interfaith Relations Committee (previously know as CRPOF) exists to encourage an engagement of Episcopalians with people of other faiths that moves us beyond tolerance, that challenges prejudice and that deepens our faith through hospitality and encounter.

The 2011 census underlined the extent of the diversity within Scotland, particularly in our urban areas, and it is important to build bridges in a culture of fragmentation, where diversity and difference, we are sometimes told, lead only to conflict.

Our experience is that the opposite can be true: that people from the range of faith communities present in Scotland truly welcome and value approaches from other faiths.

A first step is to overcome our ignorance and fear through learning about the living heart of another’s faith, but beyond that, we can move into joint action, and robust conversation about our differences.

The dynamics of inter-faith encounter were explored in a Grosvenor Essay produced by CRPOF in 2006. Apart from those mentioned above, the current Inter Faith Relations Committee engages with a variety of organisations, included below.

CTBI – Churches Together in Britain & Ireland

The Scottish Episcopal Church participates with CTBI through two forums. One is the Churches Forum for Inter-Religious Relations CFIRR, bringing together representatives from participating churches in sharing experience and contextual issues. The other is the Inter Faith Theological Advisory Group, IFTAG. The advisory group provides a number of helpful resources, listed below:

CTBI also provides helpful links with the Christian-Muslim Forum, currently working on developing a response to Islamophobia within the UK, and with the Council of Christians & Jews. A helpful perspective on dialogue between Christians and Jews can be downloaded here, and this next document is a helpful guide for churches, individuals, and groups in participating in Holocaust Memorial Day (this document changes annually)

There is a general ‘Interfaith’ page with other helpful links here.

World Council of Churches

The convener of the Inter Faith Relations Committee contributed to the WCC document Building Interreligious Solidarity in Our Wounded World.

The WCC 2022 World Assembly invited Prof. Azza Karam, secretary general of Religions for Peace International to address the gathering. More information can be found here. There is also a UK branch of Religions for Peace with which the IFRC is in contact.

Working with Civic Scotland

The Scottish Episcopal Church engages with Civic Scotland as part of its public witness and commitment to the common good. This work includes responding to parliamentary consultations and petitions, contributing evidence to parliamentary committees where the Church has relevant experience or ethical insight, and taking part in public events and civic conversations.

Through the General Synod, the Church also on occasion reflects on issues affecting communities across Scotland including poverty, justice and peace, human dignity, and climate change. Our engagement is non-partisan and seeks to bring both theological reflection and the voices of local congregations into wider Scottish public life.

In this way, the Church participates constructively in Scotland’s civic institutions, offering a faith perspective, challenge and support as society considers questions of justice, care and the flourishing of all.

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