Nancy Proctor, from the UU Congregation of the Outer Banks in Kitty Hawk, NC, and chair of the TJD Growth and Development Council, recently compiled this information about small congregation growth. And although it focuses on small congregation growth, most of the information is applicable to congregations of any size.

This is probably the best place to start if you want to see what the latest research shows as to why churches grow.
FACTs on Growth

This is an article about small congregations and growth:
A Saving Remnant: Vitality in Small Congregations

This is a very large pdf file but has lots of good information on growing members on the UUA website:
The Membership Journey

To learn more about your community:

If there is a Episcopal Church in your zipcode go to:
Studying Your Congregation and Community

If there is a Nazarene Church in your area go to:
Neighborhood Demographics Reports

My colleague in Central Midwest District, Ian Ivanson, posted a valuable interview with a marketing consultant, Mike Murschel, who has been working with some of the congregations in that district. I thought you might find it interesting. This article is available on the CMWD website: Some Marketing Basics. Mike Murschel also has created a great listing of free marketing resource for the Chicagoland Marketing Initiative for the Chicago Area Unitarian Universalist Council: Chicagoland Marketing Marketing Initiative Materials and Resources. Although some of it is specific to Chicago, most of it is adapatable to any setting.

I believe that it is the role of our congregations to, first, help new people connect with members of the congregation, secondly, to help them understand Unitarian Universalism and deepen and clarify their faith, and thirdly, to help them put their faith into action by serving the world. If you see this as your mission with new members of your congregation, I would recommend that you become intentional about how you bring people into this incredible faith. Having a plan for what happens after someone joins your congregation can result in developing a life-long UU, rather than one that burns out and leaves us after two or three years. Whether you are from an emerging congregation or a well-developed one, I encourage you to develop a program that moves people through the steps of connecting, deepening, and serving. The following three programs make a great way for new members to spend their first year in your congregation:

Evensong- this eight-week small group ministry program designed to help congregation members make lasting connections with one another. It includes Weekly worship services designed for groups of 10 to 20. Each service includes singing, readings and discussion. Participants in this program are invited to share thoughts, experiences, doubts and religious beliefs. Evensong is a wonderful way for members to get to know each other at a deeper level and to help them clarify their beliefs.

•   Evensong 1
•   Evensong  2
•   Evensong for Families

A Chosen Faith by former UUA President, the Reverend John Buehrens, the minister of All Souls Unitarian Church in New York City, the Reverend Forrester Church. Use the online discussion guide to delve deeper into what Unitarian Universalism is all about.

•   A Chosen Faith
•   A Chosen Faith Online Study Guide

Weaving the Fabric of Diversity - this eight-week course delves into the hallmark of Unitarian Universalism social justice work with an exploration of embracing diversity: racism, heterosexism, ableism, classism and ageism.

•   Weaving the Fabric of Diversity

(Thanks to The Reverend Susan Smith, District Executive in the Southwestern Conference for these wonderful suggestions)

UU University is a invaluable gathering of congregational leaders that takes place immediately before General Assembly. The theme speaker for the third annual UU University will be the Rev. Dr. Nick Carter, President of Andover Newton Theological School. Dr. Carter will be working with us on how to lead through the borderlands of difference that naturally occur in a context of diversity: diversity of thought, diversity of opinions, diversity of theologies, diversity of any kind. I strongly encourage you to consider making UU University and General Assembly 2008 as part of your summer plans.

For a quick preview, take a minute and half watch this YouTube video:

Invitation to UU University in June 2008 

and then visit UU University on the UUA website for more information and to register.

Tonight’s webcast focused on models of congregational governance and the role of boards in congregations. We explored the John Carver Model of Policy Governance, along with several other governance models. In addition, we looked at accountability in congregations and ways to move a board from a micro-managing board to a generative board that is asking the visionary questions.

I’ve posted a PowerPoint version of the presentation, along with a PDF version of the slides for those who prefer to review the presentation that way.

• Congregational Governance - PowerPoint Presentation
• Congregational Governance - PDF version

You can view the entire webcast from this link: Congregational Governance Webcast. Click the big right-arrow in the center of the first slide to run the webcast. You might have to scroll a bit to see it all. The Webcast runs about 70 minutes.

Making sure that your congregation has good practices in place in regard to hiring is one of the most important things a board can do in a congregation. Even people who are not specifically hired to work with children and youth, still interface with them. Your safe congregation policy should include specific plans to conduct criminal background checks on all employees, regardless of their role. You can find out more about conducting background checks and get some recommendations for companies to use by visiting the UUA web site page on Responsible Staffing.

Nancy Heege, District Executive in the Praire Star District, has posted some great information about a new resource for small congregations. Big Ideas for Small Congregations - a new resource! « Nancy’s Views on the Landscape

One of the top questions I receive from congregational leaders is about Committees on Ministry (COM). The following resources are good guides to get started as you organize or reorganize your COM. The UUA has developed two valuable references:

Assessing Our Leadership (PDF) was published in June 2001, and offers ideas on developing and implementing a process for the ongoing evaluation of a congregation’s leadership, both clergy and lay.

The companion tool, Congregational Self-Assessment (PDF), helps congregations take a careful look at their overall ministry.

Other COM resources:

Growing a Practice of Shared Ministry: The learning and teaching work of Committees on Ministry by Beverly Sadownick Smrha, District Consultant, Pacific Central District of the Unitarian Universalist Association

You can also find a useful tool in the The UUA Congregational Handbook for conducting an annual assessment of the congregation’s ministry (Annual Review of a Congregation).

An article in the UUA’s Leader’s Library addresses COM’s:
Committes on Minister Not Just For the Minister

Mid-South District offers a great overview of COM’s in this workshop handout:
So what does a Committee on Minister do?

In my January 15, 2008 web seminar, I presented an assessment tool developed by Curtiss Paul DeYoung, Professor of Reconciliation Studies, at Bethel University, in St. Paul, Minnesota that is designed to help a congregation assess its readiness in becoming a multi-racial, multi-cultural congregation. I’ve posted a copy of the tool and more details about the tool in the PowerPoint presentation from the seminar.

• Building Multi-Racial, Multi-Cultural Congregations - PowerPoint presentation
• Authentic Multiracial Congregation Assessment

You can view the entire webcast from this link: Building Multi-Racial, Multi-Cultural Congregations Webcast. Click the big right-arrow in the center of the first slide to run the webcast. You might have to scroll a bit to see it all. The Webcast runs about 45 minutes.

As I travel around the Thomas Jefferson District of the UUA, I can’t help but reflect on the impact Thomas Jefferson had and continues to have on our lives. Despite all the controversy that surrounds him, I am grateful for the vision that he had and his dogged determination in making that vision a reality. I know I am privileged to live in this country, to be free, and, even as a lesbian, to have some basic human rights. Recently, I reread Forester Church’s article that was published in the UU World last year at this time, “What would Jefferson and Adams do?” I have always looked to Adams as the true Unitarian, the one who was faithful to his values, the one as Church describes of Jefferson, did not “anesthetize his conscience,” the one, in other words, who did not keep slaves. And yet, if it had been left up to Adams, we might well be living in a Christian state, where religion and governance would be irrevocably intertwined.  Adams rethought this position later in his life and was able to reflect on how this view probably cost him a second term as president. But, were it not for Jefferson, his flawed thinking came dangerously close to changing our lives beyond measure.               

When I moved to the Thomas Jefferson District, the controversy surrounding the district’s name was not news to me. I didn’t know all the details but I knew a name change was considered at one time and that congregations in the district voted to retain the name. And I knew about the controversy surrounding the 1993 General Assembly and the Thomas Jefferson Ball. That was my first General Assembly and it quickly catapulted me into issues of racism within the Association. It was also my first encounter with the Reverend Hope Johnson, the courageous woman of African descent whom I am now proud to call my friend. In considering the suggestion by the GA Planning Committee to dress in costumes of the period, Hope asked of the General Assembly, and I paraphrase, “what would you have us wear? Rags and chains?” Her question sent chills down my spine as it immediately forced me to rethink whether, in becoming a UU only a few months earlier, I had only been fooled again, fooled into believing that UUs were people who truly lived their values.  How could we be who we said we were when we could cause such hurt to those among us?

And yet later that day, when I stood at the bottom of the escalator with the drummers who were respectfully protesting the Thomas Jefferson ball, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was a faith community I wanted to be part of. I knew that this was a faith community where people of courage speak their minds even when it cuts deep into their souls because in this community lives a glimmer of hope, a flicker in the darkness, that what they say matters. It is that hope that guides me every day in my work.

To learn more about this General Assembly and the impact it had on two of the key players in this controversay, the Reverend Hope Johnson and former TJD President, the Reverend Barbro Hansson, attend the TJD’s Anti-Racism Conference, February 29 and March 1, 2008, in Winston-Salem.

As I’ve traveled around the district these past two years, I have been surprised to learn how unsettled the question of the name is - it continues to bubble up in all kinds of conversations. And in fact, at last year’s General Assembly in Portland, at the workshop called Breaking the Silence: Truth, Reconciliation & Racial Justice, led by President Bill Sinkford, an African American man from Maryland asked how the UUA can even begin to talk about reconciliation and racial justice when it has a district named after a slaveholder. I spent a few minutes with this man after the workshop and let him know that discussions continued in our district about the name but that it was really up to the congregations to change it. Not a very satisfying answer, I’m sure, but the only answer I could give.

As a staff member in the district, it is not appropriate for me to take a position on whether we change or retain the name of our district. That is for our congregations to decide. At their Fall 2007 meeting, the TJ District Board decided that congregations will have another chance to decide this important question at the TJD 2009 Annual Meeting. Between now and then, I will pray that the delegates remember the glimmer of hope that so many UUs hold on to that keeps them from leaving our faith — the hope that, in this faith community, being in right relationship with all people actually matters.

Especially if you are in the Thomas Jefferson District, I invite your comments.