Unitarian Universalist Church of Palo Alto

Weaving the Web

May 30, 2008
Rev. Amy Zucker Morgenstern

I have come to realize that we at UUCPA are sometimes ambivalent about our church size and style. Going by a common categorization of congregations, we are mostly a “Program” church — over 175 Sunday participants, with many programs, multiple staff, leadership dispersed among many committees, and a distinct outward focus. Program churches exist not just to give their members a community, but to serve and transform the world. But sometimes we long for the benefits of the size below (“Pastoral”), which is more inner-focused, and simpler in structure. Here’s what happens in a Program church, and why.

• Committees make decisions about their areas of expertise. In a Pastoral church, they often feel like they need to run these decisions by the Board. In a Program church, the Board doesn’t micromanage; it backs up the committees’ decisions.

• The Board makes policy decisions. In a Pastoral church, the entire congregation expects to be consulted. In a Program church, members vote, comment on matters before the Board, and then empower their leaders to make decisions.

• A pastoral call often comes from another member. Pastoral church: the ministers can (maybe) visit everyone who falls ill or is too frail to get to church. Program church: the minister focuses on the most critical needs, knowing that a great deal of pastoral care is being carried out by members, as we do with the Caring Network, Baby Café, etc.

• Two events you really want to go to are on the same day. Pastoral: this could possibly be avoided. Program: there is just so much going on that it can’t be crammed into 365 days without overlap. Marvelous!

• You hold a great event but no minister comes. Pastoral: the mark that an activity is valued is that the minister was there. Program (where there are far too many events for the ministers to attend): we know an activity is valued if it reaches people who need it and it furthers the mission of the congregation.

What is our mission? To empower and inspire people to make the world better while declaring the good news that everything in our lives is part of the spiritual quest: reason and revelation, emotion and experience, science and the insights of the human heart gathered over millennia.

I’ll be sharing more of these thoughts in this space, as the Board and staff lead us firmly forward into that mission-centered Program style.

— Blessings,
Amy