Page Contents:
Universalism Today - Reflections of a Traveling Universalist
by Kalen Fristad (This article appeared in the September/ October 2006 issue of the
UNIVERSALIST HERALD)
Where Have All The Universalists Gone?
by Ken R. Vincent (This article appeared in the Janurary/Feburary 2006 issue of the
UNIVERSALIST HERALD)
Additional Page Contents:
Believing the Future In.
by John Morgan
Young Adult Workshop at 2006 Convocation
by John Lapoint
Small Churches and Trained Ministers
by Peggy Rawheiser
WHAT I WANT AND NEED IN A RELIGIOUS COMMUNITY
by John C. Morgan
________________________________________________________
Believing the Future In.
by John Morgan
Some years ago a Maine friend asked me to take a ride with him down the road. He said
he had a surprise awaiting me. About twenty minutes later, I spotted the white church
steeple in the distance as we got closer to the building situated near the intersection of
three highways.
As we got out of the car, he pointed to a marker which read: “Universalist Church.”
Some of the paint was peeling, bringing to mind the story of another old New England
church in the same plight, in which cost conscious members had put water in the white
paint to make it go further. Of course, the paint wore off quickly, until a voice burst out of
the heavens one day: “Repaint and thin no more!”
The door to this old building was locked. There were cobwebs across a window. But I
noticed the grass had been cut recently, which gave me some hope that someone knew
something.
Stopping in a country store, we learned that the person who maintained the building was a
dairy farmer who lived “down the road a piece.” Sure enough, five miles later, we found
the farm and the farmer. She was thrilled that someone was interested in the building
since she had been a member for years.
When I asked her about its history, she told a story that probably could be repeated many
times over. After the merger or consolidation of Universalism and Unitarianism some
decades ago, church membership had dwindled. She said she just couldn’t sell the
building so she kept it going, noting that the only time it was used was for a few weddings
and an annual meeting.
“But if you’re the last Universalist in town, why hold an annual meeting?” With a twinkle in
her eye and a steady Maine accent, she didn’t miss a beat in responding:
“Well, I try to keep our status as a church and it requires an annual meeting. I’m the only
one there.” I joked that it must be easy making decisions. “Not always,” she said;
“sometimes I don’t agree with myself.”
Now I’ve heard all the stories about leading Unitarian Universalists is a little like “herding
cats,” or, better yet, “wrestling alligators,” but I think this may have been the best story I’ve
encountered about why making collective decisions is so difficult among such rugged
individualists. In any case, she gave us the key to front door so we could look for
ourselves.
I still remember brushing cobwebs from my face as we entered the space. Old hymnals,
some of them still open on the pews, were arranged neatly as if expecting churchgoers
any moment. There was an old pump organ up front, with the hymn numbers still listed for
the last Sunday service, probably decades ago. As I went up to the pulpit, I found the
Bible opened to what might have been the last sermon text from the Book of Jeremiah:
“Truly they have loved to wander; they have not restrained their feet; therefore the Lord
does not accept them” (14:10).
In a strange way, this small and now closed building symbolized far too many others I have
seen over my journeys as a new congregation organizer or minister—some closed due to
lack of faith, others not started for the same reason.
It is true that people come and go as communities change over time. I once estimated the
demographic center of the Unitarian Universalist movement was heading south and west a
few map inches every year until one day Nashville, not Boston, might become the
statistical center. But I don’t think it’s entirely demographics that shape a movement; it
also is vision, or the lack thereof, the unwilling to share the faith for which early
Universalists paid such high prices.
I also recalled Jeremiah’s story. Before the fall and exile of his people, Jeremiah bought a
plot of ground to symbolize his hope for the future. Robert Frost once wrote of the
American founders that they did not believe in the future; they believed the future in. It’s
the same principle at work in vital, growing religious movements.
If I had the opportunity to preach one last time in that Maine church, I think I would have
used another text from the Book of Jeremiah: “Set up road markers for yourself; make
yourself guideposts; consider well the highway, the road by which you came.”
And I would have added, “consider also the road ahead.”
A polite generic religion is not enough to sustain or build a deeply spiritual community. It
takes vision, courage, and a willingness to share a heartfelt faith.
John Morgan is a contributing editor for the Herald. Before retiring from parish ministry,he
was a new congregation or extension minister. He now teaches philosophy and ethics at
a community college.
Young Adult Workshop at 2006 Convocation
by John Lapoint
On the weekend of May 5th through the 7th, Universalist Convocation met at Our Home
Universalist Church in Ellisville, Mississippi. On May the 6th, together with my father, the
Rev. Justin Lapoint, I led a workshop called “Faith Without Works is Dead,” a forum on
what we can do to get young adults into the Universalist movement. It was noted that
Sunday School programs in Universalist churches are dying and that Universalist
churches have trouble recruiting and keeping young adults.
Problems that were mentioned included that older adults in the movement don’t always
treat younger adults as adults, that services held in Universalist churches aren’t always
relevant to young adults, that young adults have an aversion to organized religion, that
young adults move around a lot and don’t settle in one church, and that young adults
aren’t always free on Sunday morning. A solution that was suggested was to have events
on either Wednesday night or Sunday afternoon, that they be held somewhere other than
a church building, and that programs contain music and religious and non-religious
components. It was suggested that programs be spiritually filling and livelier. Many
individuals come to Universalist conclusions from their own study of religion and the Bible,
but do not join the movement for fear of being part of an organized religion.
Publicity and advertising were also discussed. While television and internet advertising
were discussed, it was decided that word of mouth advertising was most effective.
We discussed how to integrate young people into Universalist churches. One suggestion
was for churches to minister to the whole person. Another was to practice spirituality
through action related service, commitment to a cause, and involvement in work camps. A
third suggestion was to hold a coffee house type event either at the church or at a less
formal locale, on a Wednesday or Sunday night, and have a talent show where young
adults can read poetry or prose, perform music, and show off other talent.
After the convocation was over, I talked with Justin Lapoint, Barry Whitamore and Don
Outlaw about ways to get more young adults to attend Convo. We all agreed that we need
to take a serious look at the entertainment we book for Convo to make sure it’s something
that would interest young adults. We believe more contemporary music is needed.
Another idea was to have a break Saturday afternoon so people can recuperate from the
beginning of Convo.
When asked what he thought, my father, Justin Lapoint, had this to say, “Our Young Adult
Workshop created a good deal of food for thought. If Universalists are to draw young
adults to our churches and to Convocation, we older adults need to modify our programs
both in terms of style and substance.”
Small Churches and Trained Ministers
By Peggy Rawheiser
(There has been much conversation and discussion about small churches in our
denomination. The Universalist Convocation 2005, held in Eldorado, Ohio, had as its
theme “Land & People, The Future of Rural Ministry.” There was a workshop on “Circuit
Riders and Preaching Stations” conducted by the Rev. Wells Behee. There also was a
Panel Discussion “Bi-Vocational Ministry and Rural Churches.” This panel was made up
of three ministers who have experience in this type of ministry. They were the Rev. Dr.
Vernon Chandler, Pastor Derek Parker and the Rev. Kat Hawbaker. There is a place for
ministry to small congregations with ministers shared by two or more churches or by the
minister having another vocation in the area of the church. Our history is full of examples
of this type of ministry.)
In a sermon in 1994 at the Asheville UU Church, The Rev. Dan McCurry of Chicago, said,
“When it was discussed that the Inman Chapel Church was about to expire, the monied
Yankee Universalists believed that southern churches should be supported only in those
urban areas with a steady financial base.”
Recently an Interim minister in one of our small Universalist churches has said that it is
her view that the small Universalist Churches should be allowed to die. The level of
theological education has been under discussion in this same church. She tried to push
the congregation to change the by laws to require that any minister hired to serve that
church be a properly ordained UU minister. Fortunately the change to the by laws was
not voted upon.
There has been a discussion of the advantages of small churches on the UU Historical
Society Chat Group. The views of one of our cousins from the United Kingdom, Andrew
Hill, are of interest to us. I quote with his permission.
Small Churches are to be desired. The future is great because small is beautiful and
sustainable! There are British Unitarian churches which yesterday were almost dead but
which today are flourishing.
On a more general level, the life of British Unitarian churches cannot be separated from
the life of organized religion in Western Europe as a whole. It rises and falls with the tide
and the church involvement tide has been falling for many years and continues to fall. No
one quite understands why although the sociologists of religion hazard guesses. It is said
that a French Catholic farmer arriving at the railway station in Paris becomes a secular
person as soon as he puts his feet on the station platform.
On the other hand the Western European looks at North American church life and asks
"Why do so many people go to church?" Sociologist’s hazard guesses as to why - identity
with ethnic origins, the need for religious education, high mobility and finding new friends,
also the conservative mega churches which are major players in the US power game.
Thank goodness that in Western Europe, we don't have mega churches to contend with!
Western European politicians who mention God lose votes. Denmark couples Europe's
lowest prison population with Europe's lowest church involvement figures.
That said, US church involvement levels are falling - I read a figure of 25% of the US
population recently. Also a great many UU churches and fellowships are actually in the 0-
100 member bracket? Someone may have figures. But small churches are resilient and
they play by different rules to large ones and they have amazing survival skills which are
often not available to large churches. I predict that many small UU churches will still be
flourishing long after many of the larger ones have died out.
I am reminded of a similar struggle in Pennsylvania during the first half of the nineteenth
century about how very well educated Unitarian ministers need to be. This is from an
unpublished paper of mine about James Kay the British Unitarian minister who settled at
Northumberland and rescued Priestley's chapel from oblivion.
Troubled by the lack of suitable ministers from Harvard he put forward a plan for
ministerial training after that of Robert Aspland's Unitarian Academy at Hackney, London
(1812-1818).
"It is not necessary that every minister should be a classical scholar" he wrote to The
Christian Examiner. "If one in ten of our ministers are deeply learned, it will be sufficient
for the honour and success of our cause." But as he wrote later to Harm Jan Huidekoper
"no one took any notice". So he lauded Huidekoper’s plan announced in I844 to open a
seminary at Meadville PA, looking to it for a greater good "than from our more learned
institution [Harvard] where so very few are preparing for the work of the ministry among
us."(Kay to Harm Jan Huidekoper 6 September 1844 Meadville/Lombard Theological
School Library Chicago IL)
Somewhere I read that more American churchgoers actually belong to small churches
than belong to large churches which is comforting to western Europeans where all
churches are small churches. I wonder what the interim minister Peggy refers to would
make of Great Britain where all Unitarian churches are in the 0-100 member bracket and
many in the 0-50 member bracket and some in the 0-25 member bracket. British Unitarian
churches increasingly rely upon lay ministry.
There is so much wrong with the idea that all ministers must be graduates of accredited
Theological Schools and be ordained by the denomination in order to minister to a
church. Lay ministers have always been a part of our denomination and still must be.
Small churches with no endowment and only a handful of members can't pay a big salary
for a properly credentialed minister. They need someone who can give them a shove and
perhaps help them get to the point where they can afford a minister with a larger
"portfolio". Whether the paid leaders of these churches are men or are women does not
enter into the controversy at all.
Bi-vocational ministers come in many stripes. I have personally known one who was city
manager of the town where he was minister, one who was a college instructor, one who
was a prison chaplain and one who was a hospital chaplain. Also there are senior
ministers of large churches who would like to go into semi-retirement at a small church as
minister. That has worked well for several churches that I am familiar with.
The Rev. Elaine Bomford of First Parish Church, Ashby Massachusetts has written of her
experience in this area. With her permission I quote her:
The subject "Small churches - well educated ministry" caught my eye, as I am a fairly well-
educated minister in a small church myself. I serve a congregation which hovers around
40 (relatively active) members. The First Parish Church of Ashby is in a rural area of
Massachusetts. The congregation has called ministers educated at Harvard for the
majority of its 221 years. Prior to Ashby, I served as a regular minister for a small (25
members and outdoor plumbing) old Universalist-rooted church situated near the
Connecticut River in New Hampshire. I have a great fondness and respect for the "family-
sized" congregation. I believe in the small congregation not as a means to an end (i.e., a
larger congregation), but as a blessed entity *as is.*
I have found that in small, rural, parish-oriented Unitarian and Universalist churches in
New England one can sense the history of the liberal movement, and in particular the two
separate streams of the Association in the U.S. The congregation's orientation is
generally towards the local community, rather than "Beacon Street," and there is
sometimes prejudice going both ways - folks in small churches often don't appreciate the
U.U.A. and vice versa, due to mutual irrelevance. That's a real loss for both entities, as I
see it. Obviously I do not agree that small congregations cannot successfully sustain a
professional ministry. That's why God created part-time. I think a lot about my
predecessors in this parish who divided their time
between ministry, farming and, no doubt, more study than I accomplish.(End of quote from
the Rev. Bomford)
There are many resources available for small churches.
New York State Convention of Universalists has grants and loans that are given out each
year to qualified applicants. See the information about this at: NYSCU.org
Smallchurch-min@lists.uua.org is a resource for ministers who pastor churches
of less than 150 members
smalltalk@lists.uua.org is a support list for small congregations where ministers, religious
educators, musicians, other staff, lay leaders and members can discuss the joys and
challenges of life in the small congregation
small talk newsletter@lists.uua.org is published 10 times a year. It includes articles,
resources and good ideas for churches of less than 150 members.
In looking over the many web sites, not UUA, which offer advice and suggestions for small
churches, I found one that particularly appealed to me. It is: bradboydston.
com/html/small_clustered.html
The name of the article at that site is “Small Clustered Multiplying Churches”
This article was not quite so pointed at Fundamentalist, Bible oriented churches as some
of the other articles are. Still the articles by more Orthodox Christians do contain some
nuggets of ideas that might be valuable for a Universalist (UU) church to try.
WHAT I WANT AND NEED IN A RELIGIOUS COMMUNITY
by John C. Morgan
For the first time in over thirty years, I don’t have to go to church on Sundays. I am
learning what Sunday, the Sabbath, is really about—resting one’s body and spirit to get
ready for the coming week. It might surprise some of you that most ministers don’t feel
they worship on Sundays since they are the ones in charge of the performance.
I realize it must sound rather paradoxical to hear the minister say he’d rather be home
reading a good book or taking a walk. I think it’s very important that I speak from first-
hand experience of what it feels like not to have to go to church. I’m not speaking now as
a minister who is supposed to be in church every Sunday. I’m speaking as one of millions
of people who don’t belong to any religious organization. .
It is a strange irony of life that I’ve been a minister for over two decades. I grew up the
son of a Presbyterian minister and would feign every sickness I could to avoid going to
Sunday School. I remember embarrassing my father once when I was asked by someone
after church if I wanted to be a minister like my father and both grandfathers. “No, I’m
going to work for a living when I grow up.” I have long regretted that comment after
learning just how time consuming and demanding ministry really is.
I know this must sound quite strange—a minister confessing he doesn’t need church to be
a spiritual person. I am reminded of others who reached the same conclusion: The
German Lutheran martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, before he died at the hands of the Nazis,
said he awaited the day of what he called a “religion-less Christianity,” one in which all the
outward forms of the church would collapse and nothing would remain for a community but
the presence of Jesus. The Unitarian minister and writer Ralph Waldo Emerson said he
preferred the silence before worship more than anything else. Henry David Thoreau
confided he often would hide Emerson’s hat on Sundays so the two of them could walk the
Concord woods instead of attending church services.
So for the first time in many years I am forced to rethink about what I want and need in a
religious community - not what I think others need.
Here is the paradox: I am finding that I need a spiritual community more than ever - not
the Brand X Sunday Only Church, but a dynamic, caring group of people who know me by
name and travel the same road I do. Being religious and being spiritual is not the same
thing. You can be religious by following all the rules, attending all the services, following
the requirements of your faith. But spirituality is more about the depth of living you are
doing—your connections to God and others.
I’ve had a lot of time lately to think about becoming part of a religious community. And I
have some things to say that you may never have heard a minister confess before, and
you probably won’t hear often again.
I really wouldn’t come to a church because the minister gave great sermons. Of course, if
the sermons were boring, I wouldn’t come back, either. I also wouldn’t come to church
because I liked the building. Too many churches suffer from what I call “the edifice
complex” - people putting most of their time and energy into raising money to keep the
roof from collapsing or the building heated.
Let me tell you why I would come to a spiritual community. I would come because I felt at
home. It’s something quite simple and almost indefinable - like knowing what house you
are going to purchase the minute you walk through the door.
A few weeks ago I attended a service at a church I might never have attended. But the
music was fantastic. I didn’t have to read one verse ahead to see if I agreed with the
words - I just sang my heart out. And as we sang the old benediction - “God be with you
‘til we meet again” - I found tears in my eyes and a deep sense of peace. Maybe that’s
just because in the last eighteen months I’ve lost a sister, a niece, a sister-in-law, and just
recently my stepmother. I needed comforting.
I would also appreciate a place where I could take my time to grow up spiritually. Would it
surprise you that after two master’s degrees and a doctorate from a Lutheran Seminary, I
have come to the place in my life where I don’t know much at all, but know this much - I
need people around me who want to grow. I wouldn’t care if the community were six
people or six thousand. Size is not a measure of spiritual depth.
I want a place where my soul can sing - that’s the bottom line, the real measure of a
spiritual community. I want a spiritual community that has heart and spirit. My soul sings
when I am touched by music or poetry or people who are gentle or who care about each
other and the world around them. I want a religious community to care about and nurture
the feeding of souls.
I know many of you trust the old saying: “Seeing is believing.” I want to reverse that
saying and suggest that when in comes to how you see the world, “believing is seeing.”
Every person has a paradigm or model in their heads of what things should be—whether it’
s a relationship, a job or a church. You may not even realize you carry such a model in
your minds, but I am convinced you do. In this way, “believing is seeing.”
I know what we are told about being a “successful” church: it has over 500 members, a
million-dollar budget, a new suburban edifice with land to spare, and a staff that can meet
every need. That’s one paradigm or model.
I have a very different paradigm or model for what I want and need in a spiritual
community. I want a religious community to be high in relationships, low in institutional
maintenance, and deep in theology and service to others.
I want a religious community low in institutional maintenance, where people don’t spend
the greater part of their time raising money to pay ministers or fix the buildings, but where
everyone pitches their to help, where ministry is not about a professional providing
services to clients but where everyone ministers to one another, where gifts are honored
and used, whether it is playing the piano, leading a study group, or putting chairs away
after a service.
And I want a religious community that is deep in theology, where you can be a pilgrim and
not just a passing tourist, where you can wrestle with life’s great meaning with others.
Too many congregations take Jesus’ first miracle in Cana - turning water into wine -and
reverse it: they turn the wine back into water. Maybe it is time for the Spirit to move in
our midst, turning the water back into wine once again.
(John C. Morgan has been a Unitarian Universalist minister in America for twenty-five
years. He is now a newspaper columnist and writer.)
Universalism Today - Reflections of a Traveling Universalist
by Kalen Fristad (This article appeared in the September/ October 2006 issue of the
UNIVERSALIST HERALD)
Where Have All The Universalists Gone?
by Ken R. Vincent (This article appeared in the Janurary/Feburary 2006 issue of the
UNIVERSALIST HERALD)
Additional Page Contents:
Believing the Future In.
by John Morgan
Young Adult Workshop at 2006 Convocation
by John Lapoint
Small Churches and Trained Ministers
by Peggy Rawheiser
WHAT I WANT AND NEED IN A RELIGIOUS COMMUNITY
by John C. Morgan
________________________________________________________
Believing the Future In.
by John Morgan
Some years ago a Maine friend asked me to take a ride with him down the road. He said
he had a surprise awaiting me. About twenty minutes later, I spotted the white church
steeple in the distance as we got closer to the building situated near the intersection of
three highways.
As we got out of the car, he pointed to a marker which read: “Universalist Church.”
Some of the paint was peeling, bringing to mind the story of another old New England
church in the same plight, in which cost conscious members had put water in the white
paint to make it go further. Of course, the paint wore off quickly, until a voice burst out of
the heavens one day: “Repaint and thin no more!”
The door to this old building was locked. There were cobwebs across a window. But I
noticed the grass had been cut recently, which gave me some hope that someone knew
something.
Stopping in a country store, we learned that the person who maintained the building was a
dairy farmer who lived “down the road a piece.” Sure enough, five miles later, we found
the farm and the farmer. She was thrilled that someone was interested in the building
since she had been a member for years.
When I asked her about its history, she told a story that probably could be repeated many
times over. After the merger or consolidation of Universalism and Unitarianism some
decades ago, church membership had dwindled. She said she just couldn’t sell the
building so she kept it going, noting that the only time it was used was for a few weddings
and an annual meeting.
“But if you’re the last Universalist in town, why hold an annual meeting?” With a twinkle in
her eye and a steady Maine accent, she didn’t miss a beat in responding:
“Well, I try to keep our status as a church and it requires an annual meeting. I’m the only
one there.” I joked that it must be easy making decisions. “Not always,” she said;
“sometimes I don’t agree with myself.”
Now I’ve heard all the stories about leading Unitarian Universalists is a little like “herding
cats,” or, better yet, “wrestling alligators,” but I think this may have been the best story I’ve
encountered about why making collective decisions is so difficult among such rugged
individualists. In any case, she gave us the key to front door so we could look for
ourselves.
I still remember brushing cobwebs from my face as we entered the space. Old hymnals,
some of them still open on the pews, were arranged neatly as if expecting churchgoers
any moment. There was an old pump organ up front, with the hymn numbers still listed for
the last Sunday service, probably decades ago. As I went up to the pulpit, I found the
Bible opened to what might have been the last sermon text from the Book of Jeremiah:
“Truly they have loved to wander; they have not restrained their feet; therefore the Lord
does not accept them” (14:10).
In a strange way, this small and now closed building symbolized far too many others I have
seen over my journeys as a new congregation organizer or minister—some closed due to
lack of faith, others not started for the same reason.
It is true that people come and go as communities change over time. I once estimated the
demographic center of the Unitarian Universalist movement was heading south and west a
few map inches every year until one day Nashville, not Boston, might become the
statistical center. But I don’t think it’s entirely demographics that shape a movement; it
also is vision, or the lack thereof, the unwilling to share the faith for which early
Universalists paid such high prices.
I also recalled Jeremiah’s story. Before the fall and exile of his people, Jeremiah bought a
plot of ground to symbolize his hope for the future. Robert Frost once wrote of the
American founders that they did not believe in the future; they believed the future in. It’s
the same principle at work in vital, growing religious movements.
If I had the opportunity to preach one last time in that Maine church, I think I would have
used another text from the Book of Jeremiah: “Set up road markers for yourself; make
yourself guideposts; consider well the highway, the road by which you came.”
And I would have added, “consider also the road ahead.”
A polite generic religion is not enough to sustain or build a deeply spiritual community. It
takes vision, courage, and a willingness to share a heartfelt faith.
John Morgan is a contributing editor for the Herald. Before retiring from parish ministry,he
was a new congregation or extension minister. He now teaches philosophy and ethics at
a community college.
Young Adult Workshop at 2006 Convocation
by John Lapoint
On the weekend of May 5th through the 7th, Universalist Convocation met at Our Home
Universalist Church in Ellisville, Mississippi. On May the 6th, together with my father, the
Rev. Justin Lapoint, I led a workshop called “Faith Without Works is Dead,” a forum on
what we can do to get young adults into the Universalist movement. It was noted that
Sunday School programs in Universalist churches are dying and that Universalist
churches have trouble recruiting and keeping young adults.
Problems that were mentioned included that older adults in the movement don’t always
treat younger adults as adults, that services held in Universalist churches aren’t always
relevant to young adults, that young adults have an aversion to organized religion, that
young adults move around a lot and don’t settle in one church, and that young adults
aren’t always free on Sunday morning. A solution that was suggested was to have events
on either Wednesday night or Sunday afternoon, that they be held somewhere other than
a church building, and that programs contain music and religious and non-religious
components. It was suggested that programs be spiritually filling and livelier. Many
individuals come to Universalist conclusions from their own study of religion and the Bible,
but do not join the movement for fear of being part of an organized religion.
Publicity and advertising were also discussed. While television and internet advertising
were discussed, it was decided that word of mouth advertising was most effective.
We discussed how to integrate young people into Universalist churches. One suggestion
was for churches to minister to the whole person. Another was to practice spirituality
through action related service, commitment to a cause, and involvement in work camps. A
third suggestion was to hold a coffee house type event either at the church or at a less
formal locale, on a Wednesday or Sunday night, and have a talent show where young
adults can read poetry or prose, perform music, and show off other talent.
After the convocation was over, I talked with Justin Lapoint, Barry Whitamore and Don
Outlaw about ways to get more young adults to attend Convo. We all agreed that we need
to take a serious look at the entertainment we book for Convo to make sure it’s something
that would interest young adults. We believe more contemporary music is needed.
Another idea was to have a break Saturday afternoon so people can recuperate from the
beginning of Convo.
When asked what he thought, my father, Justin Lapoint, had this to say, “Our Young Adult
Workshop created a good deal of food for thought. If Universalists are to draw young
adults to our churches and to Convocation, we older adults need to modify our programs
both in terms of style and substance.”
Small Churches and Trained Ministers
By Peggy Rawheiser
(There has been much conversation and discussion about small churches in our
denomination. The Universalist Convocation 2005, held in Eldorado, Ohio, had as its
theme “Land & People, The Future of Rural Ministry.” There was a workshop on “Circuit
Riders and Preaching Stations” conducted by the Rev. Wells Behee. There also was a
Panel Discussion “Bi-Vocational Ministry and Rural Churches.” This panel was made up
of three ministers who have experience in this type of ministry. They were the Rev. Dr.
Vernon Chandler, Pastor Derek Parker and the Rev. Kat Hawbaker. There is a place for
ministry to small congregations with ministers shared by two or more churches or by the
minister having another vocation in the area of the church. Our history is full of examples
of this type of ministry.)
In a sermon in 1994 at the Asheville UU Church, The Rev. Dan McCurry of Chicago, said,
“When it was discussed that the Inman Chapel Church was about to expire, the monied
Yankee Universalists believed that southern churches should be supported only in those
urban areas with a steady financial base.”
Recently an Interim minister in one of our small Universalist churches has said that it is
her view that the small Universalist Churches should be allowed to die. The level of
theological education has been under discussion in this same church. She tried to push
the congregation to change the by laws to require that any minister hired to serve that
church be a properly ordained UU minister. Fortunately the change to the by laws was
not voted upon.
There has been a discussion of the advantages of small churches on the UU Historical
Society Chat Group. The views of one of our cousins from the United Kingdom, Andrew
Hill, are of interest to us. I quote with his permission.
Small Churches are to be desired. The future is great because small is beautiful and
sustainable! There are British Unitarian churches which yesterday were almost dead but
which today are flourishing.
On a more general level, the life of British Unitarian churches cannot be separated from
the life of organized religion in Western Europe as a whole. It rises and falls with the tide
and the church involvement tide has been falling for many years and continues to fall. No
one quite understands why although the sociologists of religion hazard guesses. It is said
that a French Catholic farmer arriving at the railway station in Paris becomes a secular
person as soon as he puts his feet on the station platform.
On the other hand the Western European looks at North American church life and asks
"Why do so many people go to church?" Sociologist’s hazard guesses as to why - identity
with ethnic origins, the need for religious education, high mobility and finding new friends,
also the conservative mega churches which are major players in the US power game.
Thank goodness that in Western Europe, we don't have mega churches to contend with!
Western European politicians who mention God lose votes. Denmark couples Europe's
lowest prison population with Europe's lowest church involvement figures.
That said, US church involvement levels are falling - I read a figure of 25% of the US
population recently. Also a great many UU churches and fellowships are actually in the 0-
100 member bracket? Someone may have figures. But small churches are resilient and
they play by different rules to large ones and they have amazing survival skills which are
often not available to large churches. I predict that many small UU churches will still be
flourishing long after many of the larger ones have died out.
I am reminded of a similar struggle in Pennsylvania during the first half of the nineteenth
century about how very well educated Unitarian ministers need to be. This is from an
unpublished paper of mine about James Kay the British Unitarian minister who settled at
Northumberland and rescued Priestley's chapel from oblivion.
Troubled by the lack of suitable ministers from Harvard he put forward a plan for
ministerial training after that of Robert Aspland's Unitarian Academy at Hackney, London
(1812-1818).
"It is not necessary that every minister should be a classical scholar" he wrote to The
Christian Examiner. "If one in ten of our ministers are deeply learned, it will be sufficient
for the honour and success of our cause." But as he wrote later to Harm Jan Huidekoper
"no one took any notice". So he lauded Huidekoper’s plan announced in I844 to open a
seminary at Meadville PA, looking to it for a greater good "than from our more learned
institution [Harvard] where so very few are preparing for the work of the ministry among
us."(Kay to Harm Jan Huidekoper 6 September 1844 Meadville/Lombard Theological
School Library Chicago IL)
Somewhere I read that more American churchgoers actually belong to small churches
than belong to large churches which is comforting to western Europeans where all
churches are small churches. I wonder what the interim minister Peggy refers to would
make of Great Britain where all Unitarian churches are in the 0-100 member bracket and
many in the 0-50 member bracket and some in the 0-25 member bracket. British Unitarian
churches increasingly rely upon lay ministry.
There is so much wrong with the idea that all ministers must be graduates of accredited
Theological Schools and be ordained by the denomination in order to minister to a
church. Lay ministers have always been a part of our denomination and still must be.
Small churches with no endowment and only a handful of members can't pay a big salary
for a properly credentialed minister. They need someone who can give them a shove and
perhaps help them get to the point where they can afford a minister with a larger
"portfolio". Whether the paid leaders of these churches are men or are women does not
enter into the controversy at all.
Bi-vocational ministers come in many stripes. I have personally known one who was city
manager of the town where he was minister, one who was a college instructor, one who
was a prison chaplain and one who was a hospital chaplain. Also there are senior
ministers of large churches who would like to go into semi-retirement at a small church as
minister. That has worked well for several churches that I am familiar with.
The Rev. Elaine Bomford of First Parish Church, Ashby Massachusetts has written of her
experience in this area. With her permission I quote her:
The subject "Small churches - well educated ministry" caught my eye, as I am a fairly well-
educated minister in a small church myself. I serve a congregation which hovers around
40 (relatively active) members. The First Parish Church of Ashby is in a rural area of
Massachusetts. The congregation has called ministers educated at Harvard for the
majority of its 221 years. Prior to Ashby, I served as a regular minister for a small (25
members and outdoor plumbing) old Universalist-rooted church situated near the
Connecticut River in New Hampshire. I have a great fondness and respect for the "family-
sized" congregation. I believe in the small congregation not as a means to an end (i.e., a
larger congregation), but as a blessed entity *as is.*
I have found that in small, rural, parish-oriented Unitarian and Universalist churches in
New England one can sense the history of the liberal movement, and in particular the two
separate streams of the Association in the U.S. The congregation's orientation is
generally towards the local community, rather than "Beacon Street," and there is
sometimes prejudice going both ways - folks in small churches often don't appreciate the
U.U.A. and vice versa, due to mutual irrelevance. That's a real loss for both entities, as I
see it. Obviously I do not agree that small congregations cannot successfully sustain a
professional ministry. That's why God created part-time. I think a lot about my
predecessors in this parish who divided their time
between ministry, farming and, no doubt, more study than I accomplish.(End of quote from
the Rev. Bomford)
There are many resources available for small churches.
New York State Convention of Universalists has grants and loans that are given out each
year to qualified applicants. See the information about this at: NYSCU.org
Smallchurch-min@lists.uua.org is a resource for ministers who pastor churches
of less than 150 members
smalltalk@lists.uua.org is a support list for small congregations where ministers, religious
educators, musicians, other staff, lay leaders and members can discuss the joys and
challenges of life in the small congregation
small talk newsletter@lists.uua.org is published 10 times a year. It includes articles,
resources and good ideas for churches of less than 150 members.
In looking over the many web sites, not UUA, which offer advice and suggestions for small
churches, I found one that particularly appealed to me. It is: bradboydston.
com/html/small_clustered.html
The name of the article at that site is “Small Clustered Multiplying Churches”
This article was not quite so pointed at Fundamentalist, Bible oriented churches as some
of the other articles are. Still the articles by more Orthodox Christians do contain some
nuggets of ideas that might be valuable for a Universalist (UU) church to try.
WHAT I WANT AND NEED IN A RELIGIOUS COMMUNITY
by John C. Morgan
For the first time in over thirty years, I don’t have to go to church on Sundays. I am
learning what Sunday, the Sabbath, is really about—resting one’s body and spirit to get
ready for the coming week. It might surprise some of you that most ministers don’t feel
they worship on Sundays since they are the ones in charge of the performance.
I realize it must sound rather paradoxical to hear the minister say he’d rather be home
reading a good book or taking a walk. I think it’s very important that I speak from first-
hand experience of what it feels like not to have to go to church. I’m not speaking now as
a minister who is supposed to be in church every Sunday. I’m speaking as one of millions
of people who don’t belong to any religious organization. .
It is a strange irony of life that I’ve been a minister for over two decades. I grew up the
son of a Presbyterian minister and would feign every sickness I could to avoid going to
Sunday School. I remember embarrassing my father once when I was asked by someone
after church if I wanted to be a minister like my father and both grandfathers. “No, I’m
going to work for a living when I grow up.” I have long regretted that comment after
learning just how time consuming and demanding ministry really is.
I know this must sound quite strange—a minister confessing he doesn’t need church to be
a spiritual person. I am reminded of others who reached the same conclusion: The
German Lutheran martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, before he died at the hands of the Nazis,
said he awaited the day of what he called a “religion-less Christianity,” one in which all the
outward forms of the church would collapse and nothing would remain for a community but
the presence of Jesus. The Unitarian minister and writer Ralph Waldo Emerson said he
preferred the silence before worship more than anything else. Henry David Thoreau
confided he often would hide Emerson’s hat on Sundays so the two of them could walk the
Concord woods instead of attending church services.
So for the first time in many years I am forced to rethink about what I want and need in a
religious community - not what I think others need.
Here is the paradox: I am finding that I need a spiritual community more than ever - not
the Brand X Sunday Only Church, but a dynamic, caring group of people who know me by
name and travel the same road I do. Being religious and being spiritual is not the same
thing. You can be religious by following all the rules, attending all the services, following
the requirements of your faith. But spirituality is more about the depth of living you are
doing—your connections to God and others.
I’ve had a lot of time lately to think about becoming part of a religious community. And I
have some things to say that you may never have heard a minister confess before, and
you probably won’t hear often again.
I really wouldn’t come to a church because the minister gave great sermons. Of course, if
the sermons were boring, I wouldn’t come back, either. I also wouldn’t come to church
because I liked the building. Too many churches suffer from what I call “the edifice
complex” - people putting most of their time and energy into raising money to keep the
roof from collapsing or the building heated.
Let me tell you why I would come to a spiritual community. I would come because I felt at
home. It’s something quite simple and almost indefinable - like knowing what house you
are going to purchase the minute you walk through the door.
A few weeks ago I attended a service at a church I might never have attended. But the
music was fantastic. I didn’t have to read one verse ahead to see if I agreed with the
words - I just sang my heart out. And as we sang the old benediction - “God be with you
‘til we meet again” - I found tears in my eyes and a deep sense of peace. Maybe that’s
just because in the last eighteen months I’ve lost a sister, a niece, a sister-in-law, and just
recently my stepmother. I needed comforting.
I would also appreciate a place where I could take my time to grow up spiritually. Would it
surprise you that after two master’s degrees and a doctorate from a Lutheran Seminary, I
have come to the place in my life where I don’t know much at all, but know this much - I
need people around me who want to grow. I wouldn’t care if the community were six
people or six thousand. Size is not a measure of spiritual depth.
I want a place where my soul can sing - that’s the bottom line, the real measure of a
spiritual community. I want a spiritual community that has heart and spirit. My soul sings
when I am touched by music or poetry or people who are gentle or who care about each
other and the world around them. I want a religious community to care about and nurture
the feeding of souls.
I know many of you trust the old saying: “Seeing is believing.” I want to reverse that
saying and suggest that when in comes to how you see the world, “believing is seeing.”
Every person has a paradigm or model in their heads of what things should be—whether it’
s a relationship, a job or a church. You may not even realize you carry such a model in
your minds, but I am convinced you do. In this way, “believing is seeing.”
I know what we are told about being a “successful” church: it has over 500 members, a
million-dollar budget, a new suburban edifice with land to spare, and a staff that can meet
every need. That’s one paradigm or model.
I have a very different paradigm or model for what I want and need in a spiritual
community. I want a religious community to be high in relationships, low in institutional
maintenance, and deep in theology and service to others.
I want a religious community low in institutional maintenance, where people don’t spend
the greater part of their time raising money to pay ministers or fix the buildings, but where
everyone pitches their to help, where ministry is not about a professional providing
services to clients but where everyone ministers to one another, where gifts are honored
and used, whether it is playing the piano, leading a study group, or putting chairs away
after a service.
And I want a religious community that is deep in theology, where you can be a pilgrim and
not just a passing tourist, where you can wrestle with life’s great meaning with others.
Too many congregations take Jesus’ first miracle in Cana - turning water into wine -and
reverse it: they turn the wine back into water. Maybe it is time for the Spirit to move in
our midst, turning the water back into wine once again.
(John C. Morgan has been a Unitarian Universalist minister in America for twenty-five
years. He is now a newspaper columnist and writer.)
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