The legacy of charismatic renewal
40 YEARS or so since the Charismatic Renewal Movement took o in Ireland in the mid-1970s, how has the charismatic style of spirituality developed in the Church of Ireland? In search of some answers to this question, SEARCH editor Canon Ginnie Kennerley visited Archdeacon David McClay at Church House in Belfast, to nd out how the leader of New Wine Ireland experiences the legacy of the movement.
THE NEW WINE Conference, taking place for a full week at a venue in Sligo each summer, attracts attendance of around a thousand resident participants and another thousand who come on a daily basis. Going back to John Wimber and Bishop David Pytches, and the latter’s ministry at St Andrew’s Chorleywood, its president is Bishop Ken Clarke, a veteran of the interdenominational Charismatic Renewal Conferences in Dublin, when he was posted in Crinken, South County Dublin.
McClay was drawn into the movement as a young clergyman, still deeply grieving the death of his wife, rst on a visit to a Church Growth Conference in Singapore where he met the charismatic leaders Derek Hong and Bishop Banit Chu, and then at a life-changing clergy retreat in Belfast. The fact that, as rector of Kilkeel, he had already begun to frequent the Christian Renewal Centre in Rostrevor was not unrelated to these spiritual quests.
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Bishop David McClay
Bishop of Down and Dromore, is Chair of the Church of Ireland Pioneer Ministry Council and the leader of New Wine Ireland.