Amen, Jim Naughton. Thanks much for this.

Amen and Amen. Thank you for saying this, Jim. I hope others take up your point and redirect the energy o our church leadership back where it needs to be.

I join the Amen Corner. Our energies ought to be expended in letting people outside the church know there is a place where they can bring all their doubts and questions about God and faith--and find acceptance and community.

Endlessly rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic may give the people in power (and by that, I include bishops, clergy, and laity) something to do, but I doubt it gives much glory to God or a hope of the future to the faithful.

Agreed! How about if we talk about our collective queasiness about telling our stories and helping people understand why "The Episcopal Church Welcomes You" means -isms, baggage and all (assuming, of course, that we actually mean that when we say it!).

Count me in the Amen Corner, too.

June Butler

As a former Catholic who is currently drawn to the Episcopal Church (as well as the ELCA) I too hope that you can get your act together.

Jim is absolutely right that we need the Episcopal brand of Christianity more than ever.

I would also say that Paige is right on that you need to "let people outside the church know there is a place where they can bring all their doubts and questions about God and faith--and find acceptance and community." Not only that, but there are lots of people in the Catholic Church and evangelical churches who love the acceptance and community they personally find there--yet deep down, they wish that there was a place where they could find that acceptance and community without the right-wing social agenda that many of those churches push. Where not just they would be welcomed, but their LGBT friends and their feminist friends and their "misfit" friends would be welcomed as well.

The Episcopal Church offers that in spades. But you do need to be a bit more proactive about letting people know about that.

The irony is that it seems that many of the "conservative" churches, content with their growth rate, are gradually turning their attention towards running off their more socially progressive members. Many Catholics in particular would seem to be a better fit in the Episcopal Church than the Catholic Church, but they're still pretty comfortable so far.

When the process of "purging" intensifies, will those people have a place to go? Or will they feel that they have no other option but to become one of the "nones," those with no spiritual home? For the sake of the world, for the sake of our smaller neighborhoods and communities, for the sake of the spiritual well-being of all those people who wish there was a place that their doubts and questions would be dealt with honestly rather than glossed over, I hope that you can figure something out.

It looks like a loss of about 50,000/year every year(ish). Is there any data on why these people leave? Like is it whole churches, or a general decline spread over most churches? How much of it is due to attrition of older members, without us replenishing them our younger cohorts? (Which could be due to a general lack of focus/energy/resources on children, youth, and young adult programs and development...)

Another Amen. I'm sick of the navel gazing. There are poor people all around us that need to hear the Good News. There are young people hungering for spiritual nourishment. I would say that liturgy and music are vitally important to nourish us, but then we need to get out and make religion a verb.

Absolutely (Amens here, too). As a 20-something convert (?) to TEC, I'm trying to figure out what worked/works for me and why, and the size of the House of Deputies doesn't have a whole lot to do with it. Though I have to admit it's a lot easier to debate something with concrete terms and calculable costs/benefits than to address the enormous issue of church vitality and membership decline. How can we spread passion for tackling the tough, messy, overwhelming stuff?

We lose close to 20,000 due to death each year

I agree that now is the time to really spread the word about the Episcopal Church to the younger Catholic generation. According to the National Catholic Reporter many younger people in the pews have personal beliefs that conflict with official RC doctrine, but have been accepted by some portions of our denomination (though we allow for debate and difference in belief on certain issues). With the new masses (or old if you will) being imposed by the Vatican this fall, I would expect more persons to feel they have no choice but to leave the Catholic church. Let's make sure we can show them we exist!

You know, I don't think the new Masses would necessarily be much of a catalyst for people leaving the RCC, although I could be wrong. That certainly wouldn't have done it for me.

It's more the general feeling that if you're not a right-wing anti-gay social crusader, then you're not a real Catholic, or even a real Christian.

The first may well be true; the second is most certainly not.

What finally made me decide to look at other churches was that I had finally been mocked for caring about economic justice and having empathy for our LGBT brothers and sisters one too many times.

So clearly I failed at the whole transparency use-your-real-name thing (alas, TypePad). Oops. All fixed now. "Episcotheque.wordpress.com" is in fact a real person: I, Alissa. No obfuscation intended.

On the other hand, maybe we can do a bit of "both-and" with this . . . one of the strengths of our tradition is certainly the ability to hold multiple theological stances in a creative tension -- and ultimately in an appropriately humble awareness that God's vision transcends all of our attempts to theologize it -- and this present moment may well call for groups working simultaneously on streamlining our processes, proclaiming our mission, exploring our vision, and all other good things.

If our commitment to live in communion as the people of God can grow a heart big enough to keep loving even as we wrestle with different theological opinions, surely we can grow skin big enough to handle growing pains . . . even when they involve shrinking!

I'll add that I'd take my place among 12 spiritually curious people up for the journey of a lifetime over thousands of pewsitting hoards. I hope I'm standing in all due humility when I dryly suggest that I've got my eye on a good example by this.

I hope we can do a bit of both-and with this. The evangelism we need to be doing will be more flexible if we take a little time to get the balance between local and centralized right. We desperately need to be better at communicating who we are, and this means resources for parishes as well as a coherent "brand" strategy from The Episcopal Church central hierarchy. We're bloated at the top right now, and it's not helping anybody.

It's impossible to know why people leave, or the numbers are slipping, but I would like to mention the possibility that we have opened up too far theologically, and gotten away from orthodox, creedal Christianity.

This decline is not confined to the Episcopal Church. The Southern Baptists continue to slide, for instance. And overall, the numbers of American Christians remains stable, which means that Christianity as a whole is declining compared with U.S. population growth. See http://bit.ly/eHqSZV
Moreover, the number of self-professed atheists has doubled in ten years, and the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses continue to grow. So what can we conclude?
Whatever changes are needed in our church's governance -- and they are needed -- the emphasis must remain on the local congregation within the diocese. Each one has a role to play in God's mission, and that role is primarily outside the church walls. What matters is not the numbers in the pews but the numbers out in the community who are engaged in God's mission. If that's not the priority we deserve to disappear. See also http://bit.ly/vVxLvx

For many of us who were received into the Episcopal Church, this was the place we found the daring and courageous witness of radical hospitality that Jesus embodied. Sadly, if we do not embrace that vocation, that prophetic vocation, with an ever growing sense of courage we might just as well pack it in. We as members of this wonderful church have the opportunity to live into this vision of church that inspires, that fascinates, that compels IF we decide that our faith is big enough to allow such a bold move. That's the church I want to belong to and I honestly believe others would feel the same. We are not called to tend a museum but to proclaim a living faith in every word and action. IF we're headed for ruin on the path we're on, why not try doing something absolutely crazy like living the Gospel recklessly? We have nothing to lose and EVERYTHING to gain.

Bishop Pierre, I have been wondering lately about the focus on mission and whether it helps or hinders evangelism. On the one hand we are told that millennials are searching for an active faith. Fair enough. But on the other hand the people whom I could invite to church are over-committed, time-pressed and looking for something that renews them rather than depletes them. I was once a part of a congregations composed primarily of social workers, teachers, nurses and labor activists, and we once had a priest who made us feel a failure because all of these people who were pouring out their energies in the community every day weren't pursuing any corporate mission as a parish. I am hardly a sit on my hands kind of guy, but the world is full of mission opportunities that go by many names, but the church is the only place where I can worship Christ in community.

Good point Jim. I have seen that too, and maybe what we need to do is to figure out how to bless what our people are doing outside of the parish and affirm that as doing mission. Your comment makes me think that what is now done in society by social workers, teachers and nurses used to be done by clergy and religious. The work is similar, just done under a different banner.
~Caoilin

Everybody can use a little mercy now....

(i.e.: "The Grace of God"....)

What Jim is saying and what Bishop Pierre is saying is another "both-and" situation.

In terms of worship services that renew and inspire people, the Episcopal Church has far more going for it than every other mainline denomination except the ELCA. And that's a really important thing. It might be easy for people who were born Episcopalian to take this for granted, but after having visited a number of mainline churches within walking distance from my residence, the Episcopal and Lutheran churches were really the only ones that had very inspiring worship services.

The opportunity to make a difference in the world and be a part of a congregation that offers a lot of service opportunities is also a good thing. But, as Jim said, not everyone is going to have time to participate in every service activity through the church, and people shouldn't be made to feel like they're a failure because they are helping people through their daily jobs rather than through the church.

BSnyder! I heard this song playing in the background on PBS Mystery on Sunday night and went immediately to YouTube and found it. I was planning to post this video yesterday to The Lead, but then the St. Paul's stuff broke, and I decided to hold on to it. It's terrific.

Do post it, Jim Naughton. It's wonderful - a balm for the sore heart and the troubled soul....

It is interesting to me that the pattern in the Mega Churches is to deliver life coaching messages at their services and fundamentalist theology in small groups. So they combine Oprah, Osteen and Oral. The crowds come for Oprah and Osteen and may or may not embrace the conservative social messages in the Oral groups.

We have the most comprehensive, tolerant, merciful and justice oriented theology and praxis that actually focuses on inviting us to do What Jesus Would Do and yet we languish. Part of that is we are too modest or shy to evangelize what we have and our branding efforts maintain the tradition of being "non-tacky".

But I also think a big part of the more successful messaging is around the Church of I AM (It's About Me) and the Church of I AM I AM(I'm Against Malefactors - Illegals, Abortionists and Muslims)

So I am not sure we yet have the bright shining Way of delivering the Message of Grace and in my opinion that's the only turn around that will help.

It's time that TEC gets with the times. Enough of the suffocating bureaucracy that takes three cycles of General Conventions to do anything. It's time to get on Facebook and Twitter, whatever it takes to make people know that there is a church where they are welcome.

Morris Post

What parishes are growing? Why? How can we learn from these? Do we really and honestly believe we have a great treasure and a duty to add to this treasure and share it, or is our association with this treasure more of a way to validate whatever it is we feel like doing? For example: the 82 Hymnal is great art and I'm glad we have it, but I don't really want to sing that stuff, it's not "popular". Or: The Book of Common Prayer is such fabulous literature, but really, who uses that old stuffy thing at church, just the grannies at 8 am? Or: the Nicene Creed, it's so ancient and venerable, but I like my own affirmation of faith better, I would rather start with that than with the Creed. Or: I'm glad we have priests and bishops, that makes us so high church, but I would rather be able to participate and have a say in every part of the liturgy, and I don't want to feel left out at all, so why don't we just all say this prayer together, it's so much more community oriented when we do, lay power!

Yuck. And bit by bit, those who just want to rest in the beauty of holiness and not be run off by the doctrine nazis in other churches, well, they figure out that Nature herself is completely authentic and just does what she does without apology, and how about just sleeping in on Sunday and when I feel religious, read a little Marianne Williamson and take a walk in the park on an afternoon and See what I See? I would get a more authentic, accepting welcome from the squirrels and cardinals and the sun or moon than I do at that frozen fake-fest coffee hour at St. Barnabas Church, and see more of the life-giving sacrifice in the natural cycles than attending the Holy Eucharist.

I wish I knew what the solution was, if there is a solution. With some exceptions, western Christianity is failing. Attitudes to Christianity outside the church tend to fall into camps of indifference to outright hostility. One needs spend little time on the internet to encounter hostility a-plenty. I had, as part of a "growing" congregation, been somewhat more optimistic until recently. I was asked by a priest, and a friend, to help out and play for Sunday liturgy at another church where he had been installed as vicar. The liturgy is well done. The preaching is good. The congregation is kind and welcoming, but also elderly. There are a few kids. The average Sunday attendance is about in the 40's. The church is in "mission" status and is not getting help but the savings balance continues to decline. It is not in a depopulated area, but one that has fallen in economic status. The average age in 70's plus. Since the parish has an anglocatholic bent, it has attracted some gay membership (ceremonial is good). It is "on life support" but "not dead yet." How to revive it?
From my own standpoint, as one who has "come out" as finding traditional supernatural theism to be unsustainable and unsustaining, I have taken to "reinventing" liturgy and church for myself. I have tried combining traditional practices such as lectio divina, the Jesus prayer and silent meditation along with an internal "rewriting" of the narrative. Liturgy remains sustaining because I have reinvented the "meaning" for me which is more firmly metaphorical and non-literal. This "works" for me, but it is a lot of "work." I do not think that I am alone in finding "heaven and hell" Christianity to be unappealing and unsustaining. Yet our prayerbook is saturated with it. No amount of "mission" orientation is going to make much difference to our lives if we are "doing it to be doing it." If it does not transform us from within (no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me)-if it does not make a real and personal difference to me when I drag myself out for another day of work. As a physician and neurologist, I understand how hard it is to motivate people to "take medicine" when they see no results that they can feel, and I worry that "mission" orientation may just be that kind of medicine. So many of us suffer from a "sickness" of our consumerist and individualist age. It just seems that the church is not doing much to help our personal, spiritual and devotional lives. The help is there in our heritage, but it is buried deeply and, at least for me, a lonely pursuit. What a neophyte could do, heaven knows. We need, I think, a "spiritual" revival, along the lines of what happened with Methodism. People want "meaning" and a "spiritual" side to their lives, but we seem to be failing to deliver a means to achieve this. No amount of cost cutting, reorganization or redistricting or "mission strategy" is going to help us if we have lost our "heart" or cannot communicate that "heart" to a world that is increasingly hard of hearing.
Sorry for the length!

Just a clarification, the "St. Barnabas Church" referenced in my previous post was just an Episcopal sounding parish name, not referring to a particular church I've ever attended!!

Jeffery, though I find your post largely spot on, I don't think it is right to jettison everything, just come to a deeper understanding about what it all means, why it arose in the first place, and how we have grown past some of the traditional and unsustainable meanings of certain terms. Also, I think it is imperative, since we do have an historic episcopacy and a priesthood, that ways of deep personal religious practice for lay folk are developed and taught. The Book of Common Prayer is just that, Common Prayer, and when you're alone you know it just isn't the same even if, say, the Daily Office is still a good spiritual practice. The Catholic aspect of our tradition needs to inform the personal practice of our laity simply because the Catholics themselves (and the Orthodox too) have a whole lot of devotions, prayers and practices especially developed for lay use.

On a personal note, I've found the 17th Cent. Rosicrucian phrase "Jesus mihi omnia [Jesus is all/everything to me]" to be an excellent mantra. The mystical Lutheran movement that produced the R+C Manifesto and Confession also produced mystics like Jacob Boehme, who had much influence on William Law, and thus on the Wesley brothers.

If we'd just create something worthy of people's time and energy, they'd be there. That means: passionate worship, radical hospitality, deeper faith formation, selfless service, and extravagant generosity. No more business as usual. It is critical that we begin to think outside the box and maybe by allowing ourselves to be transformed by and excited about the Reign of God.

Here's a fascinating recent article in Forbes magazine: "A Religion for Atheists."

This is what is actually happening out there: at least some people are realizing that secularism is incomplete - and that religion offers important psychological benefits that real human beings, living our real lives, have trouble doing without. Here's a quote that gets to the heart of the issue (I added the bolding):

"A third aspect of secular religion would be to offer us lessons in pessimism. The religion would try to counter the optimistic tenor of modern society and return us to the great pessimistic undercurrents found in traditional faiths. It would teach us to see the unthinking cruelty discreetly coiled within the magnanimous secular assurance that everyone can discover happiness through work and love. It isn’t that these two entities are invariably incapable of delivering fulfilment, only that they almost never do so. And when an exception is misrepresented as a rule, our individual misfortunes, instead of seeming to us quasi-inevitable aspects of life, will weigh down on us like particular curses. In denying the natural place reserved for longing and incompleteness in the human lot, our modern secular ideology denies us the possibility of collective consolation for our fractious marriages and our unexploited ambitions, condemning us instead to solitary feelings of shame and persecution. "

That is what at least some folks are feeling out there - and this whole notion is arising out of a deeply felt pain and alienation. (Personally, I'm not sure "pessimism" is the right word here - perhaps "realism" would work better? - but you get the point, I'm sure.)

And as luck would have it, our actual vocation is, in fact, to to preach the Gospel, the "Good News" of the Grace of God - and to offer something like "collective consolation" to those who suffer (i.e., everybody). Yes?

But on the other hand the people whom I could invite to church are over-committed, time-pressed and looking for something that renews them rather than depletes them.

Oh yes! If the church could find more and better ways of blessing the good that members of congregation are already doing in their everyday lives, while serving as a place of spiritual refreshment, that would be a lovely thing.

It's not only what the church does as a corporate body that counts.

June Butler

I understand the points relating to "in as much, as you did it . . . . ." but that is not the foundation of Christianity. +Cranmer understood inclusiveness under Christ as does +Rowan. Inclusiveness and unity is found in Jesus Christ, One Whom we worship and to Whom we are asked to be faithful in our own different ways. The test of our church is not how well we promote rights, but how people find metanoia, see that their lives have been changed through Jesus Christ. Once changed, then there are so many ministries, the harvest is huge but the laborers few. I am shamed at the way 'main line' diminishing churches, like ours, mock the growing numbers of evangelicals claiming 'we don't check our brains at the door'. Gamaliel understood this, the complexity of the Holy Spirit and where it lands and sets fires going. There is room for the political left and right to worship together, be faithful together and LEARN from each other. In our local parish, membership and pledges are in steady decline but there is no will to change as far as I can see.

We also need to be concerned not so much about the numbers of Episcopalians we have or want as how to increase our numbers of younger members. To be blunt, if the average age of an Episcopalian is 60+ then no wonder we lose about 2-3% each year at a steady rate! Many of our members are passing away.... They aren't all leaving by choice because of some policy change in the Church, or theology. We need to have a clearer reason why a person should stay and raise families in our tradition. Why is it important to be an Episcopalian today? If we only reason that Anglicanism is just one choice of many "spiritual" choices, then no wonder we don't keep your younger kin.

Thats my two cents after thinking about this for the past couple days.

Thoughts?

Eric

The bog above written by Jeffrey Shy MD states very well how many Episcopalians feel. Since I have lived in S California, I have seen Calvary grow from a tent in Costa Mesa, the Vineyard from the gym in the local Junior/High, Saddleback appear from a small Bible Study and an Anglo Catholic Church appear 5-7 years ago and already attract not just more Sunday worshippers than us but appeal mainly to the 20-40's. In other words, the number of local Christian church-goers has grown amazingly while we have declined. Their ministries serve apparently every aspect of spiritual desolation. Have we learned from this? No. Do we actually even want to learn from this? Not as far as I can see. Does a newcomer to Christianity want to spend Sunday morning debating whether the resurrection happened - per the Jesus Seminar? The Unitarians probably do a better job on philosophy and ethics. What actually do we offer people? A dusted up civil rights movement? Moral leadership squabbling over real estate? A place to purge the right wing, as in S Carolina? Can we easily reconcile Title IV with our contempt for the Anglican Covenant?