Third of a monthly series

A healthy assumption is emerging from the talk about restructuring. In the days ahead the congregation has to be the primary building block for Christian witness in an increasingly secular U.S.A. The local church is on the front line. It is the threshold between a gospel which transforms, and an increasingly hostile, hurting world.

This truth has been lost - maybe unwittingly - under all sorts of agendas. But the West is now a mission field. Our primary target must be the unchurched, and the congregation is God's vehicle for doing business, but it must be prepared to make radical changes. The temptation is to insulate ourselves from our environment, or to absorb the values of the prevailing culture, until we are either irrelevant or have lost our distinctive message.

Much more will be expected from parishes if they are to be effective in tomorrow's world. In the past, congregations have been spoon-fed. They have gotten used to working with programs coming down from the church or a publishing house. They have generally been unreflective. But hard thinking and careful analysis of the culture and community are as essential as prayer, if we are to interface effectively with our milieu - local, national, global.

World mission obligations were taken care of by paying your quota to the diocese, which sent on its share to the Episcopal Church Center in New York City. The result is disastrous. We have managed to breed a church with almost non-existent global mission consciousness. If we are to be obedient to Christ's great commission and our baptismal covenant, congregations must take on this responsibility themselves. This requires new structures which can provide an environment to facilitate local initiatives.

People with limited experience and understanding will be expected to plan how they will make global mission happen, beginning at their front door and to the ends of the earth. This demands far broader access to information, as well as mission education. We use world mission as an example because it is a sobering illustration. What is true globally is also true locally.

We plead with the church to drop the prevailing "business as usual" mentality. In the years ahead, this attitude will be the kiss of death for congregations as well as whole denominations. The Episcopal Church has no more divine right to exist than the dysfunctional Asian churches in the early chapters of Revelation. Pollster George Barna has noted "ministry in the year 2000 will be as different from ministry in 1980, as ministry in 1980 was from ministry in 1900!''

Even in turbulent times change is seldom a tectonic lurch, but a series of incremental shifts, hardly noticeable until we detect a totally different landscape. We must learn to adjust to a constant procession of change, while at the same time discovering how to anticipate the future. Any congregation that refuses to change its approach is in for a rude awakening. It is like the Mom and Pop store that closes its eyes to Wal-Mart opening a block away. It won't be long before they put up their shutters.

Successful congregations focus upon the transforming person of Jesus Christ. To be effective, however, the surrounding culture must be understood. If a congregation is to survive, let alone bring transfiguration, it must observe constantly what is going on, think creatively, and strategize accordingly.

Churches are extraordinarily averse to taking risks. When under pressure, most congregations slide into a coy cocoon. What makes the timidity so sad is that resources are available to them to adjust to the changing world. Between now and 2015 an incredible demand will be placed on Christian courage and imagination. Episcopal churches that prosper will have begun to make far-reaching changes before the turn of the millennium - and will be prepared to go on making them.

Paul's ministry began with three years in the desert, where he rigorously reworked his theology, focusing it on Christ. He grappled to understand how the world-changing Savior could be made comprehensible to his contemporaries. Paul was doing the research and development necessary for his apostolic ministry.

Today, congregations need to do this too, but now we are as likely to find the information in databases as deserts - although deserts should not be shunned! We need all the available data to probe the relationship between congregation and environment. This is not a once-in-a-decade exercise, but a constant activity. As we prayerfully seek God's will, we need to discern the demographics, cultural mutations, and the social influences that are shaping attitudes. Simultaneously, we need to see how congregations interface with their neighborhoods, cities and the world.

The relevant congregation in a time of rapid national and global transition is an inveterate gatherer and processor of information. Much is readily available. Churches retooling themselves for effective ministry collect most of their data from outside rather than within the Christian community. Only as we understand the culture will we effectively address the gospel into it.

Washington, D.C., is replete with think tanks intent on telling government how to be effective. The marketplace has an army of futures consultants who work with clients as they plan for the long term. What is to prevent a think tank network emerging to serve the Episcopal Church?

This network would need to be independent and have a clear understanding of the church's task. Too much of our so-called research in the past has been little more than wishful thinking. Church consultants focus solving problems, rather than addressing the impact of the future on the churches. A futures network could help us digest everything from polling data, through the insights of a Martin Marty, to the insights of futurists, economists and marketers.

This network should scrutinize things both globally and nationally because boundaries between nations have become porous. Then as we develop our ministries for the new millennium, we must consider how they interface with the Anglican Communion, and the whole of Christianity. The network should be able to launch warning flares, and create tools which provide the framework in which Christians discover which information is relevant - and how to use it.

People are going to say, "Why can't the seminaries do this?" They, too, will be radically retooling in the days ahead. It is people in the trenches who know the information they need for future success. As well as providing information, a research network must know how to receive and process such input from the grass roots.

For as long as any of us can remember the church has planned on the basis of hunch - if at all. As a result, dollars have been wasted and people have been hurt. Intuition plays a part in seeking God's guidance for ministry in a new kind of world. However, these instinctive ways of thinking need to be informed if they are to be effective. So here's our suggestion - that we develop and fund networks to research and develop future ministry. What are your ideas? o

Ideas and comments may be sent to Bishop White and Fr. Kew at 2015, P.O. Box 92936, Milwaukee, WI 53202. The authors may use the thoughts of readers as input for a book they are writing.