Church Development
Catastrophic Congregational Development
By Office of Research, GBGM

October 2005 Volume 17, No. 10
Background Data for Mission

A unique crucible in the study of congregational development is before us. After hurricanes Katrina and Rita hammered the Gulf Coast, massive damage and dislocation took place, including United Methodist churches and church folk. Upon going to the website of the Louisiana Annual Conference, one can find pastors and churches impacted by Katrina listed. Of these (at the time of this writing), 8 are listed as under water or the like, 15 more had water damage, some heavy, 4 more damaged severely, and several others impacted in various ways. While many others are operational, they are not open. The good news is that all 91 New Orleans pastors have been placed, including in other conferences. The big challenge is what to do with New Orleans as it repopulates. Here we see congregational development stretched to new dimensions.

When asked about his approach, Steve Stephens, Director of Congregational Development for Louisiana Annual Conference, noted that "On the day after Katrina, I started to think about how the church will respond. I thought of the diaspora and realized that a significant percentage of the population of New Orleans will most likely not return." This is a situation unparalleled in recent US history. We have a highly populated area with a whole district' s worth of established United Methodist churches now depopulated, with no certainty of who will come back. Only some of the church folk may return and there is no solid sense of who else might repopulate. What becomes of the churches still operational, not to mention the severely damaged ones? What leadership will be deployed there? Louisiana is seriously grappling with these issues and is being proactive in their approach. They may be able to teach us all as they progress.

One of the first conclusions reached was that the process would be one of new congregational development rather than what is commonly called re-development. In other words, the focus would not be to simply reopen existing churches as they were with the hope of them being vital going forward. In some cases, this would be impossible since building and people are not as they were. As Steve Stephens puts it, "before we begin to assess viability of existing congregations, I believe we need a theological and practical rationale for new congregational development in New Orleans. What is our purpose? Why do we need to change our current approach? How is this new development a part of God's plan? If we begin to assess churches before they have an idea of where we are headed, it will seem legalistic and perhaps even punitive. Thus our case for a new approach needs to be discussed with interested parties before we make a pronouncement."

The next step in the process being used by Louisiana is to evaluate the situation of those churches which still have enough there, both in property and congregations, to continue. Several measures have been employed so far to determine viability. Evaluating viability is not a new concept, nor is there a widely recognized means of doing so. Much discussion swirls around various approaches to this task. Louisiana has developed six or seven categories and has rated each church on them. Questions asked include, does the church pay the pastor's health insurance, is the pastor full time, is salary at or above minimum, are apportionments paid, have sufficient numbers of new members been added, has worship attendance improved, and is building insurance up to date? These questions are not definitive but informative.

An additional perspective used during this phase involves analyzing those churches which may not have future viability. Included in these are those most damaged and whose neighborhoods are most decimated, as well as those which were weak before the hurricanes, though not as impacted by them. Demographics of the communities prior to Katrina were obtained and estimates done on how many folks might repopulate the areas. Then the question of how many churches might best serve the repopulated area was addressed in conjunction with various levels of repopulation. For example, if one area had 25% return, three to six churches might be needed. If 40% repopulate then five to nine might be appropriate, and so forth.

Next, each functional church needs to develop a ministry action plan. This is a strategic document designed to capture vision, mission, goals, and a plan to get there. Materials were provided to assist in this process. Steve notes, "I think it is important to ask: What will you do in response to this crisis/opportunity for ministry and let them come up with a strategy first. This is the more subjective side of assessment."

After these are completed, the conference and other strategists invited to be part of the process work through development of vision/mission and ultimately a strategic plan for the whole area. Questions asked during the strategic planning include, "What will be our discipleship system? How will we build belonging community? What kind of resources (people and money) will we need? What is our timeline for new church starts?" Regarding the latter question, Steve Stephens notes, "Timeline will depend on re-development schedule in the city. However, I believe we should identify pastors for new starts, train them and prepare to appoint some of them to new starts in New Orleans no later than January of 2007, with launches around Easter or Labor Day 2007. If we have at least 2 new starts at that time, they can daughter new congregations as the population grows."

All this is very preliminary and may have changed significantly by the time this newsletter is distributed. The whole situation is obviously fluid and the planning for congregational development is a work in progress, as well as the approach to doing so. Several facets of this process may be useful in non-catastrophic settings. (Actually, as one seasoned congregational development staffer commented, the decline in our denomination is catastrophic.) The basic concept of developing a strategic, or comprehensive, plan for a region or conference is valuable in all settings. Under girding the plan with vitality assessment of existing churches is a key component of planning, as well. Existing churches would all benefit from developing a Ministry Action Plan, or MAP. Various resources exist to help this process. The General Board of Discipleship now has a fine tool called the L3 Incubator.

We can be sure that the conferences impacted by the hurricanes all desire our prayers, as well as various forms of provision. Let's watch them closely and supportively as we try to learn from their congregational development in coming months.

©2005 Published by the Office of Research of the General Board of Global Ministries 475 Riverside Drive, Room 300, New York, NY 10115 Tel. (212)870-3840 -- Fax (212) 870-3876, e-mail: research@gbgm-umc.org