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Source: (consider it) Thread: Should the CofE focus on church planting?
Curiosity killed ...

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This Observer article from last weekend expresses many of my misgivings about the current Renewal and Reform agenda of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

According to the article, in the CofE:
quote:
From January next year, funding will be allocated to two streams. One will go to poor areas, mostly deprived inner cities; the other for “strategic development”, with church planting taking centre stage.
and a number of church people are quoted as having reservations.

Something that confirmed my impressions about church growth comes from comments given in the article:
quote:
He drew a rough graph, showing the downward trajectory of the traditional congregation and the upward trajectory of the “growing church”. “The evidence suggests that the institutional church is in decline. But you have these two things happening at the same time: an ageing way of doing church is becoming less popular, but there’s a new movement of young people particularly in situations of growth. If you draw those curves together, there will be a bottoming out,”
and
quote:
“Actually, the more apt comparison is with Corbyn and Momentum,” said one critic. “The diehards become more and more frenzied, while everyone else looks on in total incomprehension – and in many cases are repulsed.”
Is the article right, is the new way of being church driving out the traditional congregations? Should the CofE concentrate on church planting and reduce funding to the traditional congregations.

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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat

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Eutychus
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quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
quote:
He drew a rough graph, showing the downward trajectory of the traditional congregation and the upward trajectory of the “growing church” (...)an ageing way of doing church is becoming less popular, but there’s a new movement of young people particularly in situations of growth.


This appears to me to be completely tautological; growing churches are growing...

I strongly doubt there is enough growth to offset the decline, though.

An article from last week's Economist, This sceptic isle (not sure if it's behind a paywall or not) confirmed my anecdatal suspicions:
quote:
A 65-country study by WIN/Gallup last year found a lower proportion of people are religious in Britain than in all but six other countries.
The challenge the Church of England has before it, along with the rest of the UK, is facing up to the reality that it is in a post-Christian society. Focusing on church-planting sounds like a good idea in that respect.

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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Curiosity killed ...

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Even if, as many people were quoted as saying in the Observer article, that the Christianity peddled by the church plants is off-putting to many?

And yes, the point was that the growth from church plants is not offsetting the decline in Christianity.

[ 19. August 2016, 09:01: Message edited by: Curiosity killed ... ]

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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat

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Eutychus
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quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
Even if, as many people were quoted as saying in the Observer article, that the Christianity peddled by the church plants is off-putting to many?

I think the fact is that the Christianity "peddled by" the more traditional churches is no more attractive.

For most people, it's a cultural curiosity at best. I acknowledge this is a bitter pill to swallow, but I think that's the reality and that it's better to realise that sooner rather than later.

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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Baptist Trainfan
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To an extent this is an issue facing many denominations, Protestant ones at least. At its root lie certain basic questions, such as:

- Is there a certain outward form which a church must take in order to be true to its faith and traditions? (The corollary must be, "To what extent should churches adapt to changed cultural situations?") And are there Anglican "distinctives"?

- Are the growing churches doing so at a cost, both in finance and personnel, to the more traditional ones? Indeed, is their very growth fuelling the decline of "less attractive" churches? a world of finite resources and personal preferences, how can this tension best be resolved?

- Do churches (especially the CofE) adopt a largely market-led approach of concentrating resources in places which seem amenable to church growth? Or should they aim to still be a significant presence in every small community (and might there be ecumenical implications in so doing)?

It strikes me that similar questions and - dare I say? - hints of disapproval must have been voiced when Wesleyanism burst onto the scene in the 1700s.

By the way, the "parallel graph" idea was peddled back in the 90s, when the so-called New Religious Movements seemed to be growing fast. It was thought that this would counter-balance the decline in traditional religious observance and so disprove the secularisation thesis. But the rise in NRMs was not only much smaller than the decline in (say) the churches, it was a rather different and much more introverted kind of religion.

[ 19. August 2016, 09:58: Message edited by: Baptist Trainfan ]

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Baptist Trainfan
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quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
I think the fact is that the Christianity "peddled by" the more traditional churches is no more attractive.

For most people, it's a cultural curiosity at best. I acknowledge this is a bitter pill to swallow, but I think that's the reality and that it's better to realise that sooner rather than later.

Couldn't agree more ... and there's surely something to be said for the idea that Jesus would have cared more about mission to the world than the likes and dislikes of hidebound church members.

(I know that at this point someone will come on board and say, "We're a traditional church, we do it well and we're bursting at the seams". Well, that's great and it obviously works in your context. But it clearly doesn't work in lots of other places, despite a great deal of hard work.)

[ 19. August 2016, 10:04: Message edited by: Baptist Trainfan ]

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Eutychus
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The problem is that nobody is starting with a blank sheet of paper. Especially in the UK where you still have an established church with enormous assets compared to elsewhere.

Rather than church-planting, my preferred model (by a staggering coincidence [Big Grin] ) is that of chaplaincy. Here (in secular France!), chaplains have a spiritual function acknowledged by the state and a positive mandate in law to fulfil that function.

They operate on a demand-driven basis (requests from individuals or the authorities) in relationship to but distinct from various social charities, and have opportunities both for very street-level interaction and input into policy decisions.

Engage in this kind of activity for long enough and some sort of church is likely to emerge.

To me the historic mistake is for churches to have become ends in themselves rather than byproducts of seeking the Kingdom, or as I like to put it, Disneyland rather than a service station.

[ 19. August 2016, 10:13: Message edited by: Eutychus ]

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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Honest Ron Bacardi
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Baptist Trainfan wrote:
quote:
By the way, the "parallel graph" idea was peddled back in the 90s, when the so-called New Religious Movements seemed to be growing fast. It was thought that this would counter-balance the decline in traditional religious observance and so disprove the secularisation thesis. But the rise in NRMs was not only much smaller than the decline in (say) the churches, it was a rather different and much more introverted kind of religion.
Yes, the "parallel graph" argument is nonsense - mostly because they are not parallel graphs. If you are going to plot "the growing church" on one graph, you need to plot "the shrinking church" on the other. A pointless activity as Eutychus says. The reason the latter correlates with the traditional church is that TC has a huge historical tail and includes many churches that are complicit in their own decline.

In fact, the report on church growth in the CofE a few years ago looked at the type of churches that grow, and found that all types of churchmanship can be found to produce growth equally - it isn't confined to one sort of church. It's an important point because if a corporatist drive to roll out "newer ways of being church" steamrollers other ways of growing congregations, then the result will be both monochrome and suboptimal.

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Anglo-Cthulhic

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Ricardus
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Does 'church plant' mean a new congregation in a new building? Because ISTM the last thing the Church of England needs is more buildings ...

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Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)

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Baptist Trainfan
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I can't speak for the CofE. But the trajectory of many groups, albeit "New Churches" rather than "Fresh Expressions", seems to be that they'll first rent a building or use somewhere like a hotel Function Room or a coffee house. At this point they may well say that church buildings are "unnecessary" or even "bad". Yet later on they seem to end up purchasing a building for themselves.

I can think of one or two CofE "Fresh Expressions" which do meet in a church building - I don't know how this works for those which are not direct initiatives of the parishes concerned.

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Baptist Trainfan
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quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
The report on church growth in the CofE a few years ago looked at the type of churches that grow, and found that all types of churchmanship can be found to produce growth equally - it isn't confined to one sort of church. It's an important point because if a corporatist drive to roll out "newer ways of being church" steamrollers other ways of growing congregations, then the result will be both monochrome and suboptimal.

Yes, I've read that too. It then begs the question as to what are the real factors that influence church growth ... and whether the folk in the growing churches are "new Christians" or merely refugees from other congregations who find the atmosphere more congenial? (Sorry if that sounds snarky but it needs to be asked!)
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Wayward Crucifer
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quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
Does 'church plant' mean a new congregation in a new building? Because ISTM the last thing the Church of England needs is more buildings ...

Round here (Diocese of London) it almost always seems to mean a new congregation in an old (or at least current) building. Closure would now be seen as a last resort if planting, grafting or other redeployment is unsuitable.

Wayward

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chris stiles
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quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:

In fact, the report on church growth in the CofE a few years ago looked at the type of churches that grow, and found that all types of churchmanship can be found to produce growth equally

Yes, to a point. Though probably they all get subjected to the argument that they are a bunch of frenzied diehards.

I wondered actually to what extent that response was due to the final vestiges of cultural Christianity.

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Eutychus
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Again, perhaps being idealistic here, I think the whole point of genuine church is that you can't systematise it. The wind bloweth where it listeth.

One of the things that alarms me about the so-called Reading Outpouring™ is the claim that what's happening there is "transferable" elsewhere. The Holy Spirit doesn't transfer like that; or at least that's what Paul told the Galatians!

For over a decade now my entire church-planting strategy has consisted of "God made it grow" and it is every bit as successful as the much more sophisticated models I formerly bought into.

Some of our growth is indeed transfer growth, but not all. And in any case we have recently decided we don't really want to grow much bigger anyway as it would seriously interfere with the way we do church.

Again, if you start thinking of a church as a means to an end (seeking the Kingdom out in the world) you end up worrying a lot less about church growth anyway.

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fletcher christian

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With all of these things, figures, statistics and fancy graphs are all used to pedal an agenda already decided, or lazily redacted into what people expect to hear. For example, only a few months ago I read a report by one CofE diocese regarding church decline in rural areas. It was about how churches were struggling with numbers and making ends meet had to rely on constant fund raising etc and the report suggested this was no longer sustainable and was frankly a waste of good resources that could be siphoned off somewhere else. It was littered with graphs and pie charts and stats and all manner of things.

Then about a month or so later I read someone's critique of the report. It took exactly the same graphs, pie charts and statistics tables that were in the original report to make its point, and the point was that regular attendance by percentage of population was considerably more vibrant than in any other situation in the CofE. For instance, looking at regular attendance in comparison to the percentage of the total population was actually quite high (if memory serves it was something close 60%). The measurable effect of the presence of the church to the local community was also far more significant than in any other area, particularly in the realm of community building and social cohesion. The point was that you can interpret all these figures in different ways.

We've had the same issue here in the CofI. There is a growing nationwide concern about rapid and significant rural decline and what has been labelled as 'the exodus from the west'. The government has done various things, implemented plans and continues to work on the problem. The church (and not only the Episcopalians, but all denominations) response has been, 'oh well, maybe we should just close the doors and leave too'. The result is that schools close, nursing and care homes close, religious centres close, community groups fold, charitable organisations fold or struggle to relocate to a meaningful area, to name but a few. This also has a knock on effect and has in some cases already led to the death of entire villages which now lie entirely empty as travel links weaken and transport moves out, post offices close, businesses fold, county council funding is cut and people move to towns and cities. When large groups move into the towns and cities they experience a lonely rootlessness and tend not to reconnect with churches, groups, community centres etc, for whatever reason.

The church always points out that it is a problem of church decline, but there are already a small number of people who are beginning to see the bigger picture which has more to do with the fracturing of society and of communities and how there needs to be a much more imaginative approach to this. Going evangelical, all fresh expression or charismatic or high church or traditional or conservative isn't actually going to change the root of the problem.

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Eutychus
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quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
the bigger picture which has more to do with the fracturing of society and of communities and how there needs to be a much more imaginative approach to this. Going evangelical, all fresh expression or charismatic or high church or traditional or conservative isn't actually going to change the root of the problem.

Agreed. Which is why at the end of the day, and based very much on my experiences in prison chaplaincy, I now militate for integration of all faiths in secularised societies*.

However this view is not popular among evangelicals (who think it's syncretism), among the historic institutional church (who have yet to really admit there are any other admissible churches or religions apart from theirs), or among those of the general public who think the solution is to eradicate religion of all forms from the public sphere.

==

*and yes, I'd defend this as a "Kingdom of God" approach, too.

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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Curiosity killed ...

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One of the things suggested in the article was that the congregations in these new churches draw on young people in university towns. Holy Trinity Brompton neighbours the halls of residence for Imperial College, for example.

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Raptor Eye
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I don't understand how church planting and the mothballing of church buildings can or should work side by side, if that is what is being suggested.

The premises are there already, why start up anew in community buildings? Is it that people have more of an aversion to going to church than to the religion that is practiced in it? Perhaps it would be better to tackle the urban myths, and to encourage everyone to make sure that those who come to church for the first time want to come again.

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lowlands_boy
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quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
With all of these things, figures, statistics and fancy graphs are all used to pedal an agenda already decided, or lazily redacted into what people expect to hear. For example, only a few months ago I read a report by one CofE diocese regarding church decline in rural areas. It was about how churches were struggling with numbers and making ends meet had to rely on constant fund raising etc and the report suggested this was no longer sustainable and was frankly a waste of good resources that could be siphoned off somewhere else. It was littered with graphs and pie charts and stats and all manner of things.

Then about a month or so later I read someone's critique of the report. It took exactly the same graphs, pie charts and statistics tables that were in the original report to make its point, and the point was that regular attendance by percentage of population was considerably more vibrant than in any other situation in the CofE. For instance, looking at regular attendance in comparison to the percentage of the total population was actually quite high (if memory serves it was something close 60%). The measurable effect of the presence of the church to the local community was also far more significant than in any other area, particularly in the realm of community building and social cohesion. The point was that you can interpret all these figures in different ways.

We've had the same issue here in the CofI. There is a growing nationwide concern about rapid and significant rural decline and what has been labelled as 'the exodus from the west'. The government has done various things, implemented plans and continues to work on the problem. The church (and not only the Episcopalians, but all denominations) response has been, 'oh well, maybe we should just close the doors and leave too'. The result is that schools close, nursing and care homes close, religious centres close, community groups fold, charitable organisations fold or struggle to relocate to a meaningful area, to name but a few. This also has a knock on effect and has in some cases already led to the death of entire villages which now lie entirely empty as travel links weaken and transport moves out, post offices close, businesses fold, county council funding is cut and people move to towns and cities. When large groups move into the towns and cities they experience a lonely rootlessness and tend not to reconnect with churches, groups, community centres etc, for whatever reason.

The church always points out that it is a problem of church decline, but there are already a small number of people who are beginning to see the bigger picture which has more to do with the fracturing of society and of communities and how there needs to be a much more imaginative approach to this. Going evangelical, all fresh expression or charismatic or high church or traditional or conservative isn't actually going to change the root of the problem.

Seems rather OTT to quote the whole thing, just so I can say "excellent post". But, excellent post.

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I thought I should update my signature line....

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lowlands_boy
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quote:
Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
I don't understand how church planting and the mothballing of church buildings can or should work side by side, if that is what is being suggested.

The premises are there already, why start up anew in community buildings? Is it that people have more of an aversion to going to church than to the religion that is practiced in it? Perhaps it would be better to tackle the urban myths, and to encourage everyone to make sure that those who come to church for the first time want to come again.

If you're talking about traditional CofE church buildings, they've probably been around a long time, can be extremely expensive to maintain, difficult to adapt well for accessibility etc, and might have lots of listed building constraints that stop you from doing what suits - like installing a video screen or something.

If you just rent your local community centre, those things don't apply.

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I thought I should update my signature line....

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Curiosity killed ...

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The other thing that hasn't been mentioned is the increasing attendance at cathedral services, which doesn't tend to be evangelical in the same form as found in these plant churches. That suggests there is something else going on in a desire for a more traditional worship - and possibly a desire to avoid the involvement that is being pushed at these churches.

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Eutychus
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a) I think this may well reflect the new place of the church as a cultural curiosity more than anything else

b) in my limited UK experience, it's one of the few ways of getting into a cathedral there free of charge these days

c) has anyone produced a business model considering a) and b) that pays for the upkeep of the buildings concerned?

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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L'organist
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OP from Curiosity Killed
quote:
Is the article right, is the new way of being church driving out the traditional congregations? Should the CofE concentrate on church planting and reduce funding to the traditional congregations.
This ties in neatly with a piece in today's Church Times about the effect of clergy presence on church numbers/adherence, which comes up with the unsurprising conclusion that clergy presence has a direct effect on numbers and church 'health'.

All of which would be so much yawn-provoking, except that it underlines conclusions reached in earlier studies in the 1960s and 1980s.

ISTM that what is really borne out is that a succession of bishops - often ABoCs - keeps trying to bully through their obssessions with 'improvement', 'modernisation', amalgamation of parishes, centralising of personnel, etc, etc, etc, despite all the evidence being to the contrary.

In particular, an urban-based hierarchy continues to choke off resources from smaller parishes to fund and man their pet projects in larger towns and cities despite their being plenty of evidence that it doesn't work.

What is particularly worrying is that recent appointments of bishops seem likely to strengthen this viewpoint, blithely ignoring the fact that the strand of churchmanship they're trying to ram down the throats of the unchurched is the one that non-churchgoers find most off-putting and/or cringe-making.

The same accusation can be levelled at the latest proposals for youth work, which ignores the work done by musicians, choirs and the RSCM. It is a fact that in many churches the most successful (often only) outreach to children and young people is through music; moreover children brought into church in this way have a better chance of bringing their parents and/or siblings along with them. Again, this is ignored because it doesn't fit with the prejudices of those formulating policy.

The CofE should nourish its smaller churches and traditional parishes: get clergy out of projects and into parishes and stop starving the rural church of time, talents and money,

(edited because pushed button too soon)

[ 19. August 2016, 14:19: Message edited by: L'organist ]

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Raptor Eye
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quote:
Originally posted by lowlands_boy:
]If you're talking about traditional CofE church buildings, they've probably been around a long time, can be extremely expensive to maintain, difficult to adapt well for accessibility etc, and might have lots of listed building constraints that stop you from doing what suits - like installing a video screen or something.

If you just rent your local community centre, those things don't apply.

The community buildings don't have the same atmosphere as the church buildings, and the chairs have to be stacked and unstacked etc, so that before long people meeting in them will want a building of their own, by my observation.

Presumably, people won't want the old buildings to crumble away either, so it's better to use the money toward maintaining them than toward building something new, or paying rent to private landlords.

It doesn't make any sense.

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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10

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cliffdweller
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With the caveat that I don't have a dog in this fight and very much an outsider (not my denomination, not my country, not my culture) -- I currently serve in a denomination known for it's success in church planting, at least in an American evangelical context (again, quite different from yours). Some thoughts pro & con:

analysis:
• to the point re the stats: from a purely numbers perspective, church planting works. It is the fastest, most effective way to grow your numbers (at least in our context).

• Why is that?
1. it allows you to target particular populations with particular needs. Church planting among specific ethnic or generational groups has been especially successful (again, at least in numbers). You can have worship in a particular language for immigrant groups, or style to reach people who haven't been reached by your current style.

2. in an older church you're going to have lots of generations mixed together-- not just generations in terms of their actual age, but in terms of the lifespan of the church. People who joined the congregation 5 years ago, 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years... Each of those people joined the church as it was at that time. So they joined for a particular reason-- something appealed to them-- the worship style, the music, the preaching, the spiritual formation groups. But those things have changed over the lifespan of the church. So the people who joined 20 years ago "bought into" a very different set of expectations than those who joined 10 years ago, and 5 years ago, and last week. You don't have that with a church plant-- everyone is buying into the new vision, the current style and programs-- so everyone is "all in" as it is right now. Of course, all that changes in 5, 10, 20 years when your "new church plant" is no longer new-- so you have to continue this endless cycle of new church plants to maintain that level of commitment to the vision. Church planters see that as inevitable-- that churches have "lifespans" just like all living things. (I'm not sure that assumption is supported biblically).

pros:
• you are able to reach people with church plants that you would never be able to reach with older existing churches.
• there's less conflict in church plants (altho of course always some) since everyone begins with the same set of assumptions/ expectations... for now.
• there's a strong sense of mission-- that you are in on the beginning of something, that your contributions whether financial or volunteer, are significant, the God is doing something new and exciting and different. There's a greater commitment, more of a sense of being "all in".

cons:
• you are reinforcing the culture of consumerism-- treating Christianity as a product to be marketed and sold. You're also reinforcing individualism-- that the church is there to meet my needs, cater to my tastes.
• most significantly: you are encouraging a less diverse church. While you are reaching new demographics-- new age groups, subcultures, ethnic groups-- you are doing so in a highly targeted and segmented way. Which comes with a whole host of problems, spiritually-- reinforcing stereotypes, tribalism, etc.
• less diverse churches mean less spiritual growth. We grow by being exposed to people who are different than us. That's I believe a significant reason why people come to the Ship-- to explore faith with people who experience faith differently. The less diverse our churches, the less we will grow spiritually, even as we grow numerically.

My outsider 2 cents.

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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner

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chris stiles
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quote:
Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
The community buildings don't have the same atmosphere as the church buildings, and the chairs have to be stacked and unstacked etc, so that before long people meeting in them will want a building of their own, by my observation.

The first is only true - IME - if you compare the worst of community buildings with the very best of churches. Even then it's often only true of the main area within the church - any additional areas are usually very dreary, hard to clean, light and heat. They'll suffer from a lack of toilet facilities, be hard to retrofit for accessibility and be difficult to expand.

quote:

Presumably, people won't want the old buildings to crumble away either, so it's better to use the money toward maintaining them than toward building something new, or paying rent to private landlords.

I suspect that often whilst they don't want them to collapse in the abstract, in practice they are faced with the fact that repairs to their existing building will - over time - be more expensive than renting and possibly eventually buying.
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Ethne Alba
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Sometimes a church building is far away from the centres of housing or new transport links have meant that the church has been geographically alienated from the housing in its parish. There have been times, often with wholesale clearances, when there is no housing left in a parish and quite literally parish borders have to be redrawn to include something akin to what you or i would recognise As a parish.
Sometimes the building itself has sapped so much energy from the parish that parishioners themselves are leeched of energy and newcomers give up, almost before they start.
In our city, i can think of housing areas where there is no anglican church. True; everyone is in a Parish. But the church itself is miles away from housing.

In those cases, i can see no reason why planting a church (of whatever flavour one might want to ) is considered to be a bad idea.

[ 19. August 2016, 19:06: Message edited by: Ethne Alba ]

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ThunderBunk

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I don't want to worship in a religious supermarket.

I don't want anything to do with consumerist religion, and I see it as a complete betrayal of everything that the parish church, as a servant of the community, should be. It creates a con-munity.

That's what is against church planting. No listening, no spirituality. All church, no God.

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Eutychus
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But the model that supported that is unsustainable in terms of demographics/religious affiliation and finance. I'm sure many parishes do a great job, but they are rapidly becoming irrelevant to most people's lives.

From inside an active parish it can seem really dynamic and engaged, and it probably is. But it's hard to grasp how irrelevant it may look when someone is outside all that buzz.

[ 19. August 2016, 19:36: Message edited by: Eutychus ]

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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SvitlanaV2
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quote:
Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
The report on church growth in the CofE a few years ago looked at the type of churches that grow, and found that all types of churchmanship can be found to produce growth equally - it isn't confined to one sort of church. It's an important point because if a corporatist drive to roll out "newer ways of being church" steamrollers other ways of growing congregations, then the result will be both monochrome and suboptimal.

Yes, I've read that too. It then begs the question as to what are the real factors that influence church growth ... and whether the folk in the growing churches are "new Christians" or merely refugees from other congregations who find the atmosphere more congenial? (Sorry if that sounds snarky but it needs to be asked!)
Here's a link to the CofE report I think you're referring to.

Pages 10-13 highlight the factors that seem to make a difference, both in terms of the sociological context, and the kind of focus and engagement that growing churches have. Chapter 3 talks about factors related to church decline.

I don't think the report talks about church switching, but a degree of church switching is surely inevitable. It's probably going to increase, because many churches will be entering considerable difficulties over the next few decades, and as churches head for closure many members bail out. Indeed, staying on to fight for your church when it's already too late could be a recipe for damaging your faith.

P. 31 states that among the churches studied theological tradition didn't make a significant difference to growth or decline, but even if CofE congregations of all kinds might have or develop the characteristics for growth, ISTM that evangelicals in particular are more likely to have the means, the inclination and the flexibility to plant a church.

How easily will the CofE find it to attract Anglo-Catholics away from successful churches to develop plants elsewhere? Or people from vibrant MOTR churches? If you know a church with a brilliant traditional choir that attracts commuting Christians from miles around how do you plant that kind of church somewhere else?

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Baptist Trainfan
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quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Here's a link to the CofE report I think you're referring to.

Thank you ... I think I've actually read it, now I see it!

quote:
If you know a church with a brilliant traditional choir that attracts commuting Christians from miles around how do you plant that kind of church somewhere else?

Surely the commuting of those Christians is boosting the size of one church at the expense of many others, and not having much if any effect on the total number of Christians in the locality? Indeed, they may be driving past churches which could be doing so much in their local communities if only they had the people to do it. It seems to me that, although the commuters to the wonderful traditional church would vigorously deny it, they are just as much in thrall to Christian consumerism as the folk who have opted for the vibrant happy-clappy church down the road.
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Joesaphat
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Can someone explain to me how different Reform and Renewal is from the mightily successful 'decade of evangelisation' under Carey? bar the even more managerial tone?

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Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.

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ThunderBunk

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quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
But the model that supported that is unsustainable in terms of demographics/religious affiliation and finance. I'm sure many parishes do a great job, but they are rapidly becoming irrelevant to most people's lives.

From inside an active parish it can seem really dynamic and engaged, and it probably is. But it's hard to grasp how irrelevant it may look when someone is outside all that buzz.

Which model are you talking about? This seems to me to be a perfect distillation of the chargesheet against the hypercaffeinated, over-sugared church plants, relying as they do on regular injections of the sweet stuff (cash) from the centre, and on diverting significant parts of the lifeblood of their mother communities.

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Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".

Foolish, potentially deranged witterings

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Eutychus
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The parish system and infrastructure is predicated on a model of a territorial, state church, of which everyone is by default a member. This model is redundant, and to my mind more harm is done by perpetuating the illusion that it can still work in a multi-faith (and largely UNfaith) society than by facing this fact.

Don't get me wrong; I love a nice parish church as much as anyone else. But it's a monument, not a viable way forward.

As to the "inside the fishbowl/outside the fishbowl" perspective, indeed this applies across the board. I was for many years in a new church movement which, we were told, was "changing the expression of Christianity across the world" (it turned out to be giving it a rather sour expression). It felt like it was huge and impactful; realising it was virtually unknown outside its immediate circles was quite a slap in the face.

For my preferred way forward (disregarding the issue of what to do with the legacy organisations of all stripes we have) see my post above, here.

[ 20. August 2016, 10:13: Message edited by: Eutychus ]

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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SvitlanaV2
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quote:
Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:

Surely the commuting of those Christians [to the church with the brilliant traditional choir] is boosting the size of one church at the expense of many others, and not having much if any effect on the total number of Christians in the locality? Indeed, they may be driving past churches which could be doing so much in their local communities if only they had the people to do it. It seems to me that, although the commuters to the wonderful traditional church would vigorously deny it, they are just as much in thrall to Christian consumerism as the folk who have opted for the vibrant happy-clappy church down the road.

Your criticisms are valid, but the point I'm making is more basic; if all forms of church are worthy of being planted, how does one replicate a form that requires a twenty or thirty highly trained, committed musicians from the start?

Regarding 'consumerism' in the church, that ship has sailed. Most people won't attend church, or a particular church, purely out of duty - which is really what you're asking for. They want at least some of their own needs and interests to be met in exchange for their time, money and efforts.

This is true for the faithful old ladies who refuse to support changes that they don't like, for teenagers who won't attend with their parents unless there's a strong young people's ministry, and for many others in between. It's true for the majority of nominal Christians who won't be encouraged to attend if 'duty' is given as the main reason for doing so.

Churches with a strong vision for growth may have members who are willing to support policies and practices that they wouldn't personally choose, but many struggling, relatively uninspiring congregations don't have such a vision. They basically just want to keep the doors open, which requires that disgruntled attenders (and their financial contributions) stay put and keep quiet.

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ThunderBunk

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quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:

For my preferred way forward (disregarding the issue of what to do with the legacy organisations of all stripes we have) see my post above, here.

We aren't very far apart at all in terms of what we want to see. I am, however, totally convinced that the church plant is 180 degrees (or possibly 540) from the way to do it, because it reinforces all the worst features of the existing parish system rather than challenging them. My experience of it is that it decides what it wants to offer and where, and focuses on having a shinily marketable offering, rather than sitting in the middle of a community and discovering how its life can be enhanced.

Similarly, the existing system tries to validate and reinforce its own identity in the face of every challenge, with the inevitable outcome of accelerating entropy.

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Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".

Foolish, potentially deranged witterings

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SvitlanaV2
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Eutychus

Regarding chaplaincy, you seem to be promoting this as a potentially mainstream option for the church at large. Can you explain how you think this would work?

I'm assuming that lay chaplains would be volunteers, so would have no need for a salary or money for the upkeep of church buildings. OTOH, huge amounts of training would be needed to enable ordinary Christians to feel confident in the role.

At least some Christians would still need to meet with each other in small groups for support and mutual edification, which they would also need to be trained and prepared for.

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Eutychus
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quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Eutychus

Regarding chaplaincy, you seem to be promoting this as a potentially mainstream option for the church at large. Can you explain how you think this would work?

Bearing in mind that I'm making this up as I go along...

As I see it, a chaplaincy stance is:

- acknowledged by the authorities
- demand-driven rather than supply-side
- focused on providing spiritual support rather than proselytising/evangelism.

The local chaplaincy position I occupy survives off state funding (yes you read that right) which defrays minimal expenses such as travel; I put in the hours pro bono.

Excluding any giving from believers, and letting my imagination run wild again, depending on the culture I could imagine funding for training and perhaps a little more coming from government and/or private enterprise, on the basis of a mixture of tax incentives and CSR.

The requirement for this is to make the case for a chaplaincy providing tangible non-religious benefits to civil society (which I think it would).

(Note that in my scheme of things this avenue of action is open to chaplaincies of all faiths).

In my prison world chaplaincy certainly involves corporate worship. This takes place in a multi-faith room.

While proselytising is not the chaplain's stance, that in no way prevents people coming to faith through Christian chaplaincy ministry.

As and when a group of believers grows large enough to need its own premises, then these can be rented. The church I currently help lead pays no staff but manages to pay the overhead on a rented building and have some left over for missionary giving (we do not preach tithing in any shape or form). We have virtually no midweek activities on the basis that people have other things to do with their lives and can get involved in social action etc. organised by other groups.

As I said earlier, I've tried church planting both ways and learned that doing virtually nothing and allowing God to make it grow works just as well as any shiny strategy that can be rolled out (it just doesn't make for such good newsletters).

The whole point here is to get the focus of resources off plant, property, and equipment, and the resulting layers of bureaucracy, and on to giving people basic support to enable them to become autonomous in their spiritual walk.

Of course training is important, but I think the requirements for being effective in the Kingdom of God tend to be vastly over-professionalised these days due to power-hungry bureaucrats. In my view vast swathes of Christian ministry and mission are little more than work creation.

We need to get back to seeking the Kingdom, which really isn't that complicated - if the Gospels are to be believed, the fewer resources you have the more success you'll see - and seeing the Church as a byproduct and not an end in and of itself.

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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BroJames
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quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
The parish system and infrastructure is predicated on a model of a territorial, state church, of which everyone is by default a member. This model is redundant, and to my mind more harm is done by perpetuating the illusion that it can still work in a multi-faith (and largely UNfaith) society than by facing this fact.

To some extent I see similar issues between the Church of England perspective on this and the challenges faced by the NHS. There is a continuing pressure to focus resources on larger centres of population, which means that provision becomes increasingly inaccessible for those who are unable to access it by car. (This was highlighted for me recently by a conversation with a couple who were clearly shocked that there is no hospital A&E provision nearer than 45 minutes drive away.)

I find that there is a strong level of commitment to a Christian presence in every community (in my largely rural area), so that there will not be communities where regular church life is effectively inaccessible. But big questions are being asked about how that can be resourced as we face bulge of retirements from the baby-boomer generation of clergy, and increased pressure on finances and people in churches willing and able to take on responsibilities for keeping an organisation running.

At the bottom line I think that means for the regulars there needs to be shift from the idea of going to church towards the idea of being church. Some denominations are way, way ahead of us on this. But it is not at all a straightforward question.

The lively, or good youth group, or good choral tradition church in the nearby larger town draws away numbers of people whose contribution would be invaluable in our smaller community, and makes it harder to do something here which might make contact with people in this community who are not currently committed churchgoers. So it is hard to begin to establish that kind of belonging which might help people on the way to believing.

The age 65+ church which we sustain is unlikely - because of its style and because of lack of social contacts between attenders and non-attenders - unlikely to attract or connect with the younger parts of the community, and so the idea of planting something which could have a very different feel (and might be better geographically placed within the community as well) is really quite attractive.

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L'organist
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IME when adults choose to go elsewhere yes, they are attracted to come to a church with a certain type and standard of music, but that is usually after they have made the decision not to attend or to leave their own parish church, sometimes voluntarily but also by being asked to go elsewhere by clergy.

Speaking of the church with a choir that attracts people from outside the parish: this can arise when members of the choir also live outside the parish and IME the reasons for adult singers to travel to sing elsewhere are not solely musical.

Again using the adult members of my own choir as reference, the split is 12 parish/ 13 not; of the non-parish, over and above musical considerations the reasons for them being with us are:
  • asked to leave by own parish incumbent 4
  • not in sympathy with musical style of home parish 4
  • clergy bullying and homophobia 2
  • weren't churchgoers, came to us through 'bring-and-sings' 4
  • joined through children being in junior section 3

The 'home' parishes of these people ask (in one case expect) them to take over for things like Christmas carol services but are unfriendly and unwelcoming if they give in to pressure or wheedling. In my own case, I can almost guarantee that the incumbent of my own parish church will call asking me to bail them out at Christmas - but the call will arrive around 10th December (which is far too late) and the attitude will be very much that it is my duty to dig them out of a hole and, no, there won't be a fee involved.

I wouldn't attend my home parish - never mind run the music there - if I stopped playing at my present shack for the simple reason that the liturgies are shambolic, the congregation is cliquey and frequently rude, the standard of preaching is dreadful and invariably aimed at the 7-10 year old market (not that there are any children in church), and the present incumbent is discourteous and dishonest.

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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet

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ThunderBunk

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quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:

As I said earlier, I've tried church planting both ways and learned that doing virtually nothing and allowing God to make it grow works just as well as any shiny strategy that can be rolled out (it just doesn't make for such good newsletters).

The whole point here is to get the focus of resources off plant, property, and equipment, and the resulting layers of bureaucracy, and on to giving people basic support to enable them to become autonomous in their spiritual walk.


...which proves my point. As I say, I've only ever seen the shiny version, and am not a fan.

There is a problem, which I'm beginning to think is gaining scale rapidly. The number of things that the mass of people is prepared to pay other people to do is narrowing critically. We all need to earn a living, and there has to be time and money for specialist training, and indeed for the accumulation of expertise and reflection on practice etc.. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you in this specific instance, but I think in general that this problem is going to get very important.

As an aside, have you read Jim Cotter's Yes....minister? ?

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Currently mostly furious, and occasionally foolish. Normal service may resume eventually. Or it may not. And remember children, "feiern ist wichtig".

Foolish, potentially deranged witterings

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andras
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quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
IME when adults choose to go elsewhere yes, they are attracted to come to a church with a certain type and standard of music, but that is usually after they have made the decision not to attend or to leave their own parish church, sometimes voluntarily but also by being asked to go elsewhere by clergy.

Speaking of the church with a choir that attracts people from outside the parish: this can arise when members of the choir also live outside the parish and IME the reasons for adult singers to travel to sing elsewhere are not solely musical.

Again using the adult members of my own choir as reference, the split is 12 parish/ 13 not; of the non-parish, over and above musical considerations the reasons for them being with us are:
  • asked to leave by own parish incumbent 4
  • not in sympathy with musical style of home parish 4
  • clergy bullying and homophobia 2
  • weren't churchgoers, came to us through 'bring-and-sings' 4
  • joined through children being in junior section 3

The 'home' parishes of these people ask (in one case expect) them to take over for things like Christmas carol services but are unfriendly and unwelcoming if they give in to pressure or wheedling. In my own case, I can almost guarantee that the incumbent of my own parish church will call asking me to bail them out at Christmas - but the call will arrive around 10th December (which is far too late) and the attitude will be very much that it is my duty to dig them out of a hole and, no, there won't be a fee involved.

I wouldn't attend my home parish - never mind run the music there - if I stopped playing at my present shack for the simple reason that the liturgies are shambolic, the congregation is cliquey and frequently rude, the standard of preaching is dreadful and invariably aimed at the 7-10 year old market (not that there are any children in church), and the present incumbent is discourteous and dishonest.

This matches my own experience to a T. Indeed, the young chaplain at my last church went to considerable lengths to drive away those members of his congregation that he felt were not his 'target audience.' Inevitably he succeeded. Fool!

Perhaps the church would grow if people - lay as well as ordained - didn't turn people away!

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God's on holiday.
(Why borrow a cat?)
Adrian Plass

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Eutychus
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quote:
Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
There is a problem, which I'm beginning to think is gaining scale rapidly. The number of things that the mass of people is prepared to pay other people to do is narrowing critically. We all need to earn a living, and there has to be time and money for specialist training, and indeed for the accumulation of expertise and reflection on practice etc.

I was wholly in "full time ministry"™ for something over a decade.

Now, I'm self employed, and lucky/blessed enough to be able to earn a living with about two-thirds of my available time, thus leaving another third or so to do all the "ministry" stuff. I'm sometimes frustrated that I haven't had more opportunities for training, and miss some aspects of being "full time", but all in all I much prefer my life now.

I'm currently looking to hand over more responsibility in our church, and have my eye on a young couple or two who I think might manage to pull off something approaching the same model.

I really would prefer that to them falling for the con trick over here that is living on a pittance "for the Lord" thinking Jesus is going to come back before you're 40 and waking up too late to the realisation you have basically no money for your kids' education and no pension, after you've gone past your sell-by date to be paid to lead a shiny church (and your only future on the scrapheap is to try and rebrand yourself as a "life coach" or some such...).

As I posted earlier, I think funding avenues for some specialist training should not be impossible to find, even if I'm only too aware of the difficulties. But chief amongst these is people trying to make money out of their training programmes.

quote:
I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you in this specific instance, but I think in general that this problem is going to get very important.
I really really don't think that extending the Kingdom of God requires specialist training for most people. It really doesn't.

That is my experience (looking at other people's success) and it's what I see in the Bible. Seeking the Kingdom is not about good management skills; it's about living by the Spirit. I don't claim to do this very successfully, but I'm convinced it's the way to go.
quote:
As an aside, have you read Jim Cotter's Yes....minister? ?
Never heard of it, sorry. But I'm a philistine.

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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy

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Raptor Eye
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quote:
Originally posted by andras:


Perhaps the church would grow if people - lay as well as ordained - didn't turn people away!

Yes, this.

It's OK for church members not to be perfect, but wouldn't it be good if we all tried to love one another, including newcomers.....

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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10

Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011  |  IP: Logged
leo
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# 1458

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quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
I really really don't think that extending the Kingdom of God requires specialist training for most people. It really doesn't.

That is my experience (looking at other people's success) and it's what I see in the Bible. Seeking the Kingdom is not about good management skills; it's about living by the Spirit. I don't claim to do this very successfully, but I'm convinced it's the way to go.
quote:
As an aside, have you read Jim Cotter's Yes....minister? ?
Never heard of it, sorry. But I'm a philistine.
Well, you should.

God's kingdom is not the church nor its growth. see here

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Posts: 23198 | From: Bristol | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
ThunderBunk

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# 15579

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Eutychus, the more this thread goes on, the more I can see how particular the C of E perspective is. I'm not ordained, btw - I find secular hypermanagement distasteful enough, and really couldn't stomach it with a holy glow cast over it. The longstanding social status of C of E priests, and the expectation of employment to retirement (though I know that is a little less solid than it was) is a totally different world from that which you describe.

I can certainly see the attractions of what you propose, but I think it relies on everyone sharing the risk, as it were, and helping each other out in hard times. Probably a good model for the life of a congregation. Certainly anything but shiny, which in my estimation can only be a good thing.

It would be much harder for such a model to flourish where there is such polarisation between the ultra-precarious and those who would have to commit ritual murder to be insecure.

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Posts: 2208 | From: Norwich | Registered: Apr 2010  |  IP: Logged
Schroedinger's cat

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My simple answer to the question is no, for a couple of reasons:

1. I don't think the CofE model is a sustainable one long term. I don't think that extending it (or maintaining it) is a long-term answer. All it is doing it putting off the inevitable decline for a few more years.

2. I am not sure that the churches who want to plant are the right ones to be growing and spreading.

I think, as so often, this is avoiding the real, core problems of the CofE, that the whole enterprise is not attractive to people, that the structure is expensive and unnecessary. And the changes needed are things that nobody is prepared to consider.

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Posts: 18859 | From: At the bottom of a deep dark well. | Registered: May 2001  |  IP: Logged
Gamaliel
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# 812

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I'm not sure why we are restricting this to the CofE, but yes, it does have particular issues to address.

I'm not sure managerialism is helping.

I like Eutychus's chaplaincy model and I've heard liberal Anglicans advocate a similar approach.

I'm not convinced church-planting is the answer for the Anglicans other than in areas where a parish church isn't close at hand. I'm not sure sure I like the idea of targeting particular demographic groups and so on but ...

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Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001  |  IP: Logged
SvitlanaV2
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# 16967

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Eutychus's idea of the state paying for the church to do chaplaincy work seems to be tailor-made for the CofE (and its sister churches elsewhere in the UK), considering its historic connection to the state.

However, I can't imagine the British state being willing or able to pay a big bunch of Anglican clergy or laity to do such work, let alone funding Baptists, Methodists, Pentecostals, etc. to do the same. If the state can't fund proper support for the mentally ill, or keep libraries open, etc. etc., how is it going to pay an army of Christians to go out and do stuff in the community? Even the funding for the famous faith-based initiatives has been cut back.

Private companies like shopping malls sometimes have their own chaplains, and this might be expanded, but the idea of private companies without any obvious Christian heritage or ownership funding Christian social outreach work to a significant degree feels very odd. Many denominations wouldn't be keen on it.

And chaplaincy work surely requires particular gifts. Church leaders from denominations that emphasise pastoral skills would be very good at it, but in other denominations a minister may be chosen for other reasons.

Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012  |  IP: Logged
ExclamationMark
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# 14715

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quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:

1. I don't think the CofE model is a sustainable one long term.

2. I am not sure that the churches who want to plant are the right ones to be growing and spreading.

3. I think, as so often, this is avoiding the real, core problems of the CofE, that the whole enterprise is not attractive to people, that the structure is expensive and unnecessary. And the changes needed are things that nobody is prepared to consider.

1. The CofE model is unsustainable as is. Now. Rose tinted spectacles and tunnel vision mean that that the CofE isn't seeing the signs of the times. Wholesale change could keep it alive but living on the past as of now, wont.

Many churches have massive assets in terms of bank balances and buildings (often a tiny congregation will have a few hundred thousand in the bank). Use the former to release the latter; sell a few palaces and put Senior Clergy into Housing Estates. See the parable of the telents - we have a lot in holes in the ground!

2. I've heard this lots of times. It's often used by churches who have no intention or no capability to plant and don't want anyone else to do so either. If no one plants then we all keep on the same playing field and those nasty evangelicals don't get to take over someone else's patch (It's more about parish than people).

Planting shows up their own inward thinking and sometimes the paucity of their faith and witness. Tough I know but it's all too often true.

3. Some of the necessary change is being considered - looking in as an outsider. The trouble is that it doesn't go far enough - in the business world it rarely goes as far as it could, it's usually just enough. Add to that the layers of bureaucracy and the need (in some eyes) to dialogue until the cows come home (or until everyone apart from those with the real agenda in the first place get hacked off) and you have a recipe for inertia.

By the time the agreement has come, the goalposts have moved. The change you make then looks laughable as you are answering the questions no one is asking anymore.

Posts: 3845 | From: A new Jerusalem | Registered: Apr 2009  |  IP: Logged



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