A Church for Starving Artists

One of my brilliant colleagues wondered out loud the other day what the 22nd Century Church might look like.  That’s right:  the Church 100 years from now.

I expend a lot of energy pondering the 21st Century Church and what we could be.  But Brilliant Colleague has the right idea. What if we tried to imagine what will become of the Church for our grandchildren and great-grandchildren?

I participated in a discussion yesterday about how theological institutions might make shifts to better address the spiritual needs of future generations.  And here’s what ideas popped into my head:

• The spiritual will effectively partner with the sacred, making the lines between them blurrier. Ministry will be integral in businesses, schools and other institutions.  But it will probably not be called “ministry.”
• Spiritual competency will be an expected part of human development.  (Note:  I have no idea what this might look like. And by “competency” I don’t mean that spiritual depth is something we achieve – but then I’m a fan of Reformed Christian theology.)
• Christians will have dramatically altered our expectations about what’s necessary to be a church.  We will have long cast aside those things – from real estate to programming – that do not bring the reign of God (although we liked them very much for generations.)
• Theological words and their definitions will have changed.  Just as “charity” (19th Century) became “love” decades later in Scripture, imagine changes in church vernacular: “worship service” becoming “community gathering” or “equipping the saints” becoming “training and deploying the faith community.”  Not as catchy, but someone will create better terms.
• Interfaith relationships will be strong and united against fundamentalism of every kind.

Can we begin to imagine what the Church will be like in 100 years?  I actually don’t know that we can.

Jesus will always have a Church and we do not get to control what the Church will look like.  Our job – today and generations from now – is to commit to discernment, study, and prayer.  We have only a shadow of an idea of what we could be and do, by grace.

Image source.  When do we get our hoverboards?  We were promised hoverboards.

I’m still not crazy about the term “crone” although friends tell me it’s a compliment. I still picture her in my head, so, no thank you.

One of my no-longer-secret hopes for 2015 includes finding friends who have no church connections (i.e. not connected to former or current churches that I serve.) I adore my clergy and parishioner friends. I happen to have the most fabulous church friends in the world. But tucked into the recesses of my mind is the fact that I always have my Presbytery Hat on.

I literally have zero friends in The Prairie State who are not church-related in some way, unless you count two barristas whose establishments I regularly visit. They know my coffee preferences, but they don’t know my favorite books or the names of my children. Still, it’s something I don’t take for granted.

I’ve been in search of at least one local human being with whom certain conversations do not involve potential boundary problems. Enter 60 year old acquaintance who actually said recently, “We should get together.” Thank you Jesus. (Note: This is a good article about making friends as adults.)

My potential friend and I entered different professions in our 20s and found ourselves being among the handful of women in those professions. We both love our work. We both have funny stories. But again, there is a boundary issue. Dual relationships. (She is a medical professional.) But at this point, I’m willing to chance it.

What we also agree on:

• We love being 60/almost 60.
• We have little to prove, so we aren’t afraid to stand our ground.
• We have no intention of wasting our time trying to convince people that we can do/be something even with ovaries. (Note: I don’t know her well enough yet to know if she actually still has her ovaries.)
• We are fascinated/inspired by our adult kids.
• We’ve made some big mistakes in our previous decades of life, but it’s okay.
• We’re often invisible in social situations, but this offers an excellent opportunity to scope out the room and figure out who is interesting without small talk.

I loved the Tina Fey/Amy Poehler explanations of “cake” and “birthdays” to a Golden Globe culture of perpetual starvation and age aversion Sunday night. I like cake very much. And birthday parties. And women of a certain age.

For sure I will turn 59 in 2015. Not for sure, but possible: a non-church friend.

Image of Frances McDormand whom – like Amy Poehler, I would also save from a burning building.

We love and support our neighbors, especially when they’ve been needlessly, much less fatally, hurt.  We are quick to come to their side, at least on social media.

We who seek to follow Jesus believe that God became One with us.   And so, of course, we want to stand up and shout  Je Suis Charlie and become one with the weak and victimized.  But as David Brooks pointed out in this editorial, “If they (the staff of Charlie Hebdo) had tried to publish their satirical newspaper on any American university campus over the last two decades it wouldn’t have lasted 30 seconds.”

Civilized people do not murder people with whom we disagree.  But we – in the land of Freedom of Speech – sometimes do not allow all people to speak. Remember last spring?

• Christine Lagarde withdrew as Smith’s Commencement Speaker after some protested her work with the IMF.
• Condoleeza Rice withdrew as Rutger’s Commencement Speaker after some protested her foreign policy work.
• Ayaan Hirsi Ali was uninvited by Brandeis as an honorary degree recipient after protests about her anti-Muslim commentary.
• John Corvino was uninvited by Providence College in 2013 after some protested his LGBTQ activism.

See, it can go both ways.  Progressives protest Conservative speakers and Conservatives protest Progressive speakers.

Obviously, we do not tolerate violence against those with whom we disagree.  But are we okay with tolerating their speaking at all?

Shifting this to a church context, many (most?) of our churches are not as friendly as we think we are, and we are not as tolerant as we think we are.  It’s not easy for someone to express that she isn’t sure what she believes about homosexuality in a congregation known to be “liberal.”  And it’s not easy in a congregation known to be “traditional” when someone expresses that he’s discerned that God created LGBTQ people with great joy.  Certain comments might make our deepest organs wince in pain, and we might want to shoot them (but of course we don’t.)

In my heart of hearts, I’m pretty sure I’m not really Charlie Hebdo.  I am not crazy about letting people express their views when they disagree with me that women are called into professional ministry or that transgender people are called into full leadership in the church or that marriage equality makes God happy. Nevertheless I want to be in a community that allows disagreement and respect, in spite of the profound difficulty in hearing different voices.  I admit that I do not have a sense of humor about some issues.  I admit that some of the Charlie Hebdo cartoons are seriously not funny to me.

But we’ve got to allow those with whom we disagree to speak their thoughts. Some who do not tolerate different views or satire occasionally resort to violence.  What happened to the men and women in Paris is unspeakably horrible.

But we can all be better at allowing room for those who speak words and draw images even if they offend us.

Image source (with slight editing)

I’m a big fan of Bill Tenny-Brittian and the good people at Effective Church.  But I wonder how realistic this article is – as we are newly called in the 21st Century Church to spend most/much of our time reaching out beyond the hallowed walls of Church World.

On the one hand:  what would happen if you/your pastor . . .

• Attended only one meeting per month?
• Spent almost no time preparing the Sunday bulletin?
• Kept no office hours except by appointment?
• Delegated all pastoral calls to church members?
• Trained and deployed church members to do hospital visits?
• Spent less than two hours on sermon preparation/week (for churches with less than 150 members) and no more than five hours/week for larger congregations?

Yep, you/your pastor might be run out of town.

But on the other hand:  Ephesians 4 (the only Biblical job description for “pastor” meaning the person who shepherds a church) makes it clear that we are supposed to equip God’s saints for ministry and not do it all ourselves.  If we are not preparing others to make lead, care, visit, and even preach then we are not doing our jobs.

And yet, these are fighting words.  20th Century Pastors were all about meetings, bulletin prep, office hours, pastoral calling, hospital visitation, and – God-knows – sermon preparation.  This is What We Do.  People pay us to be the professional Christians, right?

Not in a 21st Century Church.  Not in a thriving congregation.  Not in a spiritual community with a deep sense of satisfaction and energy.

If we pastors devote less time to a 20th Century job description, we will be freed up to connect with people who are not already in our church community.  We will be freed up to be connectional, missional, and focused on our community in hopes of figuring out its greatest needs.

Many/most pastors today are:

• still fulfilling those dated job descriptions
• seminary-trained only to do 20th Century ministry
• unprepared to be community leaders
• untrained in change management

Believe me, people will want to run you out of town.  If  you propose Terry Brittian’s ideas for clergy time management and suggest the kind of changes he’s talking about, they will not be thrilled.

They have (often woefully) believed that change is about tweeting and singing U2 in worship. But the change that will create growth is actually about following Jesus in a new way, taking seriously our own baptism vows, and discerning our own calling.  Much more difficult.

I remember Easum and/or Bandy saying years ago that a pastor should never ever do hospital visits.   She/he should train parishioners to do them.  Honestly, I get this to a point. But I also know that Clinical Pastoral Education is the real thing and there’s a reason why we require it of seminarians.  I, myself have experienced spiritual mayhem when an unskilled person visited me in the hospital and made things worse.

So, I’m saying that Tenny-Brittian has some good points, but pastors have got to spend A Lot Of Time equipping their people to excel in ministry.  It doesn’t necessarily take a seminary degree to be a trained minister.  But it takes massive dedication, along with the spiritual gifts required to make the ministry about God.

And if we try to make changes without success, they will run us out of town.

Your thoughts?  Anybody ready to choose only one meeting/month?

Image from The Simpsons.

Every church I know (EVERY church I know) has a budget crunch as we move into the new year.

Why? There are many reasons – some deeply analyzed by church historians and sociologists, and some pondered unscientifically by pastors and bloggers like me.

Among those reasons: Consistently-generous givers (who tend to be in older generations) died or moved away in 2014 . People who no longer worship regularly (i.e. every Sunday unless they are out of town or sick) have stopped giving as regularly too. Younger generations (who – by the way, in my experience – are very generous financial givers) are trying to pay off student loans. Unemployment is still a huge issue in many communities.

We in the non-profit world did not accept this calling expecting financial riches. And yet, we work hard and we deserve to be compensated accordingly. So, how do we ask for what we need (and maybe a tiny bit of what we want) in a culture of Financially Struggling Church? Here’s what not to do: Allow pastors, educators, and musicians who pay for their own supplies. They do it because they need certain things to do their jobs and they want their congregations to thrive in spite of what feels like a time of scarcity. The problems with this practice are:

1. We sabotage the next pastors, educators, and musicians who cannot do this. (“Our last educator bought all the bulletin board supplies out of her own pocket! This is why we miss her so much/can’t function without her/wish you were her.”)
2. We will not have correct financial information for budgeting purposes if financial gifts are donated off the books. If Vacation Bible School actually costs $2500 but the pastor has donated $2000 for it, it looks like VBS costs $500. Then somebody gets blamed for “overspending” down the road.

So, how do we Church Professionals negotiate our salary and benefits in times like these? Do we take one for team? (Leigh Thompson of Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University says no. Also, Kellogg has an excellent Non-Profit Leadership program you need to check out here.)

Full disclosure: I just asked my own Personnel Committee to consider increasing my benefits in 2015.

The bottom line is that gas costs more (if our jobs require driving for on-site visits) and continuing education classes cost more (along with transportation and hotels if required.) The minimum for Continuing Education in our Presbytery – we hope – will be increased in 2016 because 1) most pastors get the minimum and 2) you can’t attend a conference out of town within the $700 minimum we require.

Yes, our congregations are strapped. But if we want vibrant ministry, if we want well-prepared clergy, educators, and musicians, if we want sharp support staff we need to help them succeed. Removing financial stress is a good start.

Final note: if your congregation has more than one pastor and the Associate Pastor(s) make(s) less than half what your Head of Staff earns, please prayerfully consider the fact that this might be unjust. At least consider it.

Few of us believe we are mean.  

Especially we Church People tend to consider ourselves to be friendly (especially to visitors and guests), tolerant, and generous.  I visit a lot of congregations comprised of the gracious and well-mannered as bulletins are distributed and friends are welcomed.  But increasingly, I notice that – when fewer people are looking – they are mean.  They don’t even realize it.

I don’t realize it either. I find myself saying something unnecessary or untrue. And I barely realize I’m doing it.

A wise person said to me yesterday, “Some of our congregations need exorcisms.”  Ouch – and yet she’s right.  The foundational DNA of too many of our congregations is snarkiness and suspicion.  Maybe we can resolve to be less snarky and suspicious of each other in the new year.  Or maybe we need an exorcism.

It’s kind of painful and shocking to realize how much we need to check ourselves. Overheard in the last month or so in church meetings/events*:

• “Expect a couple of people to bitch that we aren’t singing all five verses of that hymn.”  (During a bulletin review before worship)
• “We had hoped to go to Florida this week but our nephew decided he needed to ruin that and get married in Minnesota this weekend.” (Said without a sarcastic twinkle)
• “Maybe it was wrong to pass that rumor about the pastor, but some of us think it’s true.” (By a church elder)
• “Why does she have to bring her baby everywhere?” (About a church leader who is also a single mom)
• “What does our pastor really do all day?  (To a room full of people drinking coffee. Note: Why don’t you ask?)

*Details have been changed.

So, remember that Bible verse about being known by our fruits?  We can do better.

If over the past two weeks, we were blessed with 1) jobs and 2) time off from those jobs, today is probably The First Day Back.  “See ya next year!” we chirped to our colleagues in late December and now we return to our usual schedule.

Resolutions have already been made and broken, but unspoken goals are still swimming around in our heads.  Can we Have It All in 2015?  No.

Read this for background.

As I recently shared on FB, my 2015 hopes include inserting hearing aids into my ears, finishing a book I’m writing, and preparing – as stress free as humanly possibly –  for FBC’s wedding.  Oh, the list goes on and on in my head:  I also want to spend MLK weekend in DC and my birthday weekend in NYC.  I need new shoes.  And maybe boots.  (I still haven’t purchased Chicago-worthy winter boots even after 3 1/2 years in The Prairie State.)  People already tell me that I need to take a week’s vacation after the wedding.  I have two classes, one training, two retreats, and a week with my preaching group planned.  And my job is transitioning in a semi-huge way.

But what will I NOT be doing/having/wanting in 2015?  This is as important a question as it’s polar opposite.   Stating up front in January that I cannot do/have/want “it all” takes some pressure off, don’t you think?  What can I release?  What can I toss?

These questions are deeply spiritual. It takes some staring into space to figure it out.  It also takes humility and some serious vulnerability.  But here goes.

• I will not lose weight for FBC’s wedding.  I know many brides, bridesmaids, mothers of the bride, etc. who cut their calories for the sake of the form-fitting gown.  And it would be nice to be my own marriage weight for the August 2015 nuptials of my FBC.  But it isn’t going to happen. I’m not even going to try.
• I will not join a gym or do Pilates on a regular basis.  It would sound awesome to say “I spend four nights a week at the gym” or “I take Pilates some mornings before work.”  But I can’t do these things and do my job well, considering the commute and the hours.  It’s fine.
• I will not clean out every closet in my house this year. Okay, the foyer closet really needs it, but Too Bad For You, bedroom closets.  That over-sized Thomas the Tank Engine gift bag in The Washington Room closet will just have to stay there.  The zebra bag with baby gifts to dole out two years ago?  Probably won’t be sorted in 2015.
• I will not read HBR in 2015.  Yes, it makes me sound really smart and less churchy, but it also drives me crazy and I turn into a non-profit maniac with ADD.
• I will also stop reading articles like this.  This kind of cultural phenomenon makes me so crazy that I start to think that secretly I want to be one of these ladies in my deepest, darkest parts.  Some of them are wearing tiaras.
• I will just say “no” – without feeling guilty about it.  (2014 was a good year for saying “no” but I was still consumed with guilt. Upward and onward!)

So, I’m not expecting comments about what you will or will not do/have/want in the new year, but I hope you’ll ponder.

Image of First Lady Nancy Reagan discouraging children from using illegal substances.  (1987)

My seminary friend J includes this in her resolutions faith practices for 2015: Make grace the default response.

This comes the week that a member of the British royal family has been accused of participating in an international sex slave operation.  (I was about to call The Duke of York “the cute one” but then I re-read yesterday’s post.  My hope is that the 2015 currency in the Duke’s pocket is actually less about his appearance and more about his charitable work. And God help this guy if he’s guilty.)

Although we Americans ostensibly ascribe to the gracious notion of “innocent until proven guilty” let’s face it:  we rarely do this.

In my line of work, I receive reports about clergy misconduct which can run the gamut from child abuse to adultery to financial malfeasance. The process involves accusations, investigations, proceedings under oath, reports, and  – if necessary – consequences.  Let’s be honest: there are pastors whom “everybody” knows are being irresponsible, to say the least.   There are pastors that parishioners feel queasy about in some way, but they do not want to rock the proverbial boat.  And there are people out to get pastors for whatever reason.  Jealously?  Power struggles?  Evil?

It’s one thing to make our default response grace when someone cuts us off on the highway or breaks in line at the movie theater or refuses to quiet their children in the library.  But what if someone is accused – like the Duke of York – of something particularly heinous and life-ruining?  It’s tricky and fraught with crazy-making emotions.  But:

1. We have to trust.  Listen to the stories with open minds.  Prayerfully discern.  Mostly trust God who ultimately makes things right.
2. We have to support the victims – who are not always the obvious ones.
3. We have to hold each other accountable.  For the love of God, you all have permission to take me aside and hold me accountable if you observe me doing something that hurts the people I serve or God or myself or my dog.  Honestly, please tell me. I (and maybe you) have taken vows that deserve to remain sacred.

Even when it’s determined that someone is unquestionably guilty, we who seek to follow Jesus are called to act accordingly.  We all need forgiveness.  We all have fallen short.  We all carry something shameful in our lives.  I’m not saying we should not hold each other accountable (I’m talking to you, abusive seminary boyfriend.)  But what if grace was our (attempted) default response in 2015?

Image source.

I want to be Amy Poehler’s friend.   She says many pithy things in Yes, Please which I enjoyed more than this person. One of her bits of advice for life and love is:

Decide what your currency is early. (page 21 in the hardcover)

Maybe your currency is physical beauty or wit or brains.  But Amy counsels, “Let go of what you will never have. People who do this are happier and sexier.” True, but not completely true.

I will never sing like Aretha, write like Flannery, or cook like Julia, and I’ve accepted those realities.  I will never again look like my twenty-something self.  All okay.  Nevertheless, I believe our currency changes through the years.

Sometimes we exchange yen for drachma.  Or in other words, we once carried X in our pockets and now we are flush with Y.  Again – all good.  Or it can be.

What if this could be the year that we:

1- Figure out our prevailing currency situation.

2- Exchange some of our old (no longer needed) currency for what we need/have today.

3 – Circulate our currency well in 2015.

For example, I was once known for my baked goods.  They were excellent. Although it probably gave all my children eating disorders, we had a baked dessert for dinner almost every night during their childhood and our home was a gathering place that smelled of double chocolate muffins.   But now I am not known for prowess in the kitchen at all.  Empty nesting and late nights at work have contributed to this shift in identity from Betty Crocker to the lady who buys pre-chopped kale salad at Costco.  I am trying to accept and embrace this.

My currency used to be Active Mom.  I ran Teacher Appreciation week for over ten years in our elementary school and even my church personnel committee once included the line “Jan is a good mother” in my annual review.  Now I live in a community who has never known me as the mother of young children and it’s as if I’ve never had them.

We are coming off of a holiday week during which many returned  to their parents’ houses where they backslid into the currency of their teenage years.  Once again, we became “the smart one” or “the moody one” or “the funny one.” Actually we traded in those roles long ago.  We’re in different places now.

Imagine figuring out what’s especially precious and valuable about ourselves at this time and place, and then spreading it around.  It’s possible that our currency has changed.

Image of a 2015 Australian Gold Proof Year of the Goat coin.  It was all I could do not to include the question “What’s in your wallet?” in this post.

We have never been a big New Year’s Eve family.  I went to Times Square for NYE once in college, but it was raining and we stayed inside and played Monopoly.

But this is a holy night as we look forward to an uncertain but hopeful future. What gives me hope – in spite of the fact that I serve the institutional church in a post-denominational context, that I try to live as a Jesus-follower in a post-Christian culture, that I grieve being American in one of the most fractured periods of our nation’s history?  Several things.

Points of Hope on this last day in The Year of our LORD 2014:

• FBC is marrying our beloved SK in August which will unite families from Pakistan, Puerto Rico, Canada, Texas, New York, Virginia, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Maryland.  The gathered mass will include Christians, Jews, Muslims, at least one Buddhist, Agnostics, and Atheists.  There was a time when somebody would have been burned at the stake or stoned to death for this.  But we will be celebrating with people who are Different – as family.
• Churches in our presbytery and denomination will close.  This will be good because it means that those congregations are making faithful choices in light of changing demographics and culture.  And the funds that have perpetuated those congregations can be directed towards something new that makes God happy.
• People will fall in love with other people they have not yet met. This is always fun to consider.
• People will retire who need to retire.  Far from meaning that they are washed-up, unnecessary, or irrelevant, they will begin new chapters of their lives, and the organizations from which they retire can make healthy changes.
• Scientific, medical, technological, and spiritual breakthroughs will happen.  Makes me giddy.
• God will continue to speak and act.  This is the best news ever.

We have many choices tonight that will impact our tomorrow.  We can start the new year with a hangover/cranky attitude/wringing hands.  Or we can prepare to listen to the positive voices around and within us reminding us that we were created for something bigger than ourselves.

Happy New Year everybody.

Image of the Chicago skyline.