Keep the Serenity Prayer close at hand when reading anonymous evaluation forms.
We just completed our diocesan convention. For the first time, I was in charge as chair of the dispatch of business. (This is also the last time because I’ve accepted a new job).
We introduced significant changes, from a new registration system to a re-structured agenda to a new style of worship. We moved to a nearly paperless convention, inviting people to bring their tablets and smart phones (we created a download page and a QR code so people could easily find all the documents).
It was a lot of change. Especially for a people who don’t like change.
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I’m exhausted.
I never thought I’d long for beer and sports-drink commercials. But when you live in or near a swing state like Ohio, all of the TV spots are bombast and lambast.
The news is, of course, consumed as well, detailing every jot and tittle of the campaigns.
And then there are the maps of the red and blue states. This shorthand for lumping whole states into one category or another reminds me of the same problem that we face in The Episcopal Church when we use labels like conservative and liberal, without acknowledging a full, rich and diverse spectrum between those points.
Despite this tendency, The Episcopal Church at its best offers another way – a middle way, perhaps even a purple way. This ethos of via media appealed to me early in my move from another denomination to The Episcopal Church. And it’s one of the first things I tell people who aren’t Episcopalian.
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Congregations die for lots of reasons. The most insidious cause, perhaps, and the most common is death by a thousand cuts.
I love how Wikipedia defines the phrase: “Creeping normalcy, the way a major negative change, which happens slowly in many unnoticed increments, is not perceived as objectionable.”
We probably all have experience in this form of torture: A job that keeps getting duties added to it until you feel crushed under the weight or a relationship defined by snark with each comment eating away at trust and confidence.
In the congregation, the instrument of torture too often is nitpicking negativity.
A common inclination (maybe even part of our human condition) is to dwell on what’s not working. The typo in an otherwise perfect bulletin. A Facebook post that not everyone thought was appropriate. A sermon that didn’t hit the mark or a hymn that no one could sing.
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This past weekend I had the chance to visit a parish a lot like the one I currently serve. The property featured a beautiful and inspiring church with a cozy chapel; an enormous rectory, and several buildings that made up the parish house. You can imagine the complex must have been truly grand in its day. Yet inside the church pews are no longer full; and outside the neighborhood is facing the challenges of economic hardship: poverty, hunger, and homelessness.
Many of the day-to-day conversations seem to have a recurring theme: the building. How to raise funds to care for the building instead of spending down the endowment? How to get more volunteers to care for the building? How to best utilize the space and bring more of the community into the building? So much of the faith community’s time, energy, and financial resources are poured into their beautiful buildings.
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I figure the joys of managing change land somewhere between trying to hold onto a block of Jello and being thigh-high in quicksand.
I’m in the midst of leading a project – an annual event for our diocese that has been carried out in similar ways for, well, ever. The bishop asked me to take over and to look at the event with fresh eyes. With new leadership, we figured this was a good time to implement some changes.
As you might imagine, we’ve encountered some pushback, internally from other staff and from diocesan participants.
I have learned a few things about how we managed (and are managing) the changes. I should have done a better job identifying all the stakeholders – and sought input from more of them. I thought more about how the internal process of change would need to be carried out than I did about how the changes would impact users.
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We rolled out a new online registration system for diocesan convention. The confusion and questions started almost immediately. We want to offer good customer service, to be helpful and responsive to parishioners. But we also wanted to find a way to pre-empt some of the questions so that we wouldn’t be consumed with e-mails and calls from 500 registrants.
Enter screencasting, this week’s favorite solution. Screencasting allows you to capture the computer screens and mouse movement as well as audio. This is different than a screen shot, which captures a moment in time. A screencast enables you to create a step-by-step, instructional video that walks users through the actual process.
I started experimenting with free screencast software, like Audacity and CamStudio. I’ll admit that my patience was short for a steep learning curve. Because this isn’t something I plan to use every day, I wanted a program that was easy and intuitive. While I’m sure both of these free offerings could work fine for the casual user, I kept bumping into problems.
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The last time I went on a spiritual retreat, jam boxes blared Journey, and we traveled by Shake-n-Bake, a beloved bus aptly named for its lack of shocks and air conditioning.
Getting in touch with my soul was, in many ways, easier in the midst of teenage angst, between the gnashing of teeth with my parents and trying to figure out who I was despite the swirl of hormones and peer pressure.
As an adult, I have two kids with horseback lessons and Taekwondo, a husband, laundry, mortgage, car payments, spaghetti suppers, and VBS. And, oh yeah, a job.
I am too busy for a retreat.
And yet. Turns out that when you think that, it’s time for a break.
Too much communication can be a bad thing.
This probably sounds incongruous with my regular litany of all things communication. And don’t get me wrong: I fervently believe that effective and strategic communication is critical to the vitality of congregations, dioceses, and church institutions.
But the rub is deciding what constitutes effective and how it fits within a larger strategy.
Here’s a case in point: We have worked hard in our diocese to encourage communications. We’ve tried to empower leaders by giving them access to an array of communication tools. We offered training and assistance.
What I forgot to do is make sure the use of the tools fit within a larger strategy of effective communication. Suddenly seven or eight people were creating and sending electronic newsletters to our diocesan lists. Each newsletter was focused on a particular area of ministry and shared important and interesting information.
The problem, though, was that we were bombarding recipients with four, five and six e-mails in a week. We didn’t coordinate and structure the information so that there was a primary reliable source, with certain e-mails sent to smaller, targeted audiences. We pushed it all out there without giving the audience the tools to help prioritize and weed through the information.
I began to fear that we were diluting our contact with the diocesan audience by sending so many different newsletters. I worried that instead of dutifully reading all of them, many people would feel overwhelmed by e-mail overload and simply hit delete.
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The out-of-town guest decided to make a visit to the church to surprise her daughter-in-law and family. But she wasn’t sure what to do with her constant companion, a poodle mix named Phoebe.
She entered in the undercroft and encountered our daughter. “I see you have a nursery for children,” the guest said. “Do you have a nursery for dogs?”
Apparently our daughter thought about the question for a moment, then shrugged. “We can.”
She took the leash and pointed the guest to the nave.
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My husband doesn’t’ t like compromise: He prefers to collaborate.
His reasoning? Compromise is giving something up. Collaboration is working together to create something new.
Semantics? I used to think so. I’ve since come around to his way of thinking.
When we met, each of us had been single for a long time. We’d been managing our lives in ways that worked for each of us. Getting married and sharing a household meant having to rethink many established ways of doing things.
We quickly learned if we each stubbornly clung to our own ‘right’ way of doing things or grudgingly went along with the other’s, life could be unpleasant. We didn’t want that: We loved each other and wanted to find a way to be together that worked for both of us. We recognized that we needed to create something new.
How might this apply to congregations?
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Champagne and midnight kisses may start the calendar, but in our house, the year really begins with the first day of school.
This time is rife with tradition for us. We have, of course, the crisp pages of new notebooks, the stiffness of a fresh-off-the-shelf backpack. The lunches are packed with wide variety, all their favorites, a day they can remember when in October the baggies are filled with whatever is left in the pantry because we haven’t been to the grocery store in two weeks.
Our daughter performed a fashion show, gauging which outfit to elevate to first-day apparel based on our appreciative claps. Our son pulled on a T-shirt, checked to see if there were any holes or major stains, and headed out to breakfast.
Since they started preschool, we have added our own household tradition of decorating the walls and halls with signs and crepe paper. These aren’t fancy, store-bought signs – just the result of my labors with Crayola markers and scotch tape. “Happy first day” in block letters. #1 Highland Bluebirds. We’re proud of you. We love you.
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The names we call each other sometimes hurt!
“Nonvital” Episcopalians are not members of nonvital and nonviable congregations.
The members of an Episcopal church about to close need to urgently know that they are not to blame for their congregation's close.
Of course you say!
Nonetheless, I sense that too many members of closed churches carry a false but real sense of blame and shame. It is very unlikely that the rector, vestry, or even bishop has blamed the members for the church's close. At the same time the language that Episcopalians commonly use to describe "at risk" congregations might be easily heard as words to describe the members of the church about to close.
Does a nonvital congregation mean its congregation's members are no longer vital too?
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Richard Dawson would be proud.
The late, cheek-kissing game host probably wished he had a nickel for every time he pronounced, “Survey says” on one of my all-time-favorite shows, Family Feud. (OK, come to think of it, I bet he did have a nickel – and more – for each proclamation. But let’s not get distracted).
I feel like borrowing his catch-phrase each time I open our SurveyMonkey account.
We are in stage two of a branding process for the diocese. In the first stage, we spent quite a bit of time talking and reflecting about what we were trying to accomplish. Was the goal to simply develop an eye-catching logo that we’d slap onto all things diocesan? Or were we ready to do some real soul-searching and honest-talk about who we are, how we’re perceived and what we want to become?
After we reached some clarity about those goals, we moved into research. Or, as I like to call it, the "survey says" stage.
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Do you know the spiritually ripe time for your congregation to make its most challenging decisions?
[
Editor's note: think buildings or changing any long held 'tradition'....]
The spiritually ripe time is when a congregation is in sync with its primary purpose to "do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with your God" (Micah 6:8). A congregation's capacity for spiritual freedom contributes to spiritually ripe times to make decisions.
Spiritual freedom occurs when congregations are able to courageously and generously make Spirit led choices that fulfill God's mission. How does a congregation grow in its spiritual freedom?
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Messing with tradition is dicey.
For most of the 110 people on this weekend’s parish retreat, every place on the mountain is sacred. The diocesan conference center in the heart of Kentucky, at the top of a mountain, is a thin place, where the space between God and earth seems ever closer.
Even though this was my first parish retreat there, I understand the attachment. Under the canopy of trees, watching the clouds move like puffs of smoke, I talked to God. Groups hiked to different peaks, scaling rock walls, bloody knuckles a small sacrifice for a magnificent view. Away from city lights, people spread blankets on the gravel path, marveling together over the Perseid meteor shower.
We shared campfires and long walks, swims in the pool and cocktails. Meals served cafeteria style at tables for eight. Compline in a ragged oval in a game room and morning prayer in the outdoor chapel.
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I’ve been doing church work for a while now. Wednesday marks a decade doing communications for the diocese. And I’ve been married to a priest for almost 15 years.
So you’d think I would learn.
Just because I’m excited about a project does not mean folks will show up and participate.
Working with volunteers is a tricky, unreliable science.
As I shared last week with you, our diocese is launching a project to produce virtual tours of churches – this way seekers can “visit” the church online, hopefully easing anxiety so that they may cross the psychological hurdle from online to actual visitor. We have to divide the project over three budgets, so I worked with our staff to carefully select the first round of 20. We looked at diversity of all kinds, from geographic to congregational size to race. I considered those who were in the midst of transitions and those who have a commitment to a vibrant web presence. I also factored with innovative ministries. Of course, there were some churches with all of those elements that still didn’t make the first list because of its size limitations. Nevertheless, I felt good about the first crop, a respectable cross-section of Episcopal churches in Southern Ohio.
So I sent invitations to a webinar – a virtual meeting – so that participants could learn more about the program, and we could schedule the first rounds of photography shoots. On the day of the webinar, I opened the virtual meeting about 15 minutes early. We expected 25 to 30 participants, and I worried about how to field questions from such a large group.
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Part 3 of 4: Exercising Leadership with Viability Threatened Congregations. Read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.
In my chaplaincy at a level 1trauma center I learned new meaning is often found when people experience extreme losses that fundamentally change their lives. Times of traumatic loss can become a paradoxical space of resurrection where loss and mini deaths often lead to new life. I recall movies about people whose traumas have revealed to them new meaning and transformation. Two such movies come to mind:
The Dolphin's Tale (2011) - Winter, the dolphin whose tail was injured found hope through a prosthesis and a young man injured in the service of his country finds renewed hope in Winter's story.
The Shipping News (2001) – The main character has a childhood experience of "drowning," an uncaring father that affects his life, and is able to find new life in new place, is able to see how the past gets dragged into everything, and finally how to break free of that past. See
http://www.textweek.com/movies/themeindex.htm.
In a similar manner viability threatened congregations, i.e. "churches at risk" or "churches in decline" have the potential to teach the rest of The Episcopal Church about grief over loss and discovery of radical new meaning. As the Episcopal Church begins the process of rethinking its governance and structure, we will need to hear congregational examples of rebirth to lead the way to discover new life. Like people who have undergone sudden trauma, viability threatened congregations who successfully rediscover their viability and vitality did not just encounter and rely on iterative change processes but rather were open to and accepted radical redefinition of their fundamental identity and purpose.
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Part 3 of 4: Exercising Leadership with Viability Threatened Congregations. Read Part 1 and Part 2.
This four-part series has been intentionally named "Exercising Leadership with Viability Threatened Congregations". "With" not "for" or "over" is a critical distinction particularly for the role of the bishop. The bishop as chief pastor exercises a crucial pastoral role with a congregation whose long-term life could be threatened by its viability challenges.
In The Episcopal Church some bishops struggle to find an in-between leadership space that avoids their being either authoritarian or passive. The bishop's exercise of leadership with a congregation is a part of their episcopal role as pastor to the diocese with the responsibility of "building up the church." In many but not all viability threatened congregations, the bishop and standing committee provide support through financial assistance. Too often financial assistance comes without an agreed upon process of accountability with timed benchmarks that the congregation is required to meet. In such instances, the result is that the bishop's and the standing committee's passive response drains the assets of the diocese for congregations that on their own cannot transform from non-viability to viability. Instead of building up the church, passive, non-accountable actions such as these hasten the demise of a congregation and the length of its suffering.
As stated in part 1 of this four-part series, the viability threatened congregation often does not have the capacity to name their needs or the infrastructure to plan a course of transformative action. In addition, the congregation's system does not allow for healthy decision making, particularly, the ability to name its prospects. Without pastoral intervention a viability threatened congregation will most often close, after a long period of decline.
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Communication is ministry. General Convention said so.
In a resolution passed by both the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops, General Convention put into the record that communications is an essential ministry.
Resolution A024 says that communications “enables and empowers evangelism, congregational development, the building of community, and mission at the Churchwide, diocesan, and congregational levels.” It continues, saying there should be a trained communications person in each diocese and ongoing training in communications for all congregations. There should be a sensitivity to multilingual and multicultural contexts. And, so says the resolution, communications should be adequately funded to meet the needs of mission and ministry as defined by the diocese.
There. No more worries about communications being cut off at the knees. Right?
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Part 2 of 4: Exercising Leadership with Viability Threatened Congregations - The Congregation's Leadership Responsibility. Read Part 1 here.
Several months after an Episcopal parish church closed I gathered its former members to engage them in a reflection process on the closing of their church and their individual processes of re-incorporation to one of three local Episcopal parishes. In a group process I asked three reflection questions of each person present. One of the three questions was "when did you know that your parish church was at risk of closing?" Several people said they had a sense over fifteen years ago! Others said they knew five to ten years ago. None present however were surprised!
While none were surprised, it is also true they admitted that none knew what to do. They agreed that they did not know how to connect their concerns with the inevitability of their parish church closing. They did not know how to name their viability challenges. Also, they did not want to believe that their beloved church was at risk of closing, so they continued to enjoy their life as a community. They hoped that their communal joy would eventually be contagious and bring more people to their parish, growing them into viability. Their hopes were not realized.
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