Episcopal Church Foundation Vestry Papers - for leading congregations

When is the last time you took a field trip? Fifth grade? Washington, D.C.?
Third grade to a historical re-enactment? First grade to the zoo?
(As an aside, my daughter’s class took a field trip to a water treatment plant. Really?)

Our staff had a field trip this week. The team I work with meets every Tuesday morning. We talk about upcoming projects and troubleshoot existing ones. This is important work. And because like workers everywhere, we are performing more with fewer resources, we are focused on the present problems. We don’t get a lot of time to dream, to imagine, to let our minds loose to explore new ideas. We’re focused, perhaps rightly so, on the work in front of us.

Enter from stage left: the field trip.

We moved our meeting to a local bookstore coffee shop. We shared brunch/lunch and spent much of that time discussing current work and making decisions about projects for the next few weeks. It probably would have been better to just let that time be for fellowship and relationship-building, but some issues were pressing and begged our attention.

Afterward, I asked the staff to spend at least an hour in the bookstore. Roam around. Pick up books that intrigue you. Touch the covers and feel the paper between your fingers. Snap pictures of compelling designs with a smartphone. Thumb through books that are similar to what we produce—make note of what they’re doing better, and where we excel. 

I wanted this time to be unhinged from our regular schedule, to open ourselves to new possibilities, to see what other people are producing, and to be out of our offices and away from the barrage of email, phones, and pressing deadlines. 

We’ll see over the course of the next few months what fruits the field trip yields. I spotted some interesting ideas that I hope to incorporate into upcoming projects. And I know others did as well. 
As importantly, I hope the field trip was a chance to break from the tyranny of the immediate, to invite some dreaming and reflection. 

I wonder how many church staffs (paid and volunteer) take field trips. What about a lunch and visit to a nearby Episcopal church? How about a visit to the booming nondenominational congregation? To a Jewish synagogue? To a mosque? Sure, there are differences. Some things you won’t find within our scope and mission. For instance, Forward Movement is probably not going to enter the market of gentle-bodice-ripping, Christian romance novels. But we’re all discerning enough to look beyond our differences to find common ground, to explore what might work in our context. After all, imitation is a form of flattery.