Friday, April 24, 2009
Illinois Methodists “Going Out of Business”
The following article was written June 11, 2004. It is posted here for reference purposes.
It won’t be in any of the newspaper stories about this week’s annual meeting of the Northern Illinois Conference of the Methodist Church, but a non-official speech may be the most significant of the event.
Last year the topic du jour was legitimizing homosexuality, that local churches should proclaim “that homosexual orientation (no less or more than heterosexual orientation) can be compatible with Christian teaching…and tell it to our children” in Sunday school, as a resolution put it.
This year it will be a statement of noted author Dr. Lyle Schaller, who attends Wheatland-Salem Methodist Church in Naperville.
“This annual conference is on the edge of going out of business,” he told about 100 Methodists gathered for a Northern Illinois Conference Evangelical Association (NICEA) dinner the first night of the convention. Although most of the group’s attendees held a low opinion of the leadership direction of current Bishop Joseph Sprague, many were shocked at hearing this long-time church growth consultant’s prediction.
Schaller wondered aloud whether he would live longer than the Northern Illinois Conference. He gave the conference about 12 more years.
The author of 52 books offered as an alternative tripling the size of adherents from the present 46-47,000 to 110,000 in 12 years.
“We know what to do and how to do it,” he calmly stated, but added, “The folks who run this annual conference have decided to go out of business.”
Although not offered as evidence, on the agenda was the sale of the Bellwood Methodist church building and the draining of $100,000 of the sale proceeds to finance conference operating expenses, similar to the approach to financing state government that Governor Rod Blagojevich (D-Chicago) has promoted.
Schaller has categorized religious organizations according to philosophical and organization behavior. The superstructure of the Northern Illinois church is “ideologically liberal and institutionally ultra conservative,” he said.
He emphasized that successful churches will use “the power of projective visual imagery.” Referring to the wall-to-wall coverage of former President Ronald Reagan’s state funeral, he observed, “There ain’t no competition. The key word in that sentence is ‘competition.’”
He pointed to the huge changes brought about by mergers.
“Merger is a way to demonstrate that 3 + 3 equals 4,” he said.
Looking back to when he was a Wisconsin pastor in the 1950’s, Schaller observed, “What happened since then is our whole society has become more competitive.”
He looked at NICEA president James Blue, retired from United Airlines, and said, “United Airlines is an HMO with wings.
“General Motors is an HMO with wheels,” he continued. The audience could tell that HMO was not being used as a positive word in conjunction with the two companies which resulted from industry mergers.
“The Methodist Church is an HMO with an offering basket,” the church growth consultant concluded. He pointed out that a 75% majority at the national conference in Pittsburgh “said we needed a bigger offering basket” for larger employee pensions. The national conference approved a 33% increase in church expenditures over the next four years.
“Old institutions choose between greater change and obsolescence,” he said. “About 1966-67, the decision (by Northern Illinois Methodists) was to vote we’re not going to be competitive. It carried and has been implemented.”
The church’s weekly attendance has nose-dived since then from 75,000+ to 46,000+. He noted that the number of new members is down 50%.
“If you decrease the number of new customers by 50%,” he stated, “you go out of business.”
“Are we ready to concede that?” he asked.
“No” was his answer.
A large part of the problem is that local congregations are now viewed as financial resources for the denominational hierarchy.
“When I was a pastor, denominations existed to resource congregations,” he remembered.
The role reversal “hasn’t worked,” he observed.
Church size is important in recruiting members born since 1960, Schaller explained.
United Methodists are not competitive with other Protestant denominations, the speaker asserted. As evidence he compared statistics from 1965 with those of 2000. In 1965 there were 35 Methodist churches in the jurisdiction with 400 or more people going to church each week. In 2000, that had decreased to “only 13.” Five congregations were on both lists.
The futurist asked if there were a desire with his church to reverse the trend.
Or, “should we gradually maintain the trend of going out of business?
“I think it would be more fun to reverse the trend.”
To grow again, Schaller pointed out, “We’ve changed the way we communicate the Good News of Jesus.”
He explained that in his day the spoken and written word were used.
“Then came television,” he explained. First, there was broadcast TV, then cable, then the internet, next, satellite TV and now interactive television via the internet.
“We have all the technology out there to communicate,” he said, stressing “visual imagery is far more powerful than the spoken work and far, far more powerful that the written word.”
As an example of how the local hierarchy is resistant to change, Schaller told of a Methodist pastor newly-minted in 1998 who wanted to start a new congregation. He was told by conference officials he would have to first go on a circuit, ministering to 2-3 small local churches.
Schaller suggested that the Evangelical Covenant Church might be interested in sponsoring him to set up a new church. He now has 8,400 worshipers at six locations.
Only 2 of his 14 messages each week are live. The rest are video taped.
The lesson is, “You can be there without being there.”
To emphasize his point, he asked how many people had seen an airliner crash into a tall building. Virtually everyone raised a hand.
“I doubt that,” he said, suggesting maybe one person in the audience, at most, had actually been in New York City on 9-11.
“We were there without being there,” he observed.
“What we are talking about is how we do church,” he said.
Looking nationally, Schaller pointed out that in 1960 Illinois was one of the four most populous states in terms of Methodist members.
“Since then, Illinois, California and Ohio have been most successful in resisting the changes to avoid going out of business,” he said, continuing in his reverse twist style of speaking. In Illinois, the number of church members has gone from 532,708 in 1960 to 294,000 now.
“Of the three, only California has been less open to change than this annual conference.
“If you lead the parade in resisting change, why not bet on another horse?” he asked, re-phrasing the question many Methodists have contemplated in recent years. “I think you could build a case that this horse has dropped out of the race.”
And, “Nobody likes to back a loser.”
Pointing to the lack of larger churches to attack those under age 44, he concluded, “I think there is a limited future. This conference has increased the number of small (less than 50 member) churches. Our greatest competition is in reaching people after 60,” he observed in a satirical manner. “This conference says, ‘Let’s focus on people born before 1950.’”
Schaller did point to one glimmer of hope. It is Resolution 700-30, passed on June 8, 2002. It summarizes characteristics of failing churches and growing churches. “The resolution, in effect, says we are not competitive.” He would add two requirements to the published list: the need for a good match between pastor and congregation and long tenure for the minister. The Methodist Church is not know for the latter, which may explain why its churches are generally have declining membership.
He expected a resolution in 2003 or this year suggesting how to implement the call for growth, but has been disappointed.
His advice for churches that wanted to step out of the Methodist mainstream and grow is to purchase 200-300 acres and plan to make it a destination site which would include not only a main church facility, but retirement housing and other attractions. This would be combined with satellite churches.
He added that in the Northern Illinois Conference that a 20-25 acre purchase was probably as much as could be expected.
It won’t be in any of the newspaper stories about this week’s annual meeting of the Northern Illinois Conference of the Methodist Church, but a non-official speech may be the most significant of the event.
Last year the topic du jour was legitimizing homosexuality, that local churches should proclaim “that homosexual orientation (no less or more than heterosexual orientation) can be compatible with Christian teaching…and tell it to our children” in Sunday school, as a resolution put it.
This year it will be a statement of noted author Dr. Lyle Schaller, who attends Wheatland-Salem Methodist Church in Naperville.
“This annual conference is on the edge of going out of business,” he told about 100 Methodists gathered for a Northern Illinois Conference Evangelical Association (NICEA) dinner the first night of the convention. Although most of the group’s attendees held a low opinion of the leadership direction of current Bishop Joseph Sprague, many were shocked at hearing this long-time church growth consultant’s prediction.
Schaller wondered aloud whether he would live longer than the Northern Illinois Conference. He gave the conference about 12 more years.
The author of 52 books offered as an alternative tripling the size of adherents from the present 46-47,000 to 110,000 in 12 years.
“We know what to do and how to do it,” he calmly stated, but added, “The folks who run this annual conference have decided to go out of business.”
Although not offered as evidence, on the agenda was the sale of the Bellwood Methodist church building and the draining of $100,000 of the sale proceeds to finance conference operating expenses, similar to the approach to financing state government that Governor Rod Blagojevich (D-Chicago) has promoted.
Schaller has categorized religious organizations according to philosophical and organization behavior. The superstructure of the Northern Illinois church is “ideologically liberal and institutionally ultra conservative,” he said.
He emphasized that successful churches will use “the power of projective visual imagery.” Referring to the wall-to-wall coverage of former President Ronald Reagan’s state funeral, he observed, “There ain’t no competition. The key word in that sentence is ‘competition.’”
He pointed to the huge changes brought about by mergers.
“Merger is a way to demonstrate that 3 + 3 equals 4,” he said.
Looking back to when he was a Wisconsin pastor in the 1950’s, Schaller observed, “What happened since then is our whole society has become more competitive.”
He looked at NICEA president James Blue, retired from United Airlines, and said, “United Airlines is an HMO with wings.
“General Motors is an HMO with wheels,” he continued. The audience could tell that HMO was not being used as a positive word in conjunction with the two companies which resulted from industry mergers.
“The Methodist Church is an HMO with an offering basket,” the church growth consultant concluded. He pointed out that a 75% majority at the national conference in Pittsburgh “said we needed a bigger offering basket” for larger employee pensions. The national conference approved a 33% increase in church expenditures over the next four years.
“Old institutions choose between greater change and obsolescence,” he said. “About 1966-67, the decision (by Northern Illinois Methodists) was to vote we’re not going to be competitive. It carried and has been implemented.”
The church’s weekly attendance has nose-dived since then from 75,000+ to 46,000+. He noted that the number of new members is down 50%.
“If you decrease the number of new customers by 50%,” he stated, “you go out of business.”
“Are we ready to concede that?” he asked.
“No” was his answer.
A large part of the problem is that local congregations are now viewed as financial resources for the denominational hierarchy.
“When I was a pastor, denominations existed to resource congregations,” he remembered.
The role reversal “hasn’t worked,” he observed.
Church size is important in recruiting members born since 1960, Schaller explained.
United Methodists are not competitive with other Protestant denominations, the speaker asserted. As evidence he compared statistics from 1965 with those of 2000. In 1965 there were 35 Methodist churches in the jurisdiction with 400 or more people going to church each week. In 2000, that had decreased to “only 13.” Five congregations were on both lists.
The futurist asked if there were a desire with his church to reverse the trend.
Or, “should we gradually maintain the trend of going out of business?
“I think it would be more fun to reverse the trend.”
To grow again, Schaller pointed out, “We’ve changed the way we communicate the Good News of Jesus.”
He explained that in his day the spoken and written word were used.
“Then came television,” he explained. First, there was broadcast TV, then cable, then the internet, next, satellite TV and now interactive television via the internet.
“We have all the technology out there to communicate,” he said, stressing “visual imagery is far more powerful than the spoken work and far, far more powerful that the written word.”
As an example of how the local hierarchy is resistant to change, Schaller told of a Methodist pastor newly-minted in 1998 who wanted to start a new congregation. He was told by conference officials he would have to first go on a circuit, ministering to 2-3 small local churches.
Schaller suggested that the Evangelical Covenant Church might be interested in sponsoring him to set up a new church. He now has 8,400 worshipers at six locations.
Only 2 of his 14 messages each week are live. The rest are video taped.
The lesson is, “You can be there without being there.”
To emphasize his point, he asked how many people had seen an airliner crash into a tall building. Virtually everyone raised a hand.
“I doubt that,” he said, suggesting maybe one person in the audience, at most, had actually been in New York City on 9-11.
“We were there without being there,” he observed.
“What we are talking about is how we do church,” he said.
Looking nationally, Schaller pointed out that in 1960 Illinois was one of the four most populous states in terms of Methodist members.
“Since then, Illinois, California and Ohio have been most successful in resisting the changes to avoid going out of business,” he said, continuing in his reverse twist style of speaking. In Illinois, the number of church members has gone from 532,708 in 1960 to 294,000 now.
“Of the three, only California has been less open to change than this annual conference.
“If you lead the parade in resisting change, why not bet on another horse?” he asked, re-phrasing the question many Methodists have contemplated in recent years. “I think you could build a case that this horse has dropped out of the race.”
And, “Nobody likes to back a loser.”
Pointing to the lack of larger churches to attack those under age 44, he concluded, “I think there is a limited future. This conference has increased the number of small (less than 50 member) churches. Our greatest competition is in reaching people after 60,” he observed in a satirical manner. “This conference says, ‘Let’s focus on people born before 1950.’”
Schaller did point to one glimmer of hope. It is Resolution 700-30, passed on June 8, 2002. It summarizes characteristics of failing churches and growing churches. “The resolution, in effect, says we are not competitive.” He would add two requirements to the published list: the need for a good match between pastor and congregation and long tenure for the minister. The Methodist Church is not know for the latter, which may explain why its churches are generally have declining membership.
He expected a resolution in 2003 or this year suggesting how to implement the call for growth, but has been disappointed.
His advice for churches that wanted to step out of the Methodist mainstream and grow is to purchase 200-300 acres and plan to make it a destination site which would include not only a main church facility, but retirement housing and other attractions. This would be combined with satellite churches.
He added that in the Northern Illinois Conference that a 20-25 acre purchase was probably as much as could be expected.
Labels: Going Out of Business, James Blue, Joseph Sprague, Lyle Schaller, NICEA, Northern Illinois Conference, United Methodist Chuch, Wheatland-Salem Methodist Church
# posted by Cal Skinner : 3:39 PM
