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Massachusetts Conference Edition
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Minister & President’s Columnby The Rev. Dr. Jim Antal April/May 08 Moving from conventional to intentional
Looking to meet their needs, hungry people are investigating all kinds of alternatives. Recently this trend was quantified by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. The first set of findings from their massive U.S. Religious Landscape 2008 Survey confirms what many of our churches have experienced. Fully 44 percent of those surveyed indicated that they had moved from the religious tradition into which they were born to some other tradition. In this context, what makes for a vital congregation? I find Diana Butler Bass’ response to this most compelling. “Congregations that intentionally engage Christian practices are congregations that experience new vitality.” Or to put it another way: vital congregations have moved from conventional Christianity to intentional Christianity. The first step in being intentional involves cultivating a learning environment – initially among the leadership of the church, with the goal of making it part of the culture of the whole congregation. When Diana Butler Bass recently spoke at a Conference event, she suggested that vital churches are asking of themselves the following questions: What are you paying conscious attention to? What are you counting and measuring without making excuses? What questions are you asking about your life together? What questions are you asking about your community and how your congregation relates to your community? As our congregation becomes an intentional learning community, we must pay more attention to cultivating the spiritual practices that will shape who we are becoming – as individuals in our personal life, and as a congregation in our life together. For decades, many of us have done our best to nurture engaging programs in our adult education hour or as part of a church retreat. But it is rare that a great program will give meaning to a person who is spiritually searching. And few would say that their lives were shaped by a particular program they attended. In contrast, the congregation can intentionally engage any number of spiritual practices (for example: prayer, hospitality, generous giving/tithing, testimony, forgiveness/ reconciliation, discernment, frugal/simple living, Sabbath keeping) and also encourage all members of the congregation to do likewise. Such practice will offer all who are searching (whether they have been members for decades or have just walked through the door) an opportunity to be grounded in a tradition of ancient Christian practice. At the same time, engaging these spiritual practices will give meaning, shape and direction to all who take them up. When congregations become intentional and honestly pay attention to their vocation to advance God’s kingdom, and when members are engaged in spiritual practices through which they experience the grace, mercy and presence of God, then congregations are able, as John Thomas has written, “to risk more than they otherwise might bear, to give more than they otherwise might share, and to trust more than they otherwise might dare.”* *“From Tourists to Pilgrims – The Vocation of Denominations in Tomorrow’s Church” John H. Thomas, General Minister and President, United Church of Christ. February 2000
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Spiritual hunger... we live in a land – in a time – of spiritual hunger. Religious leaders of all persuasions, newspaper and radio columnists, authors, and self-help movement gurus all agree on this. A new wave of studies (such as The Happiness Hypothesis) make it clear that people are spiritually hungry and that our materialist culture cannot address this need.