A Church for Starving Artists

My brother loves his church.

He treasures his relationships – both with the pastors and with the other members.  He spends vacation time serving on mission trips – and not the kind which involve side trips to rain forests and beautiful beaches.  He gladly serves on a regular basis and he credits the church with teaching, inspiring, and supporting him.  He describes his community of faith as A Happy Church.

At the risk of sounding shallow, a happy church seems to be a healthy church.  Is that what you’ve found?

I occasionally spend time with unhappy churches.  Maybe they can’t be happy because of their own personal anxieties or their anxieties over church issues.  Churches in survival mode are rarely happy.  Their members don’t seem to love each other.  They might say they are “friendly” but then they fail to serve each other much less strangers.  

Church unhappiness might stem from poor relationships between pastors and members. It might result from disagreement over the church’s course of ministry.  Distrust breeds unhappiness.  Power struggles breed unhappiness.

So, of the healthy congregations you know, would you say they are “happy”?

Image Source

“Internships are increasingly important today . . .  because skills are increasingly important in the new economy and because colleges increasingly don’t teach the ones employers are looking for.”  Thomas L. Friedman in the NY Times June 9, 2013

The same could be said about internships and seminaries.  Seminary internships – also called Field Education – can be immensely helpful in terms of fortifying one’s Pastoral Identity as well as teaching essential skills on the job.

I serve on a Middle Judicatory Staff as an Interim Associate Executive.  So, for starters, I’m just the interim and so it makes little sense for me to consider getting an intern.  But I’ve pondered what an internship in my office might look like.  A couple of initial questions:

• Would anyone even want to be an intern in the Presbytery Office?
• Could we come up with responsibilities that went beyond filing things?
• How would we deal with confidentiality issues?  (“Don’t mind the seminarian standing over there.  Just go ahead and tell me about how dysfunctional things are over there.)

But I imagine that there are skills that would be teachable out of the Presbytery Office:  Mediation.  Juggling.  Conversations about Common Church Crises and Transitions.

The future of Middle Judicatories and Mainline Church hierarchies in general is uncertain.  I see my role – as I saw it when serving as a parish pastor – as working myself out of a job.   Our work involves equipping others to do what we do.

And yet something tells me that there will always be more to do as people continue to long for community.  Maybe someone like me or someone like you could help with that.  Know anybody who wants to intern at the Presbytery?  Just wondering for the future.

Image Source.

Note to those who don’t live in Church World:  In the Presbyterian Church, the Presbytery is a geographic region of congregations (e.g. all the Presbyterian congregations in a major city and surrounding burbs) as well as a corporate bishop.  Presbyteries do what a bishop does in other traditions.  

When I talk with people pondering calls in churches in the Chicago area, I share with them that We Are A Good Presbytery.  Honestly, it attracts good people.

Life is easier when we are surrounded by supportive systems, authentic colleagues, and friendly communities.  This is not to say that there are no conflicts or crises.  God knows there are.

But when I say that ours is a Good Presbytery I mean that:

• The ministry of women is not only assumed but appreciated in obvious ways.  
• The ministry of GBLTQ leaders is honored and even those with whom we disagree theologically, there is respect.
• We make difficult decisions thoughtfully and with plenty of research, prayer, and time.
• We have become increasingly permission-giving.  (Thank you Cindy Bolbach and nFOG.)
• Even though we lean progressive/liberal, other voices are heard.

There are obvious changes needed.  Nevertheless, there is so much good which results in expanding the reign of God.

Consider this my little Sabbath love letter today.  And I can’t say it enough times:  we have ten pastors under the age of 35 coming this summer.  Joy.

“There’s fear that we are going to make a mistake in our ministry. That we are going to start the wrong program. That what we do will fail.”                              The Rev. Reggie Weaver preaching 6-2-13

Mistakes Were Made

This is a common scenario – especially in our smallest churches:

The congregation needs a new pastor and a Temporary Supply Pastor – maybe very part-time – is what they can afford.  Or they look for a FT Temporary Supply Pastor because the contract is for one year and they don’t know what they will need/want/have the capacity to pay a year from now.

The congregation is given from 3-6 Personal Information Forms/resumes to check out.  Among those, there are 1-2 who would be a good match for the church.

The search committee reads through them, listens to sermons, talks (and talks and talks) about the candidates.  And it takes at least 3 months for them to make a decision.  

In the meantime, those pastors are no longer available, the committee needs to start all over again, and the church is gasping for air and leadership.

Fearful churches are afraid to make decisions.  One false move – they believe – and everything will come crashing down.  So they don’t move.

For congregations on the cusp of closing, this is especially prevalent and ultimately deadly.  The very caution that slows down their decision-making is what kills them.

We are called to be bold.  Here’s what boldness looks like:

• Try something and give it time.  If we try a new form of worship and it’s decreed that “everybody hates it” after one week, we have sabotaged ourselves, and we teach our leaders that we like the idea of change, but we have no intention of taking it seriously.  It comforts the risk-averse to offer a limited try-out time:  “We’re trying this for six months and then evaluating it.“
• Don’t blame people as in:  “Because the Pastor moved Sunday worship to 10 am, people don’t come anymore.“
• Shift the culture from win-lose to tweak-improve.  Healthy churches are on the same team.  It’s not the “traditional worship people” versus the “fresh expressions worship people.”   We all want to make disciples, right?  How does our worship do that or not?
• Realize that Mistakes Are Our Friends.  If your church hasn’t made a mistake in the past year, you haven’t tried anything creative.
• Know that churches channeling The Bubble Boy are boring.  They also look nothing like the New Testament Church in which people are observed dropping dead during stewardship season and crashing in boats.

Everywhere – even in the bleakest urban neighborhoods, the most rural outposts, the most cookie-cutter suburbs – there are people who need what the church offers . . . if what we are offering is authentic community, spiritual healing, and transformation  – Jesus-style.

Image is The Death of Sapphira by Poussin (1652)

“This isn’t about sex,” Sen. Claire McCaskill,  but about “crimes of domination and violence.”

I am semi-speechless about the reports of sexual violence against women in our military. And yet, while it might be hard to talk about, it’s not so hard to write about it.  As Senator McCaskill said, it’s not about sex.  Some of the boys are not happy that the girls have joined their ranks.  The same thing happened to clergywomen years ago.

Women were first ordained to professional ministry in my denomination in 1956 and, if you want some crazy stories, talk to a woman who has been ordained for 50 years or more.  I have a friend who is among the Matriarchs of my clergywomen colleagues and she reports that there was never (she said never) a church meeting, a church retreat, or a church conference when a male colleague did not try to make a pass at her, invite her to have a liaison, or crack an inappropriate “joke.”  By the time I was ordained, it didn’t happen every time I went to a church event, but it happened often enough.

It was assumed – among some men – that if we (women) were there, then we (women) were ostensibly available.  It was not about sex.  It was about control and domination.

Those days are (usually) over, but our sisters in the military apparently have to deal with this currently and exponentially – especially considering that their commanding officers might be the offenders.  Military culture – like church culture – is hierarchical.  Reporting a “superior officer” might result in punishment for the accuser.

We have a part to play as regular citizens in this military misconduct mess.  We can share our outrage.  We can talk with our military friends and family members.  But mostly, we can train our sons that women are not objects to be dominated.  Women are not objects to be controlled – even in hierarchical systems.

To our daughters, we can teach them that they are created in God’s image just like the guys.  We are more than our private parts.   We were not created to live in a man’s shadow.

God bless the women who speak up at their own peril.  And may we pay attention to this issue.  We pay their salaries.

Image is The Intervention of the Sabine Women by Jacques-Louis David (1799)

I was aghast – years ago – to learn that one of our Sunday School teachers had ditched the curriculum and was teaching “good manners” to her students: five older elementary students, two of whom were her own children.  Her own children, of course, didn’t need this training but the teacher was certain that the other three did need this version of “Christian Education.”  They were were classless lowlifes, in her estimation,  since they hailed from lower middle class families, had single moms and mixed racial heritages.  She was literally teaching them which fork to use – bringing her own implements from home as teaching tools.

She was quickly relieved of her duties, although she never really got why her efforts “to civilize” those kids was a problem.  Sigh.

What I’ve witnessed over and over again as a Presbytery staffer who worships in a different congregation every Sunday is that we actually do need to teach social skills to both adults and children in our churches.  Not good manners, exactly, but graciousness.

In the almost two years since I’ve been on the job in our Presbytery, I have experienced these moments:

• A person literally yanked my bulletin out of my hands after worship saying, “Time to recycle and get out of here!“
• No one speaking to me, even when I asked questions about upcoming programs.
• No one passing the peace with me.
• No one handing me a bulletin or even sharing a hymnbook when I was trying to follow the worship service without a bulletin.
• Trying to find coffee hour.
• Finally finding the space where coffee hour was being hosted only to find no more coffee.  (I had briefly stopped in the ladies’ room on my way there.)
• Regulars referring to “Peggy” and “George” during prayer concerns as in “Peggy got out of the hospital” and “George is back” as if everybody knows these people and what we are talking about.
• Elders serving coffee to everyone around the table except me (the interloper from Presbytery.)

I have also experienced authentic graciousness:

• People who have taken me to coffee hour themselves.
• Members who have invited me – a stranger in their congregation – out to brunch after worship.
• Ladies who have made a fresh pot of coffee just for me.
• Gentlemen who have shared their umbrellas with me in the parking lot.

We followers of Jesus are in the grace business: offering it, teaching it, sharing it.  Grace could be defined as mercy, charm, or fluidity.

But we are also in the graciousness business: showing compassion, making people comfortable, being kind.  Grace and graciousness are similar words, but they are also different.

Can you honestly say that your congregation – as a whole – is gracious to each other and to guests?  Or does your church fail to look anything like Jesus in the way you treat each other?  And how can we train our people to be more gracious in the image of Christ, especially when we believe good manners has something to do with forks?

Fork by Vietri.

Many of our congregations have renters in their buildings who help them pay the bills.  Some of those congregations are under the impression that the mission of the renters = the mission of the church.  This is not necessary so.

I once served a church who started a computer training program for undereducated adults. They set up their own 501c3 but they were a mission of our church.  They never paid rent.  We were not using them to help support the church.  The church chose to support them because they helped the neighbors in extraordinary ways.

We have countless churches today who rent space to everyone from non-profit offices to Girl Scouts to training classes to other (often immigrant) congregations, and then they claim the mission of those organizations as one of their own mission projects.  The truth is that they have no relationship with those organizations except that they help pay for the utilities or salaries.

Churches that pay for their ministries via renters are dying congregations.  Yes, that’s a sweeping generalization, but I believe it’s true.  It’s one thing to discern a need in the neighborhood and then serve that need by establishing a non-profit.  It’s quite another thing to find renters (even if we call them “partners”) who help pay the mortgage/utlities with whom we have no real relationship much less a partnership.

Mainline congregations have property.  We might not have growing churches, viable ministries, healthy communities, or equipped congregations for a 21st Century mission, but we have real estate.  And often that property has faulty heating and dated plumbing.  The location might or might not be in an enviable location.  But we need help to keep those properties.

What is the future of spiritual communities with large buildings?  Often they are historic spaces.  Sometimes they are merely dated spaces in failing neighborhoods.  Even if there are active congregations still using those spaces, the neighbors often believe that those churches are closed.

Are we willing to let go of those buildings?  Can we acknowledge that we can no longer sustain those spaces?  Is it a mistake to sell the buildings?

I’d love to know what you think?  Does your congregation rent space to other organizations?  And do you know each other?

Image Source.

The wonderful JBL recently mentioned to me the benefits of pastors being Acquainted With Grief.

I have clergy friends who have lost parents at a young age.  They’ve lost children and siblings and best friends and spouses.   If I may be so bold, I believe that the best pastors are those who are indeed acquainted with grief.  We who have lost The Most Important People In Our Lives are not “lucky” but we have access to something powerful and holy.  We have said goodbye to people we didn’t think we could live without.  It continues to be a daily slog.

This is not something we can aspire to have.  But those of us who have experienced the loss of someone  – or several someones –  who have left a tremendous gap, are better pastors for it.  We are automatically in a club no one wants to join.  But it makes us better pastors.

This post is dedicated to my friends who’ve recently been diagnosed with cancer, lost parents to cancer, have children with cancer.  You know who you are.

Image is Depressed Man by Van Gogh.

The Ubiquitous Church Parlor

Our book group just read Brene Brown’s Daring Greatly and  – as I do with everything from Cooking Light magazine to Tillich, I read through the lens of Church World.

Peter Drucker apparently once said, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”  In other words, we can make all the strategic plans in the world, but if those plans mess with our organization’s culture, the plans will never work . . . unless we change the culture.

We need pastors who know how to change a congregation’s culture – albeit lovingly, pastorally, patiently, firmly.  But it’s essential for a congregation’s future to make such changes as we move into a post-Christian season.  Too few of our pastors know how to do this.

I love Brene Brown’s Ten Questions For Figuring Out An Organization’s Culture – again from Daring Greatly – and I have added common answers to her questions from churches I have known and loved.

Q1:  What behaviors are rewarded?  Punished?  Rewarded: Singing tenor in the choir.  Punished:  Changing the menu for the long-established Annual Global Mission Dinner.

Q2:  Where and how are people actually spending their resources (time, money, attention)?  On soccer fields (for the kids) and golf courses (for the adults).  At the office.  In minivans and SUVs.

Q3:  What rules and expectations are followed, enforced, ignored?  Followed:  Casual Fridays dress code.  Enforced: No smoking.  Ignored:  Coffee cups in the sanctuary.

Q4:  Do people feel safe and supported talking about how they feel and asking for what they need?  If they are under 35.

Q5:  What are the sacred cows?  Who is most likely to tip them?  Who stands the cows back up?  Sacred cow:  The parlor.  Suspected Tipsters:  Members under age 40 with kids.  Cow restorers:  Church Ladies.

Q6:  What stories are legend and what values do they convey?  Remember when the pews were packed?  But now we have the wrong pastor/choir director/organ/elders.

Q7:  What happens when someone fails, disappoints, or makes a mistake?  We sometimes eat them.

Q8:  How is vulnerability (uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure) perceived?  As naive and too Oprah-esque.

Q9: How prevalent are shame and blame and how are they showing up?  It’s the Presbytery’s fault.

Q10: What’s the collective tolerance for discomfort?  Is the discomfort of learning, trying new things, and giving and receiving feedback normalized, or is there a high premium put on comfort (and how does that look)?  Why is The Presbytery/the new pastor/the new music director telling us what to do?  There was nothing wrong with the way we wanted to do it.

Every week of my life I visit congregations full of truly wonderful people who are faithful but fearful.  They fear uncertainty.  They see the world around them changing.  But many of them love God and want to serve in the name of Jesus.  And this is why I stay in the institutional church.

Many of my friends decry the institutional church and all the ridiculousness of it.  But – in spite of all that is ridiculous – I know really great people who want to be the church for a new season.  They just don’t know how.  And it’s scary making the necessary shifts in an uncertain world.  But about these things I am certain:

• There will always be a church.  It just might not look like it has in the last century.
• Denominations will be altered in significant ways.  But even non-denominational churches will have partnerships with other churches.
• Everybody will continue to crave community.  Everybody wants to belong.
• Jesus is Lord.

Do you and/or your pastoral leaders know how to shift the culture?  What would you need to make this shift?

There’s a breed of pastors who have committed to serving churches between “permanent pastors.”  A good interim pastor is like gold. 

Good interim pastors help congregations come to terms with their recent (and sometimes distant) past.  They prepare the way for the next pastor, so that that he/she can hit the ground running, rather than deal with a difficult staff member or gnawing issue.

But today, we need at least a few Interim Pastors who know how to teach 21st Century Church culture to their interim churches.  For example:

• A pastor has just left after 20 years and the church had still been functioning as a 1980s church.  They have never heard of the shifts in church culture.  They are still of the mind that ‘if we build it, they will come.’  They need an interim who will prepare them to call a pastor who can lead them in a post-Christian culture.
• After attempting to jolt a dying church with new energy, the pastor is moving along. Her congregation rejected all ideas to reach out into the neighborhood.  A core group of long-time members rejected the notion that the church will never be as it was in the 1970s.   Now they need an interim who can help them assess their future story:  What’s next for them?  Should they call an established pastor who will look like their former pastors?  Or do they want to try again with another visionary pastor?  Are they at the point when they basically need a chaplain?  The answer to these questions require knowledge of missional church, conversations about Belonging-Behaving-Believing, etc.

We need transitional pastors who can also offer redevelopment consultation – not to do the redevelopment necessarily, but to help a church discern if they really want to make the shifts to keep their ministry going and thriving.

Not every congregation needs this.  Some congregations still need traditional interim pastors who have serious work to do, to be sure.  But there are increasingly congregations who need an interim/consultant who helps them – forgive me for this word – survive. 

Thoughts?

Image Source.