Forum for Discussing the One Sunday Service Vote
A petition containing 15 member signatures was presented to the Board of Trustees on October 27, 2011. The petition proposed that "a Congregational Vote be called at the earliest opportunity to consider SCUU returning to one Sunday Service." The petitioners also stated, "We recognize that the two-services arrangement was a reasonable endeavor based on expectations of growth, but also recognize that sustaining two services has proven to be an unreasonable ordeal for our small congregation." The petition is a right and proper action, according to our bylaws, and was organized with the best interests of SCUU in mind. This forum is a means of dialogue and discussion on the issue. All positions, points of view, comments and opinions are welcome. Please abide by our UU principles and congregation's covenant.
posted by adam_styles at 11:18 AM
13 Comments:
Hi. Gus Vandermeeren here.
As many of you know, I was one of the people who initiated the petition to revote on the 1 versus 2 service issue.
I did it because, although I voted for going to two services, I now feel that we made a mistake--we went to two services before we had a large enough congregation to support doing so.
Assumption 1: We thought we could get enough people attending the first service to make it worth having.
Fact: We have consistently had poor turnout. Sometimes the number of people attending is less than the number of people involved in the service.
Assumption 2: Having another service will allow the RE folks to attend a service
Fact: This hasn't happened. For the most part the RE teachers are parents who would have to keep their children here for a very long time if they want to both attend a service and then teach class.
Assumption 3: Having two services will help us grow.
I believe that the attendence at the first service is so poor that I suspect we've actually LOST prospective members who've attended first service and never came back because they didn't see a vibrant community.
I think this has happened on occasion even at the 2nd service. My gut feeling is that the combined count of actual attendees (excluding people involved in producing the service) for both services is actually lower than it used to be when we had just one service.
Assumption 4: We can pull this off (ie, we have enough volunteers to do this).
Fact: The worship committee is having a heck of a time finding volunteers to consistently provide music for BOTH services.
Assumption 5: We're busting at the seams and going to two services is the best way to alleviate the problem.
Fact: I can't speak for RE, but with regard to worship, I don't think we've ever had a service where there were absolutely no seats left.
Having said that, I do agree with the various studies which conclude that you should have a certain (20% ?) of seats vacant in order to remain appealing to visitors (and not make existing congregants feel claustrophobic :-).
And I've also heard that the seats that WERE available for late-comers were undesirable ones, especially the ones in the hot sunlight.
And so I agree that we need to find solutions to these problems. But I believe that when we chose to solve them by going to two services we
a) didn't fully understand all the downsides of doing so, and
b) didn't fully explore other things we can do to solve or reduce these problems (at least long enough until we get to a point when even those solutions will no longer work).
Among those alternatives (folks, feel free to add your own :-)
- For those handful of services per year in which things do get crowded, I (and I suspect there are others) volunteer to give up my seat and either stand at the back or go have a chat with one or two other similar volunteers.
In my opinion, if we can get even 5 such volunteers we will have made great inroads toward solving the overcrowding problem.
- If parking space becomes a problem, let's get a carpooling system going. There are several ways of doing this
* produce maps showing where our congregants live so they can contact eachother and carpool
* have people sign up to meet at a nearby parking lot and carpool in from there
Again, this isn't something that has to happen for every service. We have a pretty good idea of which services will be the more crowded ones -- let's device a system of communication that puts these carpool plans into action whenever needed.
If we can reduce the number of cars by even 7 or 8, the problem will be effectively solved.
Now, of course none of those solutions are optimal. But put everything on the scale and I hope you'll agree with me that they're better than going to two services prematurely.
(continued in next comment)
Hi! Gus again. This continues my initial comment.
Other considerations:
A) Effect on lay leaders and exchange programs:
As the current chair of the worship committee (having taken over after Carol Plummer's amazing 7 years [Carol, how the heck did you last that long?]), i am touch with neighboring congregations and have begun to establish lay-leader exchange programs.
I have to say that it's kind of embarrasing to have them come here and lead a service for two or three people. Will they want to continue the program??
And the same holds to some extent with our own lay leaders, especially those who lead a service for the first time--will they want to do it again?
B) Burnout of volunteers:
Holding a good service requires a fair number of people
* The leader (Megan or a guest or lay leader)
* The leader's assistant
* The people providing the music (usually at least two, sometimes as many as 8 or 9)
* The greeters
* Occasionally others: Words for all ages leader, People selected to do readings, participants in things such as plays etc...
It becomes harder to get people to help out when they have to be here for both services, especially when at least one of the services is not a vibrant, well-attended service (it's more fun with more people)
C) Effect on community spirit:
Although we have no figures on it, I believe that attendance at coffee hour, and social mingling in general has gone down. In my opinion, mingling/chatting/socializing is a VERY important part of the service, of congregational life.
Whether we go back to one service or not, we really need to find ways to increase this. A family in which the members don't play and spend time with eachother slowly stops becoming a real family.
Anyway, that's how I see it.
I want to make the best decision for all of us, and am sincerely interested in ALL opinions, whether they support my current leaning toward a return to one service or not.
Convince me that I'm wrong and I'll gladly start telling you how wrong I was :-)
Peace my friends!
Gus
For three years, SCUU has been engaged in an experiment of sorts. Since September 2008, we have offered two Sunday worship services. As I recall, most folks were on board with this, although there were doubters. I also recall that the sanctuary - our yurt - was regularly filled on Sunday mornings, and that the religious education classrooms were getting crowded. All of this seemed very promising indeed. And yes, most of us realized that taking the step to two services was unusual for a small congregation like ours, but then our meeting space was small, and so it seemed to make sense.
I do not believe that we made a mistake in 2008. But like all worthwhile experiments, it simply did not turn out as we had hoped. And for a while, it was exciting. Like all "big ideas," launching into this new plan felt good, like we were bigger than we really were. It was kind of amazing that we were actually pulling it off. Others were amazed as well. Faith and program leaders from sister congregations had very mixed reactions. Some were impressed, many were doubtful. "Let me know how that turns out, okay?" I heard this a lot from colleagues, mostly said in jest. We were UUs, after all, and none of us were tentative about reaching beyond hope and dreaming big.
It was, as they say, a noble experiment. But by the middle of last year, it was becoming doubtful that the burden of sustaining two Sunday services was worth the effort. Or at the very least, it was becoming clear that the two-services experiment was not panning out as we had hoped. Volunteerism was beginning to slip, as was regular attendance at worship services and in the religious education classrooms. And growth appeared increasingly disconnected from our offering one Sunday service or two; simply put, we were not growing. Certainly there were those who pressed on, determined to make the experiment work, and these too were noble efforts. Admirable in every way. We should not look back now, from our future vantage point, and criticize the experiment. But it is time to draw conclusions, and decide what to do next.
It is clear to me that volunteerism - so essential in a small congregation like ours - has suffered under the burden of sustaining two Sunday services. Many individuals have backed away from volunteering, feeling pressured to continuously serve, and some families have stepped away from children's religious education for similar reasons. It requires a significant effort to create, organize and present a Sunday worship service. And since half of our services are lay led, this alone becomes a major contribution to congregational life. Presenting two worship services on a Sunday morning, especially for anyone who is not very experienced, is like a marathon. Not to mention the creative associates, assistants, musical performers, greeters and others necessary for an outstanding worship service.
Also clear is that overall participation in congregational life has dropped off, although I do not know actual membership figures. Attendance at Sunday services was dropping last year, and this year, began to slip alarmingly. The same is true for children's religious education. We continue to see visitors - always a wonderful thing - and some join us. But just as many members have left us, moved away, or just backed away so far that we rarely see them on Sundays. This cuts deep into my UU sensibility. I miss these folks, and wonder what we need to do to get them back.
I also wonder what a visitor sees when he or she arrives at an early service, and finds only seven or eight other congregants. Does this appear to be a vibrant spiritual community? And what about coffee hour? For many churchgoers, this is the social high point of the Sunday experience. The experiment has shown that people crisscrossing one another during a brief 45 minute coffee hour between services just isn't the same. We need to return coffee hour to its rightful place following the service - one service.
The experiment has clearly demonstrated one important point: offering two services did not result in the congregation growing. By some accounts, it may have had the opposite effect. SCUU needs to grow, or like all small congregations, we risk ceasing to exist. So clearly we must engage in other kinds of efforts in order to grow: interacting more with the surrounding community, conducting outreach work, building a more visible sign, and probably many other things. Many of us believe that returning to one Sunday service will help us grow, for all the reasons already cited.
So let's conclude the "two services" experiment, and with all due respect for a worthy big idea, come back together as a community. Then with clarity, let us move on to consider what comes next.
Vic
Please Note: This post and previous Post are from Vic...
Just wanted to mention a few other things we might want to try to help alleviate potential crowding.
First, we need to solve the problem of undesirable seats caused by too much sun/heat coming in through the meadow-side windows or the skylight. I suspect there are things we can do to solve that problem.
Also, on days when we anticipate high attendance we could reserve some seats for visitors, releasing most (but not all) of them when service begins.
1. Every summer we “practice” going from two services to one and then back to two in the fall so it shouldn’t be that hard to go to one service all year.
2. We should use 2.5% as our estimate of growth until we have evidence to change it. Also, how many members do we have vs. how many of them attend at least twice a month?
3. For many years we have asked members to sit up front but the first row continues to be sparsely populated. Plus many new people like to sit in the back at least their first several visits. The last row or two should be reserved for newcomers and people who come after the service has started. The ushers should encourage this and ‘pleasantly’ reseat members who always sit in the back.
4. We can make better use of the ‘meadow’ parking.
5. We considered this before, but if we have a great increase in RE but not prospective first service attendees, we should look into renting additional RE space onsite or off.
6. Since we know that we hope to outgrow our current facilities, we should work with the modular company that built the house now to see how we can expand the house and what it would cost to do so. That would give us a bottom line estimate of what it would cost us to grow. A branch of the company that built the house is right down Rte 117 from the church.
7. Some people are reluctant to lead a group because they don’t know what is expected of them. A weekend lay leadership training seminar could help. Maybe RRUUC or Cedar Lane would put one on for free for us using their extensive ministerial and RE staffs?
8. With two services in the future and Megan’s sons getting older, we may find that we want a full time minister plus increasing the RE director’s time. These expenses should be added to the cost of acquiring more space when we look at a new capital campaign. If it can take as long as five years to hold a successful building campaign, we should have at least three people starting the process now (three in case we lose one over the five year period).
9. Visioning is important and probably something we should do every year, but we need to keep in mind that these are visions for the future, not tomorrow.
“It’s Not About Growth”
Despite everything we’ve heard about growth, and especially how returning to one service will negatively impact our congregation’s ability to grow, the issue before us – deciding whether to return to one Sunday service – is not about growth. I have yet to hear from anyone who doesn’t want SCUU to grow, it seems we are all in agreement about that. Although I must add that quite a few folks have expressed ambivalence about growing, an interesting aside.
Whether we offer one Sunday service or two is in no way related to the “growth” issue. Consider a few highlights:
· After three years of offering two services, there is no indication that SCUU has grown.
· As I recall, no one back in 2008 expected that offering two services would somehow make us grow. Rather, we had many more folks in attendance at that time, and so it seemed we needed to make room for them. These were very optimistic times.
· There are no other UU congregations our size, and about which I am aware, that offer two Sunday services. Many of these one-service congregations are growing nonetheless.
· Among the many reasons people come to church on Sundays, I’d guess that the choice of coming to one service versus one-of-two services is rather low on the list.
The real question is whether we as a small congregation can sustain two Sunday services? And at what cost? With a half-time minister and half of our services lay-led, we are expending an extraordinary amount of volunteer energy on creating, preparing and presenting worship services. And as many others have noted, the earlier of these two Sunday services is almost always poorly attended. So the payoff appears minimal, and the cost high.
What are some of these costs? To name a few: a coffee hour that appears inconvenient for almost everyone, conflicts involving our beloved choir (and challenging issues regarding music in general), visitors who attend the first service and find only a few others present, and general volunteer burnout.
Let’s consider the sustaining issue another way. Not sure how many readers actually saw the signed petition calling for a vote to return to one Sunday service. The petition presented to the Board contained 15 signatures. This is not the place to list names, but suffice to say that nearly every one of these 15 members is among the most active of our volunteers. They are the tireless folks who make things happen, many on a weekly basis, and lead others in making things happen. So what is the take-away here? Who better to see the strain on our volunteers? How many of these members have personally witnessed other members burning out and pulling away from SCUU?
No, the issue here is not about growth. It is about our survival as a congregation. Certainly we need to grow, and we need to start reaching out to the community and effectively inviting others to join us. We need to build back congregational social life. Why do people come to church on Sundays? Let’s start with coffee hour. And if we really want to grow, then we need to start inviting the community to join us in every imaginable way. I myself am not impressed with the property nor the physical structures that house us. What pains my heart is to see people step back in frustration instead of stepping forward with joy.
Returning to one Sunday service is long overdue. Let’s get on with it.
Vic
I agree we should return to 1 service. In my opinion the SCUU culture has less of a community feel than it used to. I also think a half empty service doesn't represent a growing church to visitors. I would also hate to lose the choir.
“Contingency Plans”
Hi, Vic Caldarola here…
So we gather on December 11 and vote for a return to one Sunday service. What then? How difficult will it be to transition to a single worship service on Sundays? The answer, I believe, is related to how prepared we are to make the change. As another blog contributor has pointed out, we have been making this transition twice a year every summer since 2008.
Employing the same grass-roots initiative that produced a successful petition, we may move swiftly and decisively in this transition. There is no reason why we should not be offering one Sunday service the very next week following the vote.
· At the congregational meeting, a motion is made to set the time for the new Sunday morning worship hour. Let us say for the moment that this is 10:00 a.m. There is also a “renewed call for volunteers” to staff the new coffee hour from 11:00-12:00. Finally, the choir is welcomed back and invited to once again bless us with their joyful voices.
· The service times are removed from the church sign immediately following the meeting (to be updated later).
· A “digest” email announcement is sent to all members and friends by 6:00 p.m. stating the outcome of the vote, and if the outcome is “one service,” that beginning December 18, a single worship service will be offered at 10:00 a.m.
· An “RE News” announcement is sent to all Religious Education families on Sunday evening, noting that the time for worship service and RE classes has been changed to 10:00 a.m. beginning the following Sunday, December 18 (actually, a community worship service).
· A special “news” item is posted prominently on the SCUU website home page, let’s say by 9:00 p.m. the same day, and containing the announcement as outlined above. Also, the text under the header “About SCUU” will need to be changed accordingly.
· Those individuals who regularly attend the first service are contacted directly, and no later than Monday evening, to ensure that they receive the news without delay.
· The same news is prominently posted in the weekly “Digest” on Wednesday.
· Reminder announcements are sent out on Thursday via “digest” all-member/friend email and “RE News” channels.
It should be noted that the December 18 service is the last Sunday service until January 8, and so the timing is not ideal. Nevertheless, there is no reason to delay the transition to one Sunday service. And since December 18 is a community worship service, few RE volunteers will be affected.
The point is that making a contingency plan in advance will help the transition go smoothly. There is energy behind this vote. Let us be swept away by it, and move on re-energized to consider what comes next.
Vic
If our community votes that the best thing for us is to return to one service (until we have grown enough to have two), then we should do so as quickly as possible. The groups primarily affected by this are the worship and RE committees. Worship can easily change over to one service immediately, and would wish to do so, should the vote go that way. Vic indicates in his last message that RE also can go right away. So, like he says, "there's no reason to delay the transition to one Sunday service".
Roy here,
I'm convinced by the argments for returning to one service on Sundays and I hope we proceed in that way. I'd like to offer a suggestion and an observation that have come to my mind in the course of our congregational conversation.
The suggestion is that we place authority for deciding the number and scheduling of Sunday services in our board of trustees, caveated in ways that ensure compliance with the congregation's current wishes. Caveats could include a proscription against changing the number of services for six months or a year after the congregation fixes them at one, and a requirement that the board not change the number and scheduling of services without first holding a congregational conversation to obtain guidance from the congregation. The down side of requiring a congregational meeting to take an action like changing the number of services is that everyone can't attend the meeting no matter when you scchedule it. Linda and I won't get a vote because we'll be out of the country.
The observation is that I'm disturbed by the suggestion I've heard that a significant reason for returning to one service is that the choir won't participate in two services on a Sunday so if we don't return to one service we'll lose the choir. I'm a community musician myself and I value our choir; but if we're going to make a decision like this to serve the convenience and availability of the choir then we have really lost our way. Surely our mission is about something bigger than that.
I think it's high time we engaged a congregational conversation about our mission and I hope that our board sponsors such a conversation before long.
Bright blessings,
Roy
Helen Pop's response to Dec. 4 meeting's issues;
Outreach?
One idea is to begin with our in-house "Inreach." How 'bout each of us regulars who attend Sunday services take a name of someone who's a member, but a regular absentee on Sunday. Each of us would extend an invitation to that person to come to the service s/he usually attends, including being with that person during coffee time?
Burn-Out in R.E.?
Only offer R.E. at 2nd. service, but continue with childcare for both services.
First Service Music?
Do not expect any live music unless those who give it would enjoy playing it twice.
Post Second Service Hunger?
These people could be better attracted to the coffee time (motivated by wanting to encourage visitors and newcomers to like us enough to return?). Then hunger could be lessened by their mid-morning snack.
P.S. Maybe, we all need to be reminded that we repeat at the end of every Sunday service our vow to sustain our "fire of commitment."
Final Ideas -
Realizing such decisions are expected to be in the hands of the Worship Committee to work out as part of their baliwick, I have 2 suggestions for their consideration:
Order of service additions for first service attendees:
1. When less than 13 are in the congregation, form a circle of chairs around the chalice table and include Megan in the circle for conducting all the elements of the format planned for the second service.
2. Add a sermon talkback (in terms of feelings and supporting personal experiences) that would relate to Megan's thoughts.
About (12/11) Decision Making
Try to see early service attendees as "Margaret Mead's 5 good people".
With faith and Love,
Helen
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