“Will you undertake to exercise your ministry in accordance with the statement concerning the Nature, Faith and Order of the United Reformed Church?
“I will, and all these things I profess and promise in the power of the Holy Spirit.”
With this induction affirmation, followed by promises by members of the General Assembly and prayers, Catriona Wheeler was inducted as the Moderator of the General Assembly 2025-2026, during an act of worship at the close of the 2025 General Assembly. The service was led by the new Moderator’s Chaplain, the Revd Jane Wade, Minister of Abington Avenue URC and the Northampton Area Churches Partnership. Jane also serves as Deputy Moderator of the East Midlands Synod.
The Revd Geoffrey Clarke, Moderator of the East Midlands Synod, gave the charge during the Induction of Catriona.
Called beyond comfort
The sermon reminded the Assembly of its dissenting roots, the weight of empty nets and the grace that calls us beyond comfort.
The members of your East Midlands Synod family are delighted in your appointment and will seek to pray for you and encourage you in this important role, Geoffrey began. He used a trio of striking biblical images: a furnace, a fishing boat, and a charcoal fire.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, standing before the threat of death, chose the costly act of dissent. Their refusal to kneel evoked the DNA of a church born from dissent: ministers ejected in 1662, voices raised in assemblies, Synods and church meetings throughout history. God’s presence was not outside the furnace, but within it. “Even in the furnace,” Geoffrey said, “God is with us.”
To the Sea of Tiberias, where disciples returned from a night of fishing with nothing to show. Nets once full are now empty. Or congregations once bustling now flicker with fragility. Yet on that same shore, the call comes to cast the net anew. “We need to be humble enough to discern the voice of the One who urges us to throw our nets in another direction.” He invited a different courage.
At the charcoal fire, Peter meets the risen Christ. Here is the mercy that follows denial, the confidence that follows collapse.
A member’s words at a Church Meeting stood as a parable: “If we call this minister the church will change, and it will not be as I’d prefer it to be. That is precisely why I will be voting for the call.” Someone yielding to God’s disruptive call.
The charge concluded with what is reported to be Francis Drake’s invocation to be disturbed: “When our dreams have come true because we have dreamed too little; disturb us, Lord.” It was an appeal not for reassurance but for disruption.
God is with us
To the Moderator, and to the whole Assembly, the message is simple and searching. God is with us, in defiant faith that refuses to bow. God is with us, when the nets are empty, calling us in new directions. God is with us, offering forgiveness and commissioning us anew.
The whole Church is invited to a faith that resists, reorients, and follows, even, and especially, when the way is unknown.
As part of the service, the Assembly read the Statement concerning the Nature, Faith and Order of the URC.
Inducting Catriona, the outgoing Moderator, the Revd Tim Meadows, declared: “In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and representing the General Assembly of the United Reformed Church I declare Catriona to be inducted as Moderator of General Assembly. May you continue to walk in the way of Christ, following in his footsteps.”
Catriona signed the Bible of the General Assembly and was welcomed by the Assembly with warm applause.
About Catriona
Catriona Wheeler was elected as Moderator at the 2023 meeting of the General Assembly and will chair its November 2025 and July 2026 meetings.
Catriona was educated at Teesdale School, Barnard Castle, and read law at Birmingham University. An Elder and Church Secretary of Trinity United Reformed Church, Lincoln, Catriona has been the Legal Advisor to the East Midlands Synod of the URC since 1997, works as solicitor practising in the areas of commercial property, corporate law and charity law, and is a Notary Public.
Her late grandfather and late mother were both URC Elders, as are both of her brothers.
Catriona conducts acts of worship and is authorised to preside at the Sacraments and is a Stepwise student. Catriona has held membership in churches across three synods, Northern, Yorkshire and East Midlands and serves as a director of East Midlands Synod Trust and Chair of the United Reformed Church Trust.
Her hobbies include gentle cycling, with the objective of seeing places, choral singing with the Lincoln Choral society; K-dramas (Korean dramas), BTS (a South Korean band), knitting and crochet.
In its nomination, East Midlands Synod said that it was delighted to make this nomination, “having benefitted from Catriona’s wisdom and clarity of thought in meetings and discussions on many occasions and in different situations. Her ability to crystalise the thinking of the room and her pastoral sensitivity to all aspects of an issue are among her great strengths.”