Churches are not dying.

we need new solutions to new problems

I just got off the phone with a colleague who had a bunch of ideas of what I should address, all of which are brilliant (and which I will write about someday) … and when I put my fingers on the keyboard, I knew I actually do have something stuck in my craw:

I have had some conversations recently with colleagues – some of whom are ministering to small congregations wondering what their future holds; some of whom are in formation and wondering whether their call to congregational (or parish) ministry is even viable anymore. And others wondering if congregations are dying.

I’m here to tell you that yes, there is a future, for most of our congregations. And a need.

What is getting in the way, of course, is that the old models may not always be working – in terms of outreach, location, leadership, programming, and worship. For many congregations, the actual pledging numbers have gone down (or pledges decreasing because of job loss, inflation, death, medical expenses, etc.), and thus the ability to sustain full time ministry has decreased too. We’ve talked about families being overbooked on Sundays, which reduces attendance and engagement. And the costs of caring for older buildings has skyrocketed.

And.

Some of our congregations are growing, because they’ve invested in ministry, they’ve committed to changing leadership and programming, their worship might be at multiple times or include online options, they are making smart investments in their buildings and overall infrastructure, and they’ve not been afraid to touch endowments and restricted funds while the extraordinary conditions of the COVID pandemic caused downturns and uncertainty.

Churches aren’t dying.

Also, while lots of congregations have had to reduce ministry to less than full time, they still need ministers. I don’t have numbers handy, but in the last few years, there has been more need than personnel available.

We have congregations who want ministers and can’t get them.

Now this involves a lot of factors – it’s hard to get a minister when you’re isolated geographically and not able to hire/call someone full time. And it’s hard to get a minister when you’ve going through a lot of them and you have a reputation for being a hard place to be a minister (especially a brilliant, young, queer minister who is not a dude).

But the bottom line is that we need ministers who are called to do congregational ministry, and who can help congregations envision and enact new ways of doing church, so that they don’t die. And we need to empower them to try new things.

I think about something I heard on the British History Podcast a couple of months ago – the topic was the Norman invasion and how through the many months before, during, and after the Battle of Hastings, the English nobles kept assuming that William the Bastard would follow the same rules of warfare that they’d been experiencing for hundreds of years, and which worked with the Vikings (who also settled, and in some instances ruled, on Britain). The problem was, they were making decisions based on the last problem they had, in part because this is how things were always done, but also in part because they’d been thinking about it because it HAD been recent.

Where these nobles went wrong (even the Northumbrians, who you just don’t want to mess around with) was assuming that the current problem was like the last one.

Oops.

There’s a reason we don’t really know William as “The Bastard” but rather as “the Conqueror.”

Some of our churches are dying … largely because they’re making decisions based on the last problem they had, rather than looking at the problem right in front of them. And those problems – especially since the start of the pandemic – look wildly different than they used to.

The churches that are dying are facing problems we never had to face before, and the old solutions aren’t working. (I’m not saying some congregations shouldn’t be considering consolidation with another congregation or closing altogether – it can be done lovingly and elegantly, such as the process our people in Queens, NY, undertook.)

We can’t stay stuck in the rut of old solutions. We need ministers (and other religious professionals) on the ground to help us look at the new problems and imagine new solutions… and who are empowered and trusted to guide us to new solutions.

---

Hey HMC family! I just opened a RedBubble store! Click here to see five designs for shirts, mugs, etc.

I chose RedBubble because of its flexibility - I studied several of these shops, and while I like Bonfire’s commitment to non-profits, I found their model to be deeply limiting to multiple product and design options. I haven’t chosen any one charity to donate profits to, although it seems there is always a need for disaster relief, reparations to BIPOC folk, support for trans folk, funding for reproductive rights. I’ll report back when I make various donations so you know where your money is going.