conjectural navel gazing; jesus in lint form

But what does 52 Equal Sundays mean for staff? I don't disagree--I just wonder what it would look like for you and me, and WB.

Yeah...we'd have to work that out. Pacing wold be key. Dumping 40% of our program life into the first four months of the year would have to fall away. Also, honestly, what does it already look like at CCW? We were around all summer anyway.

The office would not slow down so much...and we would have to plan ahead for vacations etc. The trick for us would be to spread out what we already have and not invent more things to do. Over-functioning? Bad. That would be our temptation.

But this is all about Sundays and not the other things. WB would get paid more. That's for sure.

52 equal Sundays doesn't have to mean 52 identical Sundays. Summer has its merits the way we do it. The lack of a choir doesn't make the summer lower in quality. More people won't show just because we have a choir. The trick is making summer intentional and not defaulting to whatever we can do. But, air conditioning or not, I think that members want summer to be rich but streamlined. We have evolved (or devolved) into a casual people

Vibrant summers include sermon series that are linked like we are doing with Simplicity. It includes the Jubilee Band. It includes experiments with different formats and with intimacy in worship. The more we move to a steady format during the Sept.-June period, the more we need variety in the summer.

Of course, this opinion is mine and untested in any way, so don't take it as a barometer of the congregation. But, don't get sucked in by the desire of people to be so supportive of changes you implement. That's where the blind side really can surface.

Well, and "don't give the choir a break" is unkind if you aren't paying them. You have to be sensitive to the choirpeople's needs too - and in many many churches, they need to travel in the summer to see kids and parents and conferences and such.

Don't give the WORSHIP a break. Don't let the music go to pot. Yes. Work with your choir/choirmistress to figure out good, viable options to fully-vested full-voiced summer choir. But don't neglect to pastor your choir members in all love and compassion.

Speaking as a choir member of many years!

All good stuff...And I struggle with it. The churches I sang for in Richmond (paid and unpaid) all had the choir throughout the summer. It was not until I came up here that I encountered this slower summer thing. If anything summers were a time of greater activity.

People still took vacations. No problem. But it's not like the entire bass section (assuming section here) left on vacation on the same week. Heh.

It's just worth thinking about.

I'm curious about concepts of church that involve the notion that it's desiraable for church to back down, lower its expectations, whatever, for several months of the year.

Don't get me wrong — I'm not arguing in favor of burnout. But if we start from the equal premises that "we should not burn out our leaders and congregations" and "the Gospel doesn't become less important depending on the season," might we not develop a practicable sense of church life that avoids sending the message that love of God constitutes an onerous obligation from which we allow our congregations and ourselves release during summertime?

I take Tully's point to be that both theologically and strategically, we can never afford throw-away services or throw-away ministry. If we take the Gospel seriously enough to devote our lives to it, then it will seem odd to offer worship (or Bible Study or choral music) at a de-intensified pitch. God provides ways for us to communicate the full pitch of our ardor and enthusiasm and discipleship without closing up shop for months that don't count.

St. Bart's is where I have gone to church for 7 years here in NYC. Love it. I refer to it as Club Med to family, friends, and colleagues.

When I first came to St. Bart's, I went to a new person's kinda a thing on the terrace. There was this guy bartending. I chatted briefly with him. He was funny. Had a dry humor.

It was really funny when I went to church that Sunday and he turned out to be Bill Tully! The
rector at St. Bart's!

Bill used to be a journalist.

He has had some great homilies. He is always challenging the church in many different directions -- socially, politically, scripturally, financially -- I love it.

That is cool that he is in Chicago.

Having a staff of priests is good. They rotate who does the sermons. Even though it is a large church, I have made a lot of friends and the priests are easily, and I mean easily accessible.

Actually Reconciler has always functioned this way. In some sense for our survival and health we have simply had to plow ahead whether or not everyone was going to show up, and it doesn't always follow seasonal patterns. we do different things at different times attempting to acknowledge congregational patterns. But we don't have a fall kick off of programs and all either.
I wonder thought if this thinking is overlooking that on these sorts of things congregations should be allowed to develop their own patterns within the larger life of the church. For instance it simply is true that most of the members the Covenant Church in which I still hold membership do leave Chicago for the months of July and August, at least taking weekend trips if not gone for two to four weeks. Also, they have large college student population as well which affect the dynamics of the congregation dwindles the numbers in attendance by nearly two thirds. But that is all due to various factors that make up the character of the congregation that really can't be extrapolated beyond its context.

I think Kate is correct. One can have a full worship experience without a choir. As I said earlier, the church needs to be intentional about how it intends to be meaningful during the dog days. Personally, I find summer worship to often be more interesting than services in May where we are playing out the string of the church year.

For better or worse, this rests at the feet of the Pastor. Even with a good worship committee of laypersons, intentionality of worship is a core responsibility for the clergy. If the minister thinks we are going through the motions, then that notion needs to be explored. But, let's define what we mean by going through the motions. The absence of a choir in itself does not qualify. The absence of music would. One could argue that an unchanging worship format is the opposite of dynamic worship, but we've had that discussion before.

After thinking about this for a day, I think it is a snappy phrase that resolves a non-issue. It isn't about equality of worship - it's about quality within a continuum of time. Because of the continuum, variety is an element of quality. Dullness knows no season, and neither does excitement. When worship assumes a default position through overreliance on any single element, theme or constituency, it has the potential to become routine and calcified. That is the point where the flock is underserved.

"52 Equal Sundays" says to me that whenever we are less intentional about worship we are in all kinds of trouble. If the general consensus is that worship life is less important in the summer because fewer people are around, then we have a problem. Worship is an act offered to God. Some say in part. Some say entirely. But it ain't simply entertainment. I think we all agree on that here.

Also, I am all for switching things up, or crafting a dynamic service that gives certain people some breathing space at certain times of the year. But the worship on Sundays is the face of the church. It is the first thing people see. Okay, maybe the website is the first thing, but Sunday morning at 10:30 is the first thing after the website people encounter at CCW, for example. If it is not spot on, lovely, intentional, and conveying our love of God, then we are doing something wrong. We are not offering our whole selves to God and the community.

This does not mean we have to be insanely busy all year. The church year helps govern much of this. But if, for example, (making this up) our mime ministry was our best feature and we shared it only during the "program" year, then we would be inhibiting growth...both inward and outward.

That's what this notion is getting at. Any clearer? Other notions?

if our mime ministry was our best feature

Dude, if you're relying on mime ministry, you're "inhibiting growth" in ways more serious than having a lite summer schedule.

Not that there's anything wrong with mimes, of course.