There has been much recent talk in the Methodist blogosphere (on both sides of the Atlantic) of decline. And well there might be. There is no denying that the Methodist Church is facing some worrying numbers. There’s no need to rehearse them now. The simple fact is that there are fewer Methodists now than there have been. The situation facing our church is both serious and urgent. The question is, what do we do?
The first thing I’d say is that anyone who comes along with a simple diagnosis of and solution to this situation is deluded. There are no magic wands that can be waved, no programmes or schemes which guarantee a full and thriving church. Nor should we be quick to seek scapegoats to carry the blame. The fault does not lie in ‘headquarters’, ‘the ministers’, ‘the hymnbook’ or any other easily identifiable place. That is so obvious it shouldn’t need saying, but a good scapegoat can be hard to resist.
What I really want to see in all these conversations is some sense that the church, Methodist or otherwise, is not isolated from the rest of society but is deeply affected by the changes we see all around us. All of our social institutions are going through radical alteration. For example in 2005, it is estimated that 816 pubs closed. In 2007, it was 1409. Memberships of political parties and trade unions have seen significant declines in recent years. Parties are rightly cagey about revealing the numbers involved in local campaigning: a local party secretary told me he would be embarrassed if those numbers were widely known. Many schools have had to close their “Parents Association” because of difficulties in persuading people to get involved, and the numbers involved in apparently successful PA’s are often very small. The church as a public institution is not unique, and any attempt to address the decline in the church is doomed to failure if it does not take this context seriously.
Secondly (and this may appear to be ‘in tension’ with my first point), we need to begin to address the decline of the church as a church. It is fashionable in some circles to treat the church as if it were a institution of capitalism, with ‘brand loyalties’ that can be built on, targets that can be measured, market strategies that can be adopted. Taking on this kind of approach may seem to ‘work’ in some circumstances, but we should beware. It is not possible simply to adopt the language and strategies of the corporate world without being shaped by them.
For what it is worth, my sense is that what the church most needs now is the faithfulness to ‘hold the line’, to keep our nerve. There is no doubt that we are living through some very unsettling times. The future seems very uncertain. So what’s new? We face the world’s indifference with scarce resources and often-failing courage. Every generation of disciples since the time of Jesus has done the same. We have to lose any illusions we might hold about being in control and trust in the God who calls us to go with us into whatever the future holds.
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Methodist Preacher 04.21.08 at 5:55 pm
There is no doubt that there is a decline in active membership organsations - I say active because post box organisations like the RSPB are doing very well.
I know people involved in the Round Table and the Masons, they face similar problems of falling membership. Organisations like the Buffs have simply ceased to exist in large part of the country. Lifestyles are changing and what was taken for granted even ten or fifteen years ago no longer holds true today.
You are right to highlight the decline of the local pub, but we are now eating and drinking out more than ever, it is just happening in a different way. People still have spiritual needs but is the insistence on 11.00 am on a Sunday the best way to meet all those needs?
I think we should be careful not to too easily discard the disciplines of marketing and public relations (declaration of interest I am a member of both the chartered bodies for these professions), there are valuable insights about lifestyles and consumption that can be gleaned and harnessed to the church’s benefit. For example the Birmingham District synod had a presentation from some advertising executives and it clearly (I’m going on what other bloggers saidas I wasn’t there) created some stimulation.
What I do think is significant is that the reduced number of churchgoers no longer have the “brand loyalty” of previous generations. Frankly people under 50 go to the churches where they feel there is life - be it Baptist, Anglican, Charismatic or even Methodist.
Methodism may soon suffer from “Brand exhaustion” or even “Brand contamination”. If I had the time I’d love to do some simple research - it would be fascinating to know what picture complete outsiders have of a Methodist Church.
The reason that would be useful is that it may help us to frame our invitations. I won’t go into detail here. I think among many who have dirfted away to other denominations our brand may now seem as “contaminated”, to those who have drifted from Methodism and Christianity altogether I suspect we are seen as old and exhausted. I carried out similar research for the NCH in the mid 1980s and we transformed the way NCH operated. I’ve undertaken similar exercises for other organisations, including membership bodies such as trades unions.
One immediate issue that I am trying to get my head around is how we can contact the lost “near and dear”. These are the people who have a residual association with the Methodist Church but have drifted off and would be prime targets in any large corporate marketing plan.
They already have some knowledge of what Methodism is, may even have positive memories but have somewhere got lost, possibly because they moved home, went to college etc.
These are the people who attended the uniformed organisations and Junior Church as children, got married in a methodist Church, are keen to tell you that their grandfather was a local preacher - we all meet them from time to time. How do we break the ice and ask them home to Methodism? And when they come home will it still be as they saw it in the 1960s or 70s or will they find something different, challenging and exciting?
I make my living as a communicator. One of the reasons I have clients prepared to pay me well, is that is that I argue that communication is basically simple. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t a great deal of research and thought that needs to go into a campaign or a stakeholder engagement plan but I am a firm believer that the simple ideas work best.
For example if you believe your church can hold more people - knock on doors and invite them. Now what you invite them too, how they are greeted, what encouragement is given to return, will need some careful thought. But not too careful, if people believe you mean it they will respond.
How many churches do we drive past with fading paint on their doors and window sills and posters that look old and tatty? That is a pretty powerful message. Just simple tender loving care to the outside of the building says a great deal about the commitment of those in the church and the response that a visitor could expect.
Do churches have a clear idea of what thier “front of house” arragements are when people come for the first time? How are they welcomed, made to feel comfortable? And at the end of the service do they just disappear through the front door and members meet and greet each other? And if people are interested in knowing more about the Christian faith how does the church assist them to develope their Bible understanding and spiritual knowledge, of do we just assume and hope they won’t go away?
Astonishly simple changes can make a difference. What absolutely frustrates me is that our denomination seems to be so afraid of new ideas. I have seen at first hand the Methodist Church fighting a fruitless and failing battle against new ideas for nearly three decades. I’ve seen good imaginative preachers pushed out because they weren’t “real Methodists” ir boring, irrelevant and scared stiff of talking about the Holy Spirit.
Sorry, far longer post on someone else’s blog than I normally do. As I’m still having (thank God) a break from a hectic work schedule I’m hoping to develope some of these ideas on my blog in future days.
And before anyone says “you are just standing on the sidelines criticising the Methodist hierarchy etc” I can assure you that I have made repeated offers to help the connexional team at Church House. But my goodness, they say what does a mere local preacher of 25 years standing and 47 years experience of public relations and marketing know about strategic communications? We couldn’t possibly use a person like that on the Faith and Order or Startegy Committees, he may be too challenging!
Kim 04.21.08 at 9:08 pm
Managerial answers to sociological analyses of “decline” - market research, public relations, “strategic communications”, restructuring and downsizing, etc., etc. - O abyss of banality! For they fail to engage, indeed they ignore, the essential theological question: What if it is God’s judgement on the church? What if God is knocking down our Constantinian accommodations and arrangements? What if the owner of the vineyard is pruning his plants and doing some serious weeding? Then what? Do we repaint - or repent?
You can gild a gravestone all you like but it ain’t gonna change the fact that it covers a corpse. And corporate voodoo will only raise a zombie.
fatprophet 04.21.08 at 9:24 pm
The American singer Don Francisco sings a song about the sort of thing Kim is saying - ‘It doesn’t matter how big your steeple is, if you’re sitting on a cemetery’, is one of the lines from the song. It is well worth a listen as it seems to me to hit a few nails on the head
Methodist Preacher 04.21.08 at 9:38 pm
Kim, I actually know in some depth what the words you describe as “banal” actually mean in real life.
It could just be that because we haven’t had to humility to listen carefully to what people have been saying for the last fifty years that our denominations now face terminal decline. I as a marketing and communications specialist can see that in abundance.
As a believer I also see our denominations not listening to God. Prayer meetings and Bible study classes have ceased to exist in many churches. There is virtually no desire, thirst or “process” to help people grow in faith, so should we be surprised when their faith withers and dies?
I suspect you are absolutely right that God is passing judgement on our Churches - though I haven’t a clue what you mean by the Constatntian accomodation (don’t bother to explain it would be wasted on s simple soul like me).
I’m glad you use the word “repent”. It isn’t a word I have seen you use in many months of blogging. And once you repent, its a good idea to repaint - both spiritually and physically.
PamBg 04.21.08 at 10:57 pm
I’ve spent too much energy on this subject already. I’ll just say that I have some significant sympathy with Kim’s post although I don’t think it means that the Christian church should stop witnessing.
PamBg 04.21.08 at 11:08 pm
I had an ‘Ah ha!’ moment about a fortnight ago that I can’t really put into words. You know it theologically and I knew it theologically, it was just one of those moments when God was communicating that he knows what he’s doing and that one is being called to a deeper level of trust.
It was a deeper understanding of the knowledge that anything offered to God will not return to him empty. That the smallest act of love that we offer in the name of the Triune God will be used by God for good.
In many ways this is an answer to both views: that we must witness (of course we must) and that this is God’s judgement on what Kim calls our ‘Constantinian Christianity’ (which view I think has merit).
I offer that for what it’s worth and I wish I could communicate the ‘Ah ha-ness’ of it.
Kim 04.22.08 at 7:29 am
Hi Pam,
Second paragraph - yup. And “witness” - precisely.
PamBg 04.22.08 at 9:13 am
I’ll bother to explain what *I* mean by ‘Contantinian accommdoation’ although I certainly would dream of speaking for Kim.
It means Christianity becoming part of the worldly system and blessing worldly power structures.
As someone said once somewhere on this blog, ‘Enlightened self-interest is not a Christian moral virtue.’
Constantinian Christianity claims that very thing - that self-interest (even not very enlightened self-interest) is a Christian virtue as long as we have a private ‘personal relationship with Jesus’.
With this manifesto, we can change a message of peace into a message of war, a message of abundant life into a message of death and a message of good news for the poor into a message of good news for the rich.
And, David, if you’re such a simple soul, why all the boasting?
Kim 04.22.08 at 9:28 am
Hi David,
Actually it is quite important that we understand Constantinianism, even if we don’t use the word, because it is the fundamental heresy of the church. Basically, it describes a false understanding of the relationship between the church and the world, the church and the state, the church and culture. The copula “and” is the key: it signifies accommodation rather than interruption and unease. The exclusive Lordship of Christ is compromised; the eschatological tension between the new creation and the old is eased; the power of the powers is conceded; the kingdom of God is thought to be buildable; the church becomes a service and therapeutic industry; and the state becomes the bearer of the meaning and purpose of history.
And here are a few indications that Constantinianism reigns.
1. When Christians wave the flag and bang on about being “proud to be British/American”, confounding discipleship with citizenship.
2. When Christians, bewitched by talk of “just wars”, offer their bodies to the military-industrial complex, willing to kill rather than ready to die.
3. When Christians try to carve out a stable, institutional territory for themselves and do not joyfully live a vulnerable, experimental, diasporic life.
4. When Christians accept the going accounts of “real life” and are preoccupied with calculation and effectiveness, welcoming the Trojan horse of managerialism into the city of God, and hearkening to the voice, not of the Shepherd, but of experts and specialists.
5. When Christians make it easier rather than harder to talk about God and offer lowest-common-denominator and unproblematic accounts of Christian identity.
6. When Christians forget that we can be for the world only as we are - and continually become - the church, an alternative polis with such ridiculous practices as truth-telling, forgiveness, and non-violence, manifest particularly in the way we get in the face of power, welcome the excluded, and love our enemies. That I take to be what Pam calls our “witness”, and she is right that none of it will ever return to us empty.
ee 04.22.08 at 9:38 am
You have forsaken your first love… if you are lukewarm I will spew you out of my mouth… what you really need is a some damn good PR.*
*Jesus only says two of these statements. Which is the odd one out?