What is in Kelvin's Head?

75 questions for people who want to help churches to grow

22/09/2017
Helping churches to grow is hard work but there are some things that need to be addressed to help congregations to grow which seem to be fairly consistent across churches which are otherwise very different in style. Some time ago I published two lots of 25 questions for people who want to help churches to grow.

I thought it was time for 25 more. The new ones are the first 25 below and then come the ones that I’ve published before.
1. If someone were to hear about the congregation from a non-congregational member, what is the most likely thing they would be told?
2. What is the smallest number of words you could use to accurately explain the ethos of the congregation?
3. What are those words?
4. What strategies do you have to get good quality photographs of life of the congregation to use online?
5. Which of the arts does the congregation use in its worship and regular life?
6. How do the church education programmes relate to contemporary culture?
7. Do things start on time?
8. What steps have you implemented to ensure you don’t have the same meetings over and over again?
9. Do you have a set length of time for meetings and does someone stop them after they have gone on enough?
10. How do you stop people making decisions in the car park before or after the meetings?
11. Who chooses the hymns?
12. Why do they choose the hymns they do?
13. When was the last time the congregation learned a new hymn it sang more than once?
14. How many different styles of singing the psalms do you use and is that enough?
15. How many opportunities are there for weekly non-eucharistic worship?
16. Which would attract more people, a course in meditation or a course on prayer?
17. Is anyone working for the local congregation underpaid?
18. Does your bishop/presbytery/judicatory body or person help enable growth or are they a distraction from it?
19. Is there are three year budget?
20. Is the congregation moving into or out of debt?
21. What percentage of people in the congregation would have a basic understanding about the congregation’s finances?
22. Does anyone ever break copyright law whilst acting for the congregation?
23. How do you share good news about the denomination that you belong to?
24. When did you last issue a call to prayer for the congregation and what was it for?
25. If someone wants to make a confession is it clear who they should approach and how they should get in touch?
26. If you didn’t have to go to your church on Sunday would you still go?
27. Are the clergy happy?
28. Are the musicians happy?
29. Does the congregation have a stronger ethos than that of its denomination?
30. What one thing could you change this week to make the worship better?
31. Why didn’t you make that change last week?
32. What steps are you taking to make the phrase “All are Welcome” come true?
33. Do you do church business on a Sunday after church or is there a better time for that?
34. In the next month are you more likely to spend time on ecumenical activities or church growth activities?
35. Do people who leave become ex-members who have disappeared or do they still contribute to the life and ministry of the place?
36. What is the noticeboard like?
37. What is the first thing you see when you come through the door?
38. Did you implement the recommendations of the last “mystery worshipper” you asked to give you a candid assessment?
39. Which church events in the next six months will be newsworthy locally?
40. Which church events in the next six months will be reported in the local media?
41. Do you have enough staff and who decides this?
42. What would your clergy really like to do that they can’t because of the laity?
43. What would your laity really like to do that they can’t because of the clergy?
44. Which would attract young families more – a bible-based week long summer activity for children or letting it be known that gay people are welcome in your church?
45. Can you email those members of your congregation who want to receive regular updates?
46. Do you email those members of your congregation who want to receive regular updates?
47. Has someone done the work required to make sure emails sent to large numbers of people don’t end up in spam boxes?
48. Who in the congregation has gifts that could be better used doing a different job in the congregation than what they are currently doing?
49. Who is your volunteer co-ordinator and is it obvious how to contact them?
50. Can you volunteer without being a member of the church?
51. Do you have a decent church website?
52. Is it up to date?
53. Is it responsive – ie does it work on mobile phones?
54. Does your own online profile feature your ideas and hopes and dreams other than a desire for people to turn up to church?
55. Do you know what you are doing with twitter and facebook?
56. Who could you learn more about social media from?
57. Do you have a compelling reason why people should come to your church other than where it is or what denomination it belongs to?
58. Can everyone in the church tell you in one sentence what that compelling reason is?
59. What is your beginners’ course like?
60. What comes after the beginners’ course?
61. Do people like the preaching?
62. Do people enjoy the music?
63. Have you dealt with conflicts from the past?
64. Are the people friendly?
65. Do you have any new groups starting soon?
66. Do you talk about making the world a better place?
67. How will people experience joy if they come to your congregation?
68. If someone from your past turned up unexpectedly at worship how would it make you feel?
69. How do you identify newcomers and what do you offer them?
70. What problems will arise if you do grow and how will you deal with them?
71. Do claims that you welcome everyone stop you working at welcoming those who traditionally find it hard to find a home in church?
72. Do you use language that is inclusive of everyone?
73. How do you know?
74. Is there any identifiable group of people that you can’t explicitly say are welcome because of how an individual or group in the congregation will react?
75. Do you want to grow or not?
growth, mission, questions

19 responses to “Preferring me dead”

chris

27/11/2010

Well said, Rosemary. As for this business of everyone’s having to remain quiet and reasonable while unspeakable things are spoken … I’m sorry. I have this whined at me more times than I can count, so that my own calm goes out the window and I want to rage, rage, and the advocates of calm sit in their dispassionate heaven and think all will be well if people just shut up for another generation. It’s an affront to any society that this discrimination is still allowed to be seen as anything other than monstrous, and we need to raise a storm of protest that will make this obvious to even the most chilly political mind.

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Rosemary Hannah

27/11/2010

For the comfort of Kelvin, however, let me add this. The people who promote discrimination against queer folk very frequently neither want them dead not yet unborn. What they actually (though mistakenly) believe, is that gay people would be just the same if they were straight. That the person would be just the same, because who you desire is some kind of bolt-on accessory which you can pick from the shelf and have or not have, like adding an MP3 player to your car, or just having a tape deck. Now I know that is a terrible misunderstanding, but it is not actually quite as terrible as wishing that the essence of people was somehow different.

FWIW I do remember teaching a session on this to students, having asked them to imagine what people 100 years from now would think of our attitudes, and having one student tell me that in 50 years all gay people would be ‘cured’, and my suppressing my fury then and trying to explain why I did not want my friends and relatives ‘cured’ – and all the emotion catching up with me in my room at midnight, resulting in tears and all-but lying on the floor banging my heels and screaming. I suppose it was less actionable than banging a student’s head off the wall…..

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Scottish Roundup

28/11/2010

[…] debates at the recent meeting of the Church of England’s General Synod under the stark title, Preferring me dead. More jauntily, the damsel of the dancing scones writes about blogging’s transformative […]

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Elizabeth

02/12/2010

I wanted to post on this when I first read it (via Google Reader) but for some reason the internets wouldn’t let me on the site.

It’s hard to read this difficult words, but I think it’s very important that they’re said. I have only the smallest glimmerings of imagining how difficult it must be to be be a gay or lesbian priest now and fear that all too often I am prone to ignore the wider actions of the Anglican Communion because I’ve found it too painful and aggravating. But ignoring it is my privilege and no good in the long run.
And on this issue, as on others, I find it unhelpful to advocate a quite and slow approach. Movement is not always uni-directional and I agree with Kelvin that we seem to be moving backwards, at least, as far as the SEC College of Bishops and the Anglican Communion leadership is concerned. The softly, softly approach is not justice and is not by any stretch of the imagination the only means by which justice is reached. On this issue, as on others, the question is, if not now, when?

And I really, really dislike gay and lesbian Anglicans being sacrificed on the altar of loyalty to the ++Rowan. This is what happened in The Episcopal Church across the pond in 2006 and thank God General Convention saw fit to reverse the decision in 2009. Loyalty tests of such kind are horrendous!

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Rosemary Hannah

03/12/2010

And bluntly the only loyalty worth giving is loyalty to Truth and God.

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Revd Ross Kennedy

04/12/2010

I didn’t listen or read about anything voted on at the recent C of E Synod so can’t comment.

But frrankly I’m bored with all the obsession with sexuality – I just wish we could obey our Lord’s command to love one another.
But let me say this to lFr Kelvin, I for one certainly don’t want you dead. Life would be so dull without you – I would miss your blog and your excellent sermons ( which I must confess I sometimes plagiarise – bless me Father for I have sinned….) Don’t agree with much of what you say on sexual ethics but accept without question your devotion to our Lord and your ministry at St Mary’s.

Prejudice and intolerance certainly smother any real opportunity for real debate. However, I have experienced this as much from those on the theological left (including correspondents to this site) as well as those on the theological right.

The fact is that we are just as likely to find prejudice among liberals as well as conservatives in the church. I remember Bishop Richard Holloway discussing the ordination of women on the Television in the 1990s and making the insulting claim that most of the men opposed were probably homosexuals.

I’ve also heard many liberals express a definite wish for all those who dare to oppose the consecration of women to the Episcopacy to get out of the Church… or maybe even to drop dead.

The fact is that lots of people experience prejudice for a variety of reasons – a friend of mine who trained as a male nurse in the 1960s experienced a great deal of prejudice from his female superiors and as a result an absolute block to any promotion.

Others are discriminated against because they are too short or too tall or too fat , or not intelligent enough or didn’t attend the right university and even for daring to choose to be a ‘closet gay’!

There is a whole suffering world out there to which we are called upon to bring hope and help in the name of Jesus. So let’s stop focusing on our own personal problems and obsessions and get on with preaching the Good News.

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ryan

04/12/2010

>>>The fact is that we are just as likely to find prejudice among liberals as well as conservatives in the church. I remember Bishop Richard Holloway discussing the ordination of women on the Television in the 1990s and making the insulting claim that most of the men opposed were probably homosexuals.

If +Richard was talking about Forward in Lace types then he might have had a point ;-).

More seriously: can you cite any ‘liberal’ church that is suggesting denying the sacraments to conservatives? Or pining for an age when violence and discrimination against evangelicals was accepted as a good? These days, people have less tolerance for ‘I’m not racist,but…’ or ‘I don’t *hate* Jews, but….” or “the sexes are equal, but” rhetoric but anti-gay discrimination on religious grounds often goes unchallenged. So while it is of course important to challenge all forms of prejudice, there are no major ‘Christian’ Institute type lobbies endeavouring to defend and legitimise persecution of the fat, tall,or short.

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David McCarthy

06/12/2010

Oh, I know that in the secret halls of the likes of Facebook, there are many who feel free to exhibit prejudice against churches and individuals who don’t fit the bill. That reveals what is truly in the hearts of people. I’d hope that no-one would permit such diatribe and speak out against it, just as I have done to those on ‘the right’ who speak and behave badly.

As for you, dear Kelvin, there are many who disagree with you, but in our wee bit of the Church, I seriously doubt if there is anyone who would “prefer you dead”. You are a gifted minister – we’d miss you!

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