Rev Sharon Hollis gives Retiring President's address to 17th Assembly

Rev Sharon Hollis has delivered her retiring President’s address to the 17th Assembly, expressing her deep gratitude for all the past three years have held and sharing those things which are on her heart as her term comes to a close.

“I give thanks to God and the Assembly for calling me to the office of President,” she said. “It has been one of the great joys and privileges of my life. It has given me the opportunity to travel across these lands and the world to witness firsthand the movement of the Spirit renewing the whole creation.”

“Witnessing the many faithful communities of faith and faithful disciples of Jesus joining in with the work of the Spirit has filled me with gratitude at all God is doing and hope for what God will do.”

“This role has at times been personally costly, but friends, I have gained so much more than I have given.”

“I chose Dwelling in Love as the theme for the 16th Assembly. It was an invitation to reflect that the impulse of God is to love, and love, and love, and to invite us into this love, to make our home and purpose in God and God’s love.  This love enlarges our hearts and minds to see God’s care for the whole creation and for each of us.”

The ex-President spoke of the unfinished business of the Covenant with the Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress, challenging the Church on what it means to be a “Covenant-keeping Church”.

“At the reconvened Assembly we renewed the Covenant and at this Assembly we will mark the 30th anniversary of the Covenant. Good things have come from the Covenant but still there is more work to do, and I am restless for that work to be done.”

“The dial on Indigenous disadvantage has not moved enough in these lands now called Australia. Congress does not believe it has the support it needs to do all it believes God is calling it to do.”

Rev Hollis also encouraged the Church to consider how it could build relationships not just with Congress but with local traditional owners.

Throughout her Presidency Rev Hollis has been known for her gifted chairing and deep appreciation of consensus decision making, the Uniting Church’s unique processes by which decisions are made in discernment communities who attend to each other’s perspectives and wait upon God’s word.

“Consensus decision making is a spiritual practice of discernment. It asks us to come into any meeting or discernment conversation with an open and humble heart. Paul reminded us in his second letter to the Corinthians, that we only see through a mirror dimly. This is true of us as individuals and church. None of us has a full and complete understanding of God and God’s ways.”

“Consensus decision making invites us to listen deeply, not just to the words being said but to what might sit under them. It encourages us to speak when the Spirit prompts us, knowing we speak into a listening community.”

Rev Hollis spoke of the privilege of attending global and regional ecumenical gatherings and her hope that the Uniting Church might find more of a home in the fellowship of United and Uniting churches, exploring the gifts we offer to the Christian community.

“Like other union churches we have learned how to seek deeper unity, how to die to what we love for the sake of the gospel and new ways of practicing faith, and how to live as a movement while also tending to history and institution.”

Rev Hollis urged the Uniting Church to embrace a richer and broader range of words and images for speaking of who God is.

“As I have moved around the Church I have seen an overreliance on one or two images for all of who God is and all that God has done and is doing. We are people given the gift of creativity and imagination. And we have been given the Scriptures which were written by people who knew and named God and God’s activity in many ways.”

“We can name God Sophia, Sovereign, Mother Hen, Lodestar, Liberator, Anchor, Ancient of Days, Tree of Life alongside Father and Lord.”

In closing Rev Hollis gave thanks to all those who had supported and upheld her during her time as President.

She expressed her gratitude to Rev Mark Kickett, National Chair of the UAICC, and to Congress members for generously sharing of themselves and their stories: “You have shown me grace I did not deserve, and I am so thankful.”

She thanked the two General Secretaries who had served alongside her, Colleen Geyer and Rev Lindsay Cullen, members of the Assembly Standing Committee and Act2 Steering Committee, Assembly staff and leaders, Uniting Church Moderators, her chaplains, and communities across the Uniting Church for embracing and offering her hospitality.

“You enriched my understanding of who we are as a Church and how God is at work in our midst.”

Special thanks went to her family: her two daughters, Ingrid and Esther, and to her husband Michael Symons, whose sudden death in 2013 she has often addressed with deep vulnerability and love.

“To my beloved Michael. One of the ways I know love abides is that his support, encouragement, and love of me continues to sustain me even though he is no longer with me physically. Love is never wasted.”

“To everyone who has encouraged me, guided me, corrected me, or prayed for me. You have sustained me so that I know I have dwelt in the love of the Church and God.”

“Through all of this is the Spirit of Christ, present in prayer and in people, working through so many to sustain, strengthen, and reassure me that I am held in the love of God.”

“Thanks be to God for all that has been over these last three years and for all that is to come.”

Moderator of the Synod of Victoria and Tasmania Rev David Fotheringham delivered a Minute of Appreciation for the outgoing President, paying tribute to her spiritual leadership, encouragement, relationality and wisdom.

“Sharon adopted the theme of ‘Dwelling in Love’ for the triennium. Preaching at her installation, she spoke of how the love in which we dwell, and the love to which we are called, is not mere sentimentalism, but is active, tough, resilient and long-suffering. In God, we are encountered by love that risks vulnerability, love that crosses boundaries, love that raises up the excluded, that endures the cross, and that rises again.”

“Sharon has not just preached of such virtues; her very life and service for the church, for the people of this nation and for the whole creation reflect that kind of love; and so reflect something of God’s love.”

“Sharon engages relationally, with respect, passion, hope and courage; and she works with the wider teams of the Uniting Church collaboratively, constructively, and with gratitude for the gifts, skills and experience that every member brings. ‘Dwelling in love’ has been her passion and her theme.”

“For the way that Sharon has fulfilled the role of President with heart and strength, vulnerability and faithfulness, insight, wisdom and love, we offer our deep appreciation.”

The retiring President’s report and Minute of Appreciation were both received by acclamation.

Read the retiring President’s report and the Minute of Appreciation.