Two articles recently in the Church Times have helped to focus my mind on the resources that are needed to run a parish church well. For once, this is not about money, but it is about people and the skills & gifts they bring.
Here at St George´s we are very dependent on the willingness and the capabilities of our army of volunteers. Unfortunately ours is less an army and more a small platoon! But they are dedicated people, who have realised that serving God is as much about serving coffee, selling tickets and sweeping floors, as it is about prayer, reading the bible or receiving the sacrament. Our God is as present in our communal life as he is in the explicitly religious things that we do. And maintaining that communal life, is part of our Christian service.
But like all of us, our volunteers are aging, and, as in any voluntary organisation, we need to encourage new people, with new skillsets & a fresh perspective, to take more of the strain. Currently we have a number volunteer vacancies, some of which belong to the world of websites & social media and require more up to date skills and competencies. You can find them on our volunteering page here.
But a recent article in the Church Times has suggested that people today are less willing to volunteer than previously. Back in 1980s UK, church life was powered by housewives and the recently retired. But today three-quarters of mothers with dependent children are in employment, and many of the recently retired, if they are no longer working, are providing childcare. So the reservoir of volunteers has come close to drying up in the space of one generation.
But there has also been a shift in attitudes to volunteering and commitment. While we ‘baby boomers’ committed ourselves to something for life, today´s ‘millennials’, are perhaps a little more flighty, finding it easier to give something up and try something new. The Church Times article suggests they want to do things their own way, perhaps using a volunteer role as a stepping stone to more permanent paid employment, where they can use the skills that volunteering has given them.
The article suggests we need to reconcile ourselves to having a smaller volunteer base or else bringing in people of good will from other traditions, perhaps beyond the community of faith. But maybe more importantly, it reminds us that the job of the church is less about recruiting volunteers and more about making disciples. Christians do not volunteer, it tells us, instead they serve. They do not “give something back to the community”: they are members of the body of Christ, giving freely and joyfully of their time and talents.
Read the first article here.
The second article reflected on the value of parochial ministry and the need, perhaps at times, to weigh up the value of that front line service against the value of increasing diocesan staff/infrastructure in the back office. There is a focus here on the realities of ministry, and the need in the future to think more in terms of teams and groups of ministers than the more traditional ‘one parish, one priest’ model, and with it the skills that shift demands, for example of leadership and team working.
What is more certain is that local leadership is crucial to the health of the parish situation. Hidden within the contrasting claims of central mission strategy against clergy numbers is the sound principle that, if you do not have people and skills to lead and serve locally, then no amount of strategy will make much difference.”
Read the second article here.
So we have two slightly clashing realities. One is that we need the skills if we are to do the job properly, and the other is that we are reliant on volunteers, who are possibly declining in number or in willingness to come forward.
Well, firstly what I take from these two articles, is that we as church leaders need to be better at providing credible and competent training to prepare our people for the new realities of ministry. To quote the second article above, “There are not many areas in the Church of England where investment will provide a near-guaranteed return, but, I believe, training and skills is one”. Equally we cannot afford to do this badly. The story goes that the Finance Director asks “But what about the cost of doing all this training”, to which the HR Director responds: “But what about the cost of not doing it!” Training needs to drive change.
Alongside our budget for the new year and our communications strategy, we need to be thinking about our human resource development strategy, our plan for building the skills of clergy and volunteers, to prepare us for new times, new technologies and new models of ministry. To quote the article again: “A parish that promotes service, with training available to which to invite people, also promotes faith. “
Secondly our job as church leaders is to create the conditions for people to serve. This is not about simply pumping people full of training, but thinking first about what they already bring: the gifts of ministry that God has given them and the interests and experiences that have brough them to this point. I recently discussed this with Rev Dr Ken Ehrman from California, who has led a process in his local church to encourage people to serve, by first identifying their particular ministerial gifts. Only then did he help them to find appropriate volunteering opportunities and provide the training that was necessary. All of God’s people bring gifts: it is our job as church leaders to discern and foster them.
And thirdly it may well be that the ‘one parish, one priest’ model, prevalent here in the Costa del Sol, is not going to stand the test of time. Chaplaincies are struggling for resources and our future may be more shared, with a hub parish, perhaps here in Malaga, and spokes along the coast. This is then a very new reality, for which we are not yet fully equipped. But our chances of moving successfully into that new world depend on our willingness now to embrace change, to identify our gifts, to create the right conditions for innovation & service, and to build new skillsets among our people of all ages.