The North District in the Desert Southwest Annual Conference has seen a turnaround in the last three years. Prior to that time the largest grouping of churches in the district were declining, the next grouping was plateaued and the smallest grouping was growing. Now the reverse is true.
Major elections serve many purposes in addition to the obvious electing
of individuals to public service positions. In addition to the
political ramifications, they tend to accentuate issues which are of
concern to the voters. A corollary observation is that one can observe
which issues are not making the headlines.
The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection (aka..COR) just completed their annual leadership conference. This church was a new start in 1990 and now has weekly attendance well above 6000 people. They are glad to share their story with other churches and church leaders in hopes that they will experience new vitality in their ministries.
Within the congregational development community, a commonly held view
is that starting new churches is the most effective means of evangelism
today.
A recent GCFA posting noted that preliminary analysis of the 2005 General
Minutes data shows a membership decline in the USA of just over 1% and an
attendance decline of 1.63%.
Pro-active mainline church leaders are known to watch the cultural and religious trends with an eye toward discerning anything applicable to their own context. As the mainlines continue to decline, new, relevant ministry approaches are sought.
Congregational Development experts have long maintained that the most effective means of evangelism for denominations is to start effective new churches. This was again affirmed by a select group of United Methodist congregational development staffers from many conferences.
Economics is known as the dismal science. Working with United Methodist statistics can often seem that way as well. The last two issues of this newsletter certainly feel that way. Last month discussed a possible tipping point where church finances could be close to a serious downturn, with one factor cited being the anticipated loss of aging members. This issue will look more closely at the age distribution of the denomination.
Tipping point is a term which has become increasingly common. It describes a
situation which has seemed to be relatively stable and/or slowly changing,
but which suddenly experiences very rapid, even dramatic change.
This annual edition of this newsletter is really no new news. 2004 United Methodist statistics followed the same pattern they have been in recent years. Membership showed the same characteristics of the past nearly four decades.
Hartford Seminary does much impressive research. Their latest published findings pertain to that significant and growing part of the Protestant landscape in America. The next section of this newsletter will be a summary Hartford does of their findings, followed by some Research Office observations of UMC megachurches.
As we begin the new year, we have been inundated with media coverage of the
past year and prognostication for what lies ahead. This is a reasonable
thing to do. One might ask this of the mainline church, as well. What can we
expect in the coming year and beyond?
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