The Future Is Networks

January is a time for making predictions about the future, so here’s a prediction: The future is networks, not formal institutions.

This prediction requires some elaboration of what I mean by networks and formal institutions. The prediction should also be qualified somewhat: This is less a prediction of what is to come and more an observation of how human organization has already been changing, coupled with an assumption that such a shift will continue.

Networks

A network may be defined as a collection of separate individuals or organizations that come together for collaboration. A network is definitely a type of organization itself, in that it organizes people or other organizations. Networks are, though, defined by their relational nature – relationships are the basis of their organization. There is a large literature in several social science fields on network organizations, and this post does not even begin to scratch the surface of this literature, but this definition will do.

A network may also be a type of institution, in that it may involve “rules, beliefs, norms, and organizations that together generate a regularity of behavior,” though it lacks much formalization of these rules, beliefs, norms, and organizations. Instead, a network relies on relational ties to produce those qualities. Moreover, the focus of a network may not be so much on regularity of behavior as on responsiveness, that is, on coordinating behavior in response to particular conditions or events rather than coordinating behavior toward a pre-determined end.

As relational organization, networks involve (relatively) equal status among their constituent parts. They may be organized around common interests or a shared desired outcome. They may also be short- or long-term oriented. Networks, especially those organized around shared interests, are often open ended, with the purpose of the network evolving as its constituent relationships evolve. Thus, networks are a relatively flexible form of organization.

Networks usually serve as avenues of communication among their members and for exchanging or pooling resources around shared objectives. A network may carry out a project as an organization itself, but more often, networks serve to loosely coordinate the activities of their members through exchange of information. Thus, those members are the primary actors in carrying out any work, not the network.

Formal Institutions

A formal institution may be defined as an organization with formalized rules and structures for working towards a goal or goals. Such formalized rules and structures include aspects such as legal incorporation, by-laws, assigned roles and responsibilities within the organization, clearly defined leadership roles, organizational hierarchies, defined mission and vision, etc. Formal institutions as organizations are defined by their formalized nature.

Formal institutions tend to be goal oriented. They are very concerned with regularity of behavior and planning toward a particular end. They exist to direct the behavior of constituent parts and the use of labor and financial resources towards certain goals.

Formal institutions tend toward a long-term orientation. Their formality gives them a greater permanence, and some of a formal institution’s efforts are likely to be directed towards the continuation of the institution. Formal institutions can and do change, grow, and shift over time, but their focus is on regularity.

Contrasts

Both networks and formal institutions are solutions to the problem of collective action – how can humans act together for the sake of achieving goals beyond what any individual is capable of? Formal institutions and networks can be thought of as two ideal types of solutions to this problem with actual organizations falling somewhere in the middle. Moreover, networks are often composed of formal institutions as members. Again, there is a large literature available for those interested in the spectrum of organizational types.

Each of these solutions is better at some things and in some situations. Networks have advantages at information sharing and are more flexible. Formal institutions are better at standardization and central coordination.

Yet whatever the absolute advantages and disadvantages of each organizational form, there has been a significant shift in recent decades away from formal institutions towards networks. Formal institutions were one of the crowning achievements of the modern era of human history – the world coordinated through bureaucracy, in a non-pejorative sense. In the 21st century, however, the flow is in the other direction, towards the creation of more networks and the dismantling of some existing formal institutions.

Applications for Churches

This shift from formal institutions to networks has implications for many areas of life, the church among them. Three ways in which this shift will impact churches are in denominational structures, ecumenical organizations, and ministry collaborations.

Denominations are, at their most basic, an organization that brings together multiple congregations. Yet there are varying ways in which denominations can serve to organize congregations, and some are more similar to networks, while others more closely resemble formal organizations. Some of this depends on polity. (Baptists tend more towards networks; Methodists towards formal organizations.) But even within a denomination, shifts are possible. Thus, for United Methodists, a shift towards a more network understanding of denominational structures would mean structures that serve to equip and coordinate churches in their own work rather than structures that seek to represent churches through the work of the denomination.

A similar principle applies to ecumenical organizations. At one time, the National Council of Churches was a significant organizational force, carrying out major work itself, work that was supported by the member denominations because of the formal structures that tied them to the NCC. Nowadays, the NCC serves more as a forum for discussion among member denominations, who may sign off on statements released by the NCC, but who maintain more autonomy in deciding what of the NCC to go along with.

Such a shift applies to more local and regional forms of ministry collaboration as well. In the past, inter-congregational ministry efforts may have involved forming new formal organizations with carefully balanced representation from participating congregations and extensive binding agreements as to how the congregations would relate to one another and the new entity. Now, though, inter-congregational ministry is more likely to be ad-hoc and project-based, involve a sharing of information rather than entering an MOU, and/or involve creating an informal “coordinating committee” instead of founding a new 501(c)3 entity.

Again, these are not necessarily bad or good shifts; they’re just different. Walter W. Powell, in his 1990 article, “Neither Market Nor Hierarchy: Network Forms of Organization,” wrote that “the open-ended quality of networks is most useful when resources are variable and the environment uncertain.” In that way, the shift away from formal institutions towards networks is a reflection of other shifts going on in society. 

The point is not to try to resist this shift or to try to be the first to hop on the bandwagon. The point is to recognize the ways in which how we as humans collaborate and organize work are changing so that we may continue to do what Christians have always done: work together to make disciples and transform the world.

Bolivia and the Challenges of Church Financing

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

The Swiss UMC published a profile of the recently-elected Methodist bishop of Bolivia. The Evangelical Methodist Church in Bolivia is an autonomous Methodist denomination with historic connections to The United Methodist Church and on-going partnerships with Swiss United Methodists through the Swiss mission and development agencies, Connexio hope and develop.

One thing in particular struck me about what Bishop Medardo Vedia Gutierrez said about his vision for the future of the church in Bolivia. He argued that the church needs to become less financially reliant on its school system to pay for the ministries of the church.

Some background is important here. Methodism in much of South America was heavily influenced by William Taylor, a Methodist world-traveling evangelist, missionary, and eventually bishop. Taylor recruited most of the missionary personnel that forwarded the development of Methodism in South America in the later nineteenth century.

Taylor was a strong proponent of self-supporting mission. That is, he wanted mission to be primarily funded by local sources, not by donations from the United States. In South America, the main source for local funds to support Taylor missions was operating schools. Taylor missionaries made running schools (especially English-language schools) a primary focus of their work.

When leadership of Methodism in South America passed from missionary to local hands, these schools continued and continued to be an important part of South American Methodism, both as a source of revenue and as a marker of identity.

Thus, Bolivian Methodism's reliance on income from its school system has deep historic roots.

There have been real advantages historically to this system of church financing. It has made churches, even those serving poorer groups, less financially dependent on the United States, which has meant more freedom to make decisions locally.

But every strategy has its limitations, and the pandemic exposed the limitations of this strategy for church financing. During the COVID shutdown, income for Methodist schools in Bolivia fell sharply, which means that money to support the church in Bolivia dried up as well. That put a pinch on both the schools and the church.

Hence, Bishop Gutierrez would like to cultivate more congregational giving and more members and congregations to give and thus reduce the church's financial dependency on the schools. The challenge with congregational giving, however, comes when congregational members themselves have limited financial resources to share with the church.

This example from Bolivia is a good reminder: there is no perfect model for financing the activities of the church. Churches have had varying means of paying for the work they do throughout the centuries, and each of these means have had advantages and disadvantages.

Perhaps the goal, though, is not to find the perfect model for church financing that can apply universally, but rather to do the work of discerning what model can best support the mission and ministry of the church in a particular context at a particular time.

Running schools has had real advantages for Methodism in Latin America, but COVID caused a shift in the context. That calls for a rethinking of financial models, as Bolivia is doing. May God bless Bishop Gutierrez and the Bolivian church as they seek to continue to be faithful and wise in shifting contexts.

Recommended Readings: German United Methodists Rethink Church

As in many places in the United States, The United Methodist Church in Germany has been facing challenging trends with many small, aging, and declining congregations. While there are certainly vital ministries and new faith congregations in Germany, the church there recognizes the challenges it faces in continuing to engage in faithful, relevant ministry in its changing context.

Stemming from that recognition, the German UMC has been taking proactive steps to change its organization at the central conference and annual conference level and encourage creativity at the local congregational level to strengthen the focus of the church on its mission. These changes are intended not just to consolidate in the face of decline but to use numeric decline as an impetus for the church to become clearer about its purpose and calling.

This process is evident in the actions of the Germany Central Conference and two of the German annual conferences, all of which met late last year. The Germany Central Conference approved a wide-ranging package of structural reforms that sought "more mission, less administration" (story in German; Google translated version). The South German Annual Conference than approved its own set of structural revisions and encouragements to congregations to try new forms of worship and outreach (story in German; Google translated version). Finally, the East German Annual Conference approved a resolution to revision its conference facility as a form of "church in a different shape" (story in German; Google translated version).

Given demographic trends and the impact of disaffiliations, many annual conferences in the United States are already having or will soon need to have conversations about how to restructure in the face of reduced membership and finances. When they do so, they could learn from the German model about how to keep mission front and center in such difficult conversations and decisions.

UM & Global Collections: The UMC & Institutional Decline

For the first time in quite some time, a new UM & Global collection is available. The collection pulls together posts from this fall about "The UMC and Institutional Decline." Most of the posts are by David W. Scott, with one response by Darryl W. Stephens. The posts examine the nature, causes, and possible solutions to the decline of denominational institutions in The United Methodist Church. As always, discussion questions help connect these writings to pressing contemporary questions for United Methodist leaders, General Conference delegates, and students.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: What About Membership Decline?

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

In response to my series on the UMC and Institutional Decline, reader (and United Methodist Professor of Mission) Rev. Dr. Jack Jackson writes:

“Hello David, thanks for these articles. You are bringing up some important issues. I wonder if you plan to address the underlying problem which, if not addressed, will make all these other renovations irrelevant? Namely, the current collapse of the United Methodist species. We simply aren't reproducing ourselves in the West. Clearly the denomination is reproducing in the Philippines and a handful of countries in central Africa. But apart from those 6 or 7 countries (so much for being a global church) the UMC is in the midst of species collapse. Will you address the need [for a] new vision regarding mission and evangelism that centers on making disciples for Jesus? I'd love to hear more of your thoughts.”

Given the significance of Rev. Dr. Jackson’s question, I wanted to spend an entire post responding to it, rather than trying to do so within the confines of the comments section.

The Relationship between Membership Decline and Institutional Decline
First, in his comment, Jackson gets at what is absolutely an important truth: It doesn’t matter what denominational institutions look like if there are no denominational members left to be part of them. Decline in denominational membership (especially among white Westerners) is an essential bit of context that shapes and shades all other discussions of the UMC’s future, including discussions of its institutions.

Nevertheless, it would be wrong to conclude that because membership decline has the potential to make institutional decline irrelevant that we should focus entirely on membership and not on denominational institutions (not that Jackson is saying so). Such an argument would only make sense if membership and institutions were unconnected, but there is a relationship between the two.

The sorts of institutions that we have as a denomination can influence how effective we are at inviting new members through evangelism, retaining our current members through discipleship, and developing the next generation of members through Christian education. Rightly conceived, updating institutions can be a means to better equip the church to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

A football analogy may help. The only undefeated NFL team in history was the Miami Dolphins in 1972, incidentally the same year that many of the institutions of the UMC achieved their current form. Obviously, that team knew how to win. But if we were able to bring that team and their equipment, strategies, and training regiments to the present, the 1972 Miami Dolphins would likely struggle in the 2021 NFL season, where rules of the game have changed, game strategies have changed, technology used to help players play their best has evolved, offensive and defensive lines are much larger physically, and the season is three games longer. We can’t assume that just because the 1972 Dolphins knew how to win, none of the rest of these changes would matter.

In a similar way, evangelism (and discipleship and Christian education) is not just about knowing how to win people to Jesus in some ahistoric sense. It’s about knowing how to win people to Jesus in our present time and contexts, as Jackson’s writings highlight, and then developing the systems of rules, equipment, strategies, etc. necessary to support that approach. And our rules, equipment, strategies, etc. should be updated from their 1972 versions, just as the 1972 Dolphins would need to update if they played in the 2021 NFL.

The importance of church structure for the growth of the church is something I have addressed in several other posts (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/03/mission-structure-and-innovation.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/05/structure-financing-and-early-methodism.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/05/movement-vs-institution-choices-and.html).

Tracking Membership Trends
Second, as Jackson points out, there are important differences across The United Methodist Church in terms of how the church is doing in reproducing itself. Assessing the danger of “species collapse” and responding appropriately requires good information about where The United Methodist Church is and is not growing, how those trends compare to other forms of Christianity and population demographics, and the group-specific trends within the whole.

Over the years, developing this sort of data that can help United Methodist leaders discern where the church is and is not doing well, including in comparison with others, has been a major effort of my writing on this blog and elsewhere:

• In a co-written article from 2011, Dana L. Robert and I looked at UMC demographic trends relative to other Methodist and closely related denominations (https://www.methodistreview.org/index.php/mr/article/view/48), and I very briefly touched on a similar comparison this year (http://www.umglobal.org/2021/04/us-membership-decline-and-rhetoric-of.html).
• I crunched the numbers to analyze worldwide UMC membership growth or decline relative to the overall population (http://www.umglobal.org/2019/05/umc-membership-growth-and-decline.html), and I have encouraged United Methodists to be more specific in their thinking about global growth or decline (http://www.umglobal.org/2016/11/getting-specific-about-global-umc.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/02/making-sense-of-umc-membership-numbers.html).
• For another perspective on growth and decline, I put together an analysis of worldwide UMC clergy numbers relative to laity membership (http://www.umglobal.org/2021/01/clergy-vs-laity-membership-numbers.html).
• I have examined the racial components of membership trends in the United States (http://www.umglobal.org/2017/03/american-umc-decline-is-white-people.html) and compared membership decline to contextual economic factors (http://www.umglobal.org/2013/07/middle-class-methodists-and-church.html).
• I have put together comprehensive data on where Methodists from all denominations are located around the world (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/02/resource-maps-of-locations-of-world.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/04/resource-more-world-methodist-maps.html) and have looked at how these maps highlight historical factors influencing the spread of Methodism to date (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/02/analysis-of-locations-of-world.html).

Much of the above work can be found in the UM & Global collection “Methodist Maps and Membership”: http://www.umglobal.org/2021/01/um-global-collection-methodist-maps-and.html.

In addition, I have suggested a variety of explanations for these trends that try to look not just at The United Methodist Church but at other forms of Christianity and wider societal contexts, especially in the United States.

I have tried to enumerate factors influencing church growth (http://www.umglobal.org/2019/05/factors-influencing-church-growth.html) including organizational and cultural explanations (http://www.umglobal.org/2021/04/organizational-vs-cultural-explanations.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2016/04/coming-to-terms-with-numeric-decline-in.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/03/are-there-too-few-mainline-denominations.html) and the role of the witness of the church amidst suffering (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/06/is-suffering-cause-of-umc-growth-in.html).

I have examined the role of empire in the fate of Christianity in the West: http://www.umglobal.org/2020/06/secularization-and-collapse-of-empire.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2020/12/what-is-imperial-religion-and-why-do.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2020/12/american-christianity-as-imperial.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2020/12/routes-forward-from-imperial-american.html

This work is not the same as developing a theology or method of evangelism, but I do see it as important background for such work. Since evangelism must be contextual, United Methodists must understand the contexts in which they evangelize.

Evangelism
Jackson suggests that the UMC needs a “new vision regarding mission and evangelism that centers on making disciples for Jesus.” I wholeheartedly agree that evangelism is an essential part of mission and that the UMC should be engaged in evangelism.

That is an important part of why I developed the definition of mission I use in my book on mission for congregations, Crossing Boundaries: Mission is “cultivating relationships across boundaries for the sake of fostering conversations in word and deed about the nature of God’s good news” (http://www.umglobal.org/2019/03/a-new-definition-of-mission.html). By emphasizing conversations about God’s good news, this definition of mission is intended to include evangelism as a core component of mission.

This conviction that evangelism is an essential part of mission means that evangelism is among the subjects that UM & Global covers, even if I don’t always write those articles myself. You can find UM & Global articles about evangelism here: http://www.umglobal.org/search/label/evangelism.

Given my background as a social historian, I tend to write about areas that I feel I am uniquely qualified to analyze and that others are not writing about extensively (such as organizational theory and demographics). I then try to lift up the voices of those who are more insightful than me on other topics. Evangelism tends to fall into that latter category, not because I don’t believe it is important, but because I recognize the insights that others have go beyond my own in this area. I believe I can better contribute to furthering evangelism by doing some of this background work that I hope others will draw upon.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: A Call for Denominational Renovation

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

In a series of previous posts, I have depicted United Methodist denominational institutions as declining, crumbling even, beset by a host of long-term pressures from both within and beyond the denomination, all of which have been compounded in recent years by crises of denominational division and the COVID-19 pandemic. I have argued that these pressures towards decline are far beyond the ability of these institutions to manage through an approach of incremental and inward-focused maintenance.

Instead, the time has come for major denominational renovation. Renovation is a process in which an organization undertakes extensive rethinking of its institutions, their purposes, and how they go about achieving their purposes by trying to produce certain types of regular behavior. The last time the UMC substantially renovated its institutions was in 1972, in the wake of the merger of The Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren Church. Nearly 50 years later, it is far past time to do so again.

The need for institutional renovation stems from the nature of the forces producing institutional decline in the UMC. I have argued that the decline of institutions in the UMC is a result of decreased institutional relevance, the delegitimization of institutions by special interests in the denomination, a decreased ability of members to pay the time and effort costs associated with denominational institutions, and the failure of denominational institutions to respond adequately to moments of crisis.

Maintenance, however, has led to institutional complexification, amplifying opportunities for elite capture of institutions and a decreased ability by average constituents to participate in those institutions. Maintenance cannot address questions of institutional relevance. Since maintenance is internally focused, it is a poor strategy to address external challenges, such as the time squeeze limiting members’ ability to give of their time and money. Finally, the failures of denominational institutions in recent crises are further evidence that a more significant response to institutional decline is required than further maintenance.

We are past the point of maintenance. We need substantial renovation.

Yet in this regard, the UMC is fortunate. A division with the Global Methodist Church represents an opportunity for the remaining UMC to enter a process of institutional renovation. Mergers have consistently been an occasion for Methodism to periodically revamp its institutions. Having missed the chance to do that with the merger with Cote d’Ivoire in 2008, the UMC will have to content itself with a division as an opportunity to reassess its institutions.

And an opportunity it is. Traditionalists recognize the opportunity they have to revamp denominational institutions by establishing a new denomination; those remaining in the UMC should not miss the opportunity they have to make overdue changes while there is fluidity in the denomination.

Yet to recognize this division as an opportunity, those remaining in the UMC must avoid scapegoating their anxieties about and frustrations with denominational institutions in either of two ways.

First, they must avoid scapegoating Traditionalists for the dysfunctions of denominational institutions. As previously described, Traditionalists have de-legitimized denominational institutions, but they are far from the only force pushing those institutions towards decline.

In this regard, it is important to avoid thinking of the division itself as the thing that will relieve pressures on denominational institutions. While division will alleviate one current crisis and will reduce some of the pressures from special interests, it will by no means solve most of the challenges of the denomination’s institutions, which result either from external societal forces or from having a system of denominational institutions that has not been substantially updated in a half century. Division creates a window of opportunity for changes to strengthen the denomination; it is not itself the solution to all the problems in the denomination.

Second, those staying in the UMC must avoid scapegoating leaders for the dysfunctions of denominational institutions. It is easy to attribute the current situation of institutional decline to a failure of leadership. While not without truth, such a view can be dismissive of the magnitude of challenges facing denominational institutions and the extent to which denominational institutions are geared towards maintenance as a primary strategy.

The biggest failure of institutional leaders in the UMC has perhaps been too great a fidelity to the institutions of the church as they currently exist. In this regard, they are caught in a paradox: They are selected to care for and maintain institutions as they are, which by design are supposed to be consistent and not change much. Yet, by resisting changes for the sake of institutional preservation, leaders subject those institutions to on-going pressures that, over time, have substantially weakened them, making them more vulnerable to collapse.

Moreover, focusing on the culpability of leaders misses a significant point. Whoever may deserve blame for the current situation (and I have suggested that it is a broad group), determining blame is not the same as determining a strategy for how to address institutional decline. Regardless of the errors up to this point, right now it is time to rethink our institutions.

If those remaining in the UMC are convinced that denominational renovation is necessary, there are a variety of ways to go about it. Work on the Global Book of Discipline could become a platform for rethinking the church’s structures.

General Conference could create a series of commissions to work on denominational revamping, as the 1968 Uniting General Conference did. There could be an extra session of General Conference to support the work of those commissions, as there was in 1970.

General Conference could even pass an amendment at its next meeting (to be approved in annual conference voting) to allow for a future General Conference to function as a constitutional convention, which could allow major changes to be passed more efficiently than the normal one-resolution-per-paragraph method and perhaps with less possibility of judicial review blocking any major denominational revisions.

My point here is not to advocate for one strategy for implementing the work of systemic and extensive renovation of The United Methodist Church’s denominational institutions. My point here is simply to insist that that renovation must happen, by whatever means possible. The alternative is further institutional decline. Those who love the church must be willing to let it change or risk condemning it to a slow death.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: Institutional Maintenance and Expansion

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Throughout this fall, I have been exploring the issue of the decline of denominational institutions in The United Methodist Church. In these posts, I have followed Patrick Wyman’s definition of institutions: (https://patrickwyman.substack.com/p/what-are-institutions-and-why-are): “An institution is a system of rules, beliefs, norms, and organizations that together generate a regularity of behavior.” I have defined institutional decline, then, as a change by which institutions are no longer able to produce the same sorts of behaviors that they have previously or at least not to the same extent.

Note that not all forms of institutional change constitute institutional decline. Institutions have a bias against change because their purpose is focused on “regularity of behavior.” Yet, some changes may be neutral or may even help institutions be better able to generate regular behavior. Indeed, since the world changes all the time, some institutional changes are a necessary response to external forces to ensure that the same sorts of behavior continue to be generated regularly.

Thus, we can define institutional strengthening as changes to an institution that increase or maintain its ability to generate regular behavior. Institutional strengthening is the opposite of institutional decline, though both are forms of institutional change.

We might think about three forms of institutional strengthening: institutional maintenance, institutional expansion, and institutional renovation. Institutional maintenance includes relatively small, routine changes in an institution that are designed to preserve its ability to produce existing regular behaviors. An example is a change in provider for clergy health insurance with the aim of keeping costs and benefits the same. Institutional expansion includes changes to increase the amount or extent of an existing regular behavior. An example is starting new Walk to Emmaus chapters and holding more walks in existing chapters. Institutional renovation is reconsidering which behaviors an institution should produce and how it should produce them. An example is an annual conference ceasing support for a children’s service agency and instead promoting the formation of Fresh Expressions in congregations.

Most of the time, institutions and their leaders are focused on maintenance and expansion. This is as it should be. Institutions exist for regularity of behavior, and both maintenance and expansion take as a given the nature of that regular behavior. Institutional renovation calls it into question. It is impossible to always be in renovation mode, since if an organization were constantly questioning what behaviors it should produce, it would be ineffective at producing any regular behavior.

Institutional maintenance and expansion, however, have their own limitations. Some of these limitations can ironically end up creating an additional set of forces leading to institutional decline, and maintenance and expansion are not sufficient strategies for all situations.

One result of a focus on maintenance and expansion is a general trend towards institutional complexity. Like many institutions in the United States, the institutions of the UMC have evolved towards greater comprehensiveness (that is, anticipating as many scenarios as possible and prescribing actions in those scenarios) and towards legal protectionism (that is, guarding against the threat of lawsuit).

These two driving forces – greater comprehensiveness and legal protectionism – are a byproduct of institutional maintenance and expansion. Institutional maintenance tries to address unique scenarios that raise questions about the regular behaviors of an institution. Maintenance in the form of greater comprehensiveness eliminates “glitches” that might disrupt those regular behaviors. Institutional expansion creates new scenarios in which an institution’s desired behaviors are generated, thus also expanding institutional comprehensiveness. Legal protectionism often goes along with the elaboration of possible challenging scenarios and seeks to guard against threats that could disrupt an institution’s ability to function.

The result of these two trends is a preference for formal rules instead of informal norms and thus an increasing number of rules for the operation of institutions. The upshot of such developments is that while institutions are not necessarily more expensive to operate than they were fifty years ago (though in some instances, they are), they do require more specialized knowledge. Therefore, fewer constituents have the knowledge necessary to maintain those increasingly rule-bound institutions.

To put it in concrete terms, while the percentage of local church budgets collected in apportionments has gone down by 50% in the last 50 years, the length of the Book of Discipline has gone up by 50%. Denominational bureaucracies are less expensive to the local church, but all of the institutions of The United Methodist Church are more opaque to the average lay person or even the average clergy person.

Therefore, there are fewer people willing and able to navigate the complex procedures required to serve as conference delegates or to participate in denominational committees. With denominational institutions comprehensible to fewer people, that increases the chances of both loss of relevance and elite capture for those institutions. Thus, when maintenance and expansion lead to increased complexity, that can actually lead to rather than prevent institutional decline.

Moreover, even when institutional maintenance and expansion avoid such pitfalls, there are inherent limits to what they can accomplish. Maintenance and expansion seek to preserve and expand institutions as they are. Thus, they are ill-equipped to address questions of institutional relevance. They assume that the behaviors an institution seeks to produce are the right behaviors to focus on, even if there is less call for such behavior among an institution’s constituency.

Moreover, maintenance as a strategy is generally inward focused. It seeks to make relatively small, internal changes to ensure smooth organizational functioning. Therefore, it may be unable to address significant challenges that result from disruptive pressures from an organization’s external environment. Such pressures, since they originate from beyond an organization, are outside the realm of what maintenance seeks to control and indeed may be beyond an organization’s ability to control at all.

Therefore, institutional renovation is occasionally necessary. Institutions benefit from periodic reassessment of their functions and constituency to ensure continual adjustment to their environments. Without renovation and the periodic attention it brings to questions such as institutional relevance and external environment, it is impossible for organizations to adequately balance the tensions that inevitably build up between an institution and its environment. Renovation will not free institutions from all external pressures but can help ensure that the amount of pressure is manageable.

It remains an outstanding question, though, of how and when an institution determines a major revision is necessary. I would argue that The United Methodist Church is at a point where it requires institutional renovation, not merely maintenance or expansion of its existing institutions. I will elaborate in my next post.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: The Impact of COVID and Denominational Crisis

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Having looked at various reasons for the decline of denominational institutions—the unwillingness and/or inability of their constituency to support them and de-legitimization from vested interests—there remains one last set of contributing factors to explore: the impact of crises on denominational institutions, specifically internal denominational conflict and the COVID-19 pandemic.

The basic insight here is that the more institutions fail to serve the purposes for which they were created, the weaker they become. When institutions are unable to produce their intended regular behaviors, it reduces their ability to do the same in the future. Unless skillfully addressed, institutional failure usually begets further institutional decline.

In large part, this is because institutional malfunction delegitimizes institutions by lowering constituents’ expectations and willingness to have their behavior shaped by the institution in the future. Regardless of whether the sentiment on the part of constituents is “That institution won’t work for me” or “I don’t want to work for that institution” or some combination of the two, the result is decreased institutional capacity to shape the behaviors of its constituents.

While such institutional breakdown can happen at any time, crises are particularly fraught situations that make failure more likely.

Unfortunately for its institutions, The United Methodist Church has been in a prolonged crisis in the form of the debate over the place of LGBTQ+ persons in the church. This crisis has undercut the institutions of the church in at least three ways.

First, the conflict between Traditionalists and Progressives in the UMC has led to the polarization of almost everything in the church, including its institutions. Thus, one’s willingness to participate in and give heed to the church’s institutions, from the boards and agencies to the Judicial Council to the appointive process to apportionments, becomes a function of whether one sees those institutions as aligning with one’s own theopolitical stance. Support for institutions is no longer a given part of denominational membership; it is a political statement in an ongoing conflict.

Second, the debate over sexuality has undermined many of the institutions of the denomination because of their failure to resolve the debate. A mutually acceptable for both sides solution may always have been a fantasy, but many institutions within the church have still tried and failed to find such a solution. This includes General Conference, the Council of Bishops, and the Judicial Council. When the highest authorities within the denomination are unable to resolve a crisis, it undercuts the membership’s trust in and expectations of their ability to successfully regulate behavior.

Third, the denomination’s divisions have made it increasingly difficult for any other business to get accomplished. The debate between Traditionalists and Progressives has come to dominate more and more spaces within the denomination, which has reduced the capacity of denominational institutions to produce regular behavior even in matters unrelated to the main debate. There is less time and attention available, so less gets done. This lack of capacity can lead to the inability to carry out even routine other forms of business.

Of course, denominational division is not the only crisis the UMC has faced in recent years. The COVID-19 pandemic has added an additional layer of crisis. And, as in discussions of other sorts of institutions in US society and the world, the pandemic has both amplified and accelerated the pressures already facing denominational institutions. Again, this has taken several forms.

Related to the challenges of denominational division, the pandemic has forced the postponement of many denominational meetings. While necessary, such delays have forced United Methodists to devise other means for making decisions and doing work. In the process, it has raised questions about the value of traditional means for doing so. If it’s possible for the work of the church to get done without meetings of the standard institutions (such as General Conference), and if the main function of those institutions is just to serve as a forum for fighting, how important is it really to have those institutions?

The COVID crisis has revealed another way in which institutional weakness begets institutional weakness. Many annual conferences in the United States have struggled over whether and how to issue guidance to their congregations about in-person gatherings and health precautions during the pandemic. Especially in light of the politization of COVID precautions within secular society, denominational leaders have been faced with a tough choice:

On the one hand, annual conference leaders could issue guidance, knowing that some pastors and congregations would not follow that guidance. But issuing guidance that one knows will not be followed (and cannot be enforced) exposes the weakness of an institution: It shows that the institution is unable to produce regular behavior among its constituents. Moreover, if congregations flaunt annual conference guidance in this area without consequence, it emboldens them to flaunt guidance in other areas as well.

On the other hand, annual conference leaders could not issue guidance or issue guidance that leaves decisions up to pastors and congregations. This avoids exposing the weakness of annual conferences’ inability to produce required behavior. But it ends up weakening the institution in another way: By doing nothing, it raises questions among those who would like guidance about why the institution is not doing anything. If the institution is not going to provide guidance during a crisis, what good is it? Why pay for an institution if it is not going to serve you when you need it most?

The result of these overlapping crises is that the institutions of the church emerge weakened. People have fewer expectations that denominational institutions will try to influence their religious behaviors, and people are less willing to go along with those institutions when they do. And this process compounds upon itself: failure begets weakness, which makes future failure more likely, thereby accelerating decline.

Having now surveyed the variety of forces that are currently conspiring against denominational institutions, I will turn in my next post to the question of whether there is anything that could be done to support or strengthen denominational institutions amid such a climate.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: The Time Squeeze

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

For the past two weeks, I have been exploring reasons why the institutions of The United Methodist Church are in decline, at least in the United States. For the purpose of this analysis, I have defined decline as a reduced capacity to produce regular behaviors among the constituency of the UMC, which is primarily its members.

My previous two posts have looked at choices, motivations, and strategies among United Methodists that have had the effect of weakening institutions, either by reducing the time and effort members choose to devote to them or by delegitimizing them as a source of norms.

For this analysis, I want to look at a series of forces outside the denomination that have reduced the ability of United Methodists to support their denominational institutions, even when they see those institutions as legitimate and are motivated to contribute time, effort, and money to those institutions.

These are forces that originate within the economic and social structures of American society that have left denominational members (and potential members) with less time and energy to devote to the maintenance and continuation of denominational institutions, even if, all other things being equal, they might be interested in doing so.

The key insight here is that many church institutions, from local congregations up through denominational bodies, have traditionally relied on significant amounts of volunteer labor to function. Volunteer labor has supported everything from charitable work to Sunday schools to committees to the two weeks plus prep time it takes to serve as a General Conference delegate. Moreover, much of the institutions of the church are structured around people being able to contribute such volunteer labor on a regular basis. Yet economic and cultural factors have reduced the time and energy available for such regular volunteer labor from several different groups: women, retirees, the working class, and the middle class, especially parents.

While women in the workforce may seem like a given nowadays, it is worth remembering that in 1972, when most of the institutions of the UMC were set, female paid workforce participation in the United States was 44%. For the past two decades, it has been around 60%. The change is slightly more dramatic for married women. This transformation has been about both cultural factors (more opportunities for women) and economic factors (families have increasingly relied on women’s wages to maintain or expand their earning power).

While there have certainly been beneficial aspects to women’s paid employment, more women in the workforce means left fewer women available to serve as volunteers to keep denominational institutions going. It’s one thing to organize Sunday school in your congregation or serve as the treasurer for the annual conference UMW when working in the home. It’s another when working 40-50 hours a week outside the home.

The reduced availability of homemakers as a source of volunteer labor has put greater emphasis on another traditional pool of volunteers: retirees. Yet here too, there have been economic and cultural forces eating into the ability of retirees to contribute their time and efforts to churches and denominational institutions, as older Americans are working longer and filling their retirement years with additional commitments.

After decades of falling, the average age of retirement and the percentage of US residents over 65 in the workforce have been creeping back up in the past two decades. While there are a variety of reasons that older adults might choose to work, financial constraints are one reason. Changes to retirement plans over the past several decades have moved toward less generous benefits and have shifted much of the financial risk associated with saving for retirement toward individuals. Even among those individuals who do retire, the Baby Boom generation has embraced a model of “active retirement,” with increased travel and leisure activities that take them away from regular church commitments.

Economic and cultural developments impacting working adults have also left them less able to contribute the volunteer time necessary to maintain denominational institutions, though for different reasons in different groups.

Working-class Americans have been increasingly alienated from mainline Protestantism, and institutional religion in general, over the past several decades for a variety of social and cultural factors. Yet even working-class people who are part of United Methodist churches may be less able now than in years past to partake in and contribute to the institutions of the denomination.

While life has always been precarious for those among the poor and working classes in the United States, the amount of precariousness has increased in recent decades. Low wage jobs increasingly have erratic and unpredictable schedules, often including work on Sunday mornings, thus making regular participation in church and its institutions difficult. There’s a difference between working a regular shift at a diner that was closed on Sundays in 1972 and working at a fast-food restaurant that’s open seven days a week in 2021, but where you never find out your shift schedule more than a week in advance.

The social and economic safety net to support poor and working-class Americans has also been steadily dismantled over the past four decades. Even where it remains, it has often been made intentionally more difficult to navigate to discourage people from using it. Thus, much of the surplus time and energy of working-class church members may be used up trying to navigate obtuse government and school bureaucracies to arrange the supports they and their families need instead of dedicating that surplus to helping ensure the smooth functioning of church institutions.

Thus, life for lower-income Americans has become increasingly chaotic with fewer supports. Some working-class Americans would likely be interested in being part of United Methodism and its denominational institutions but find themselves unable to pay the time costs involved.

Finally, there are middle-class Americans, who also find themselves with less time and energy, especially with the rise of always-on-call work cultures, increased expectations on parents, and decreased support for families.

There has been a proliferation of think pieces in the past decade about burnout, especially as a phenomenon among middle-class and upper middle-class professionals. This is a group that traditionally might have had the flexibility to take time from their jobs to dedicate to church efforts. Yet new technologies such as laptops and smart phones and increased economic anxieties about middle-class instability, among other forces, have driven these professionals to working more, having fewer “off” hours, and having less mental and physical energy for endeavors outside of work, such as church.

In addition, for middle-class parents, there are increased expectations around active parenting compared to fifty years ago and frequently fewer supports for parents. Moreover, the economic anxieties of the middle class have driven parents to enroll their children in an increasing number of activities, including on Sunday morning, to try to ensure that their child will have an opportunity to get into the right sort of college that ensures the right sort of job that will make a middle-class lifestyle still possible for them. Thus, middle-class parents are run ragged, with little left over to devote to church.

All these economic and cultural forces (combining personal choices and structural pressures) which take more from people and make them responsible for a greater load of their well-being and that of their families leaves all these groups – women, retirees, the working class, and the middle class, especially parents – with less to dedicate to the church. Yet, as discussed in a previous post, denominational institutions, like all other institutions, require time, energy, and money to persist. When time and energy are increasingly squeezed out of people, denominational institutions must suffer.

The forces I have described over the past three posts have operated in the best of times. Next week, I will examine the impact of COVID and other crises on church institutions.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: Opposition from Vested Interests

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Last week, I began to explore possible reasons why the institutions of The United Methodist Church are in decline, at least in the United States. For the purpose of this analysis, I am defining decline as a reduced capacity to produce regular behaviors among the constituency of the UMC, which is primarily its members.

Last week, I examined the case for a loss of institutional relevance as a factor in explaining decline. That analysis looked at the constituency of the UMC’s institutions generally, and it focused on the willingness of that constituency to pay the costs of time, effort, and money needed to sustain institutions.

Yet, looking at the constituency of an institution as a whole misses important details. No institution’s constituency is monolithic, and different groups within that constituency will have varying attitudes towards the institution. When a specific group within the general constituency has a unique set of interests in and attitudes towards an institution and the motivation to pursue those interests independently of the interests of the constituency as a whole, that group forms a vested interest within the constituency.

Part of the reason for the decline of UMC institutions comes from the actions of four different (and largely distinct from one another) groups of vested interests and their impact on the perceived legitimacy of the UMC’s institutions. Institutions require not just resources to keep functioning but also perceived legitimacy. Rules, beliefs, and norms are an important part of institutions. But these all require a sense of legitimacy to influence people’s behavior. People largely do not adhere to norms that they see as illegitimate. Thus, a loss of perceived legitimacy leads to institutional decline.

One vested interest within the constituency of an institution is those running the institutions. This is particularly true for institutions as organizations. While in many cases, the interests of those running an institution overlap with the interests of the general constituency, there is also a possibility that an institution may be “captured” by elites running it and, as a result, the functions of that institution may be altered to serve the interests of those elites and not the interests of the general constituency. When that happens, it de-legitimizes the institution and makes the general constituency less willing to pay the costs of maintaining an institution, leading to decline.

This is a favorite critique of conservatives within the UMC of the boards and agencies and of the bishops. According to conservatives, the actions of boards, agencies, and bishops reflect elite liberal interests that are “out of touch” with the general membership of the denomination, thereby making them illegitimate sources of authority. UMW’s continued strong direct financial support by members despite liberal social positions suggests that the critique of elite liberal capture leading to alienation of general membership is not true in all cases, or at least not for the reasons conservatives allege.

Still, that does not mean that insider capture of institutions never occurs. Certainly, bishops and agency executives tend to differ from the general membership of the church in matters such as education and life experience, which gives them different perspectives, and they are closer to and more invested in church institutions than the average lay person. That means that what institutional leaders understand as in the best interests of their institutions does not always align with or make sense to those more peripherally connected to those institutions, who may therefore view leaders’ positions as illegitimate.

Conservatives themselves represent another vested interest within the denomination that has contributed to the decline of its institutions. As suggested above, conservatives object to many of the functions of boards, agencies, and bishops for ideological reasons. Since the formation of Good News in the mid-1960s, conservatives have had a sense that the institutions of the denomination are closed to them and do not reflect their interests.

Therefore, conservatives have been engaged in a long-term effort to de-legitimize many of the institutions of the denomination. The various lines of critique advanced by conservatives against boards, agencies, bishops, apportionments, and other aspects of the denominational infrastructure are well known to those familiar with the UMC.

The impact of this campaign of de-legitimation is that constituents of UMC institutions who are influenced by conservative leaders are less likely to conform their behaviors to the institutions of the UMC, regardless of the nature of those behaviors. In other words, it is not just that conversative-influenced members refuse to participate in particular behaviors they see as objectionable. Instead, because of de-legitimization, they are less likely to cooperate with all aspects of denominational institutions.

The other thing that conservatives have done to undermine the institutions of the UMC is to start alternative institutions. As a result, conservative UMC members have alternatives for shaping their worship, small group, mission participation, conferencing and other church behaviors. To give a concrete example, they don’t need to purchase Sunday School materials from the United Methodist Publishing House; they can buy them from Seedbed.

A third vested interest (or set of vested interests) also feels that the institutions of the denomination are closed to them and do not reflect their interests. This vested interest includes racial, ethnic, and sexual minorities within the church. Unlike the conservatives, however, these groups are generally interested in reforming the institutions of the church to make them more open, rather than tearing them down.

While many no longer remember this, the first action of Black Methodists for Church Renewal was to protest the General Board of Global Ministries and demand that GBGM devote more attention and funding to issues related to racial justice in the United States. BMCR did not want to abolish GBGM or replace it with an alternative mission agency, but they did have a sharp critique of the agency as an institution. One can think of more recent examples in the sorts of critiques of bishops and conferencing advanced by those supportive of gay marriage and gay ordination.

While the intention of these critiques may be to reform rather than undercut institutions, the critiques advanced can still have the effect of de-legitimizing those institutions in the eyes of those sympathetic to the critiques. This de-legitimizing then also has implications for United Methodists’ behavior when they are less willing to pay apportionments or use the church’s logo or allow the mechanisms of General Conference to happen.

A fourth vested interest, one which overlaps at different points with the two previous vested interests, is megachurches. Megachurches, regardless of their theopolitical ideology, have incentives to either actively or passively resist some of the institutions of the denomination.

Megachurches have an incentive to actively resist the frequent change of pastors that is implied by the appointive system and to resist the paying of apportionments, which can be quite expensive for megachurches. While most megachurches do still pay apportionments, they frequently function as exceptions from the general system of itinerant ministry, which has the effect of weakening itineracy as a denominational institution.

Moreover, even when not trying to oppose the institutions of the denomination, the model of megachurches can end up corroding them. Megachurches are built on their own brand, not on the brand of their denominational affiliation. Moreover, megachurches have the funds to create their own resources and programming separate from those offered by denominational institutions. While some megachurches are good about supporting denominational agencies or about sharing their material with denominational networks, conforming to denominational norms is essentially optional for most megachurches, and there are almost always ways in which they do not do so.

That refusal to follow denominational norms is itself a weaking of denominational institutions, but when megachurches are held up as the exemplars of success within the denomination, that further weakens denominational institutions. The implicit message is that there is no need to follow denominational norms in terms of worship, programming, and resources, since some of the most successful churches in the denomination do not do so.

The point here is not to offer a moral critique of any of these vested interests. Depending on one’s theo-political views, the motivations of these various groups will be seen as good, bad, or indifferent. My overall point is simply to point out that the cumulative impact of de-legitimization (and occasional withholding of funds and effort) by these vested interests weakens denominational institutions.

Yet there is another set of significant forces that have been pushing United Methodist institutions towards decline, forces that originate not within the constituency but beyond it. I will examine these forces next week.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: Declining Institutional Relevance

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Last week, I explored the decline of institutions, defined as “system[s] of rules, beliefs, norms, and organizations that together generate a regularity of behavior.” I indicated that The United Methodist Church as a denomination is composed of many institutions, and these institutions have experienced decline in the sense of no longer being about to produce the same regular behaviors as in the past, at least not to the same extent as previously.

Yet the question remains: Why have the institutions of The United Methodist Church experienced decline over the past several decades?

To answer that question, it is necessary to begin with an observation: Institutions require resources of time and money to keep running. Although most institutions are set up to continue indefinitely, that continuation is only possible because of the time, effort, and money that humans are willing to devote to the maintenance of those organizations.

A wisely established institution will include the dedication of time and money for its own maintenance as one of the regular behaviors that it seeks to generate. Thus, when institutions are running well, people willingly contribute the time and money necessary to keep them running well, often without thinking much about it.

As an analogy, think about a subscription service. Most subscription services are set to automatically renew every month, with the money being directly withdrawn from your credit card. Netflix as an institution is set up to make your regular financial contribution as easy and thoughtless as possible. While theoretically, you could cancel Netflix at any point, practically, you probably don’t ask yourself every month, “Should I continue to subscribe to Netflix?”

Similarly, while people do need to contribute time and money to the perpetuation of institutions, for the most part, they are not asking themselves every month or year, “Should I continue to put in this time and effort?” They simply do it because of the inertia of habit.

Nevertheless, even when the maintenance of institutions is routine and incentivized by those very institutions, it is still possible for an institution’s constituency to collectively decide that they are no longer interested in doing the work or paying the money to keep an institution going. Or the constituency decides that they’re no longer interested in having their behaviors shaped by that institution and would like to shape them another way. Thus, for instance, people decide they’d rather shop online rather than put in the effort to drive to the mall, and therefore malls as institutions face hard times. Such decisions need not be conscious but can instead be the cumulative effect of many small decisions that over time shape patterns of behavior.

Hence, one possible explanation for the decline in church institutions—from general agencies to the hymnal to the system of itineracy and beyond—is that United Methodists are no longer interested in putting in the effort to keep those institutions going, no longer interested in having their behavior shaped by a denomination, and/or are more interested in shaping those behaviors around other principles (congregational, secular, consumerist, etc.) than denominational ones. In other words, United Methodist institutions have lost relevance with their constituency, which is United Methodists generally.

There is credence to this theory, as a quick review of United Methodist history shows. The institutions of the UMC by and large took on their present form by 1972 and have had only minor adjustments in the 50+ years since then. Prior to 1972, most major church institutions in our denominational predecessors were majorly revised for one reason or another at least every 30 years.

The functions the current UMC institutions were created to perform were all functions that made sense in the world of the late 60s and early 70s. Yet while there has been only tweaking of most church institutions since then, much in the world has changed. Think about how much of the rest of the collective behaviors of US Americans are different than they were in 1972, let alone the relationships among US Americans and other parts of the world. There have been profound transformations in most economic, governmental, political, social, and other institutions since 1972. That there have not been the same profound changes in the institutions of the UMC makes it plausible that these institutions have lost relevance over time.

Moreover, we can think of particular examples of instances in which new institutions have arisen that have provided an alternative and more attractive way for United Methodists to achieve the same ends.

For instance, short term mission trips as an institution have replaced older forms of mission involvement through the sending and support of long-term missionaries. It’s not that United Methodists don’t want to be involved in mission anymore; it is that there are new possibilities for how to do that now that were not as widely in 1972 but have now become available because of technological and social changes in the surrounding world.

Another example might be the increased use of contemporary worship music in US church services, a transformation facilitated through the rise of CCLI as an alternative institution to the hymnal. CCLI was founded in 1988, the year before the current United Methodist Hymnal was published. Over time, the power of the UMH to generate musical behaviors in UMC worship services has declined as the power of CCLI to do so has risen.

In some instances, the services church institutions were set up to provide have largely been taken over by the government, non-profits, or businesses. This transition can represent a successful secularization of church functions, though it still deprives church institutions of their purpose.

As an example, we no longer rely on the church to provide hospitals and retirement homes. While these were an innovative way for the church to care for society when introduced a century or more ago, now these functions are routinely supplied by other sources: government social security and healthcare programs, private hospitals, and secular insurance and retirement investment options.

In other instances, the call for the services provided by church institutions or the willingness of constituents to pay for those services has decreased as a result of social and ideological shifts, within the church and in the world at large.

Thus, for instance, itineracy as a form of ministry service is less attractive now in a world where dual-career households are common than it was 50 or more years ago, when single-income households were much more typical. Social shifts around employment have made the institution of itinerant ministry less attractive for potential ministerial candidates.

As another example, an increased emphasis on choice, customization, and individuality has pervaded American culture in recent decades, affecting everything from how products are marketed to how government-sponsored college savings plans operate. In a world of increased emphasis on choice as an ideology, sticking to the denominational norm for any type of church-related activity is less attractive since it inhibits congregational or individual free choice.

Yet just because decreased relevance to the general constituency is a factor eroding support for denominational institutions does not mean that we should assume that it is the only factor. Instead, in two following posts, I will examine the role of vested interests in the fate of institutions and the role of a constituency’s ability to maintain institutions as a separate issue from its desire to do so.

The UMC and Institutional Decline: What Are Institutions, and What Is Institutional Decline?

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

The United States is, it seems, in a time of institutional decline. There has been a lot of (digital) ink spilled in the last five years about the turmoil in and disruption of political institutions in the United States. But already twenty years ago, sociologist Robert Putnam was writing about the impact of declining social capital on civic organizations and other communal institutions.

As many commentators (Putnam included) have noted, a decline in institutions in general is bad for religion, at least in its institutional variety. Yet it is particularly problematic for denominational religion. Congregations, which are most Americans’ primary connection to institutional religion, are their own set of institutions, but denominations add an additional set of institutions to those of the congregation. Thus, denominations are doubly threatened by institutional decline: It can impact both the denomination and its constituent congregations.

If, then, the United States is in a period of general decline in multiple forms of institutions, that trend is likely to have significant importance for The United Methodist Church as a denomination.

To get a better grasp on what is at stake for The United Methodist Church, though, it is necessary to get a better handle on the scope of the problem: What exactly are institutions, what does it mean for them to decline, and why do they decline?

Historian Patrick Wyman, drawing on the work of economic historian Avner Greif, has defined an institution in this way (https://patrickwyman.substack.com/p/what-are-institutions-and-why-are): “An institution is a system of rules, beliefs, norms, and organizations that together generate a regularity of behavior.” While many might think an institution is the same as an organization, Wyman’s definition gives a broader scope.

Applied to the UMC, this definition highlights the wide variety of institutions at work in the denomination. Certainly, the boards and agencies as central organizations count as institutions. But so do things like the appointive system of ministry, episcopal oversight, the paying of apportionments, the practice of conferencing, and The United Methodist Hymnal (1989). Each of these works in its own way to create regular behaviors among United Methodists, ranging from worship to pastoral ministry to finances to mission.

Institutions exist to serve a particular constituency. In the case of denominational institutions, that constituency is ostensibly the members of The United Methodist Church. Yet the issue of identifying an institution’s constituency is actually more complex. There are subgroups within the nominal constituency (say, for instance, clergy and laity in the UMC), and an institution may impact the behavior of those outside of its nominal constituency as well, which may then give them a vested interest in the performance of that institution. For example, the UMC Social Principles (which are a form of institution) are against gambling, which impacts not only United Methodists but also non-United Methodist who may try to expand gambling in an area, only to encounter opposition from United Methodists.

To say that institutions exist to produce regular behaviors is to say that institutions are intended to influence the actions of individuals and groups on an on-going basis. Regularity implies predictability and persistence. In order to “generate a regularity of behavior,” then, institutions are generally set up to continue indefinitely. Changes in behavior make them less regular, so institutions have a bias against change. Institutions are set up to continue; change is in many ways the exception.

One sees this persistence in most of the institutions of The United Methodist Church. Episcopal oversight is not a limited-time practice in the UMC; it’s a central feature of the denomination, intended to persist over time, even as there have been shifts in what episcopal oversight looks like in the 200+ years of American Methodism. Similarly, while the amounts asked and collected in apportionments vary from year to year (or quadrennium to quadrennium), there is no sense that apportionments are going to be a feature of the church for these four years, and then they will stop, to be replaced by something else. Even when it comes to denominational hymnals, where it has been common practice to issue a new hymnal every generation, the concept of a hymnal as a means to shape worship has carried throughout (most) of Methodist history.

Of course, as acknowledged, change does happen to institutions, in big and small ways, suddenly or gradually, because of internal and external factors. Even though institutions are set up to produce regularity, some amount of change is not incompatible with that purpose. The world in which institutions exist is always changing, so it is impossible for those changes not to influence institutions in some ways. Institutions could only be truly unchanging in some sort of abstract, ahistorical sense. Nor is all institutional change is bad for the institution; some change allows them to adapt to continue to serve their function.

Decline, however, is a particular form of institutional change. Institutional decline is a loss of institutional power to generate regular behavior. Institutions decline when they are no longer able to produce the same sorts of behaviors that they have previously or at least not to the same extent.

Hymnals can provide a good example. For most of history, the official denominational hymnal had significant power to shape what sorts of songs Methodist congregations sang; the liturgies used for communion, marriages, and funerals; and even the order of worship services. Yet the denominational hymnal’s role as an institution that sets norms for United Methodist worship behavior has declined. Due to the advent of contemporary worship, a growing recognition of the significance of ethnic and global worship styles, the availability of worship resources online, and other factors, the hymnal is a less significant force in shaping the worship activities of any given United Methodist congregation on any given Sunday. Depending on your view, this development may be good, bad, or indifferent, but regardless of its moral valuation, it represents a form of institutional decline.

At the extreme of institutional decline is institutional failure or institutional collapse. In these cases, an institution completely ceases to exist. Were the United Methodist Publishing House to close permanently without a designated successor organization, that would be an example of institutional collapse. Institutional collapse is the most dramatic form of decline and gathers the most attention.

Yet, while institutional failure is sudden, it is usually preceded by a long period of institutional decline that is the result of subtle shifts that happen over time due to long-standing pressures. To take the example of the Publishing House again, if it ever does close, it will not be a case of brisk sales and comfortable revenues one day and then closed the next. It will be the result of years of falling sales, shrinking budgets, and reduced staffing and capacity.

As the examples of The United Methodist Hymnal and the state of the United Methodist Publishing House suggest, many, perhaps even most, United Methodist institutions are indeed facing decline. Moreover, this decline goes beyond the numeric decline in the number of US United Methodists. It’s not that UMC institutions are in decline because there are fewer US United Methodists to generate regular behavior among. It’s also the case that UMC institutions are struggling to generate regular behaviors among the US United Methodists that remain in the same ways that they have in the past.

That leaves the question of why. The answers, it turns out, are multi-faceted. I will examine them over the course of a series of subsequent blogs.

After the Pandemic, Pastors Are Done Enduring Ministry

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Last week, I suggested that after the pandemic, people are done enduring wrongs. While that piece was primarily focused on movements in broader society, I connected this thesis to the church too. I wrote that, while there is an opportunity here to join in work toward the kingdom of God, "[f]or some, the things that they are no longer willing to endure are connected to the church." I want to explore that suggestion further in this week's post and a following one next week.

This week, I'd like to explore what it means that for some pastors, the things that they are no longer willing to endure are connected to their roles in and experience of church, and thus, after the pandemic, an increased number of pastors are done enduring ministry.

First, I must say out that I am far from the first to point this trend out. There has been a series of articles over the past year in both religious and secular press describing the exodus of pastors, including these sources: The Alabama Baptist, Kentucky Today, Religion News Service (also reprinted in The Christian Century and USA Today), ChurchLeaders.com, Lifeway Research, Business Insider, and Christianity Today. More citations could be added too.

It seems like this exodus of ministers is being driven by fall-out from a combination of the top headlines of last year: the COVID-19 epidemic, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the extremely contentious election cycle. All of these stories have made pastoral work harder, and misinformation related to the first and third of these stories has further added to pastors' challenges. The cumulative effects have been stressful and have left pastors asking questions about their place in the church.

The pandemic involved significant stress for pastors in figuring out what to do in the face of church shut-downs and how to do it, how to made decisions about remaining closed or reopening, and how to navigate the organizational dynamics of congregants' opinions on questions about reopening and COVID-19 precautions. Questions about how to meaningfully address racial conflict in the United States, especially when such issues are polarizing to (white) congregations, added to pastors' stress. Then trying to promote Christian love in a political climate of extreme division made the job more complicated, especially for pastors serving politically mixed churches.

In each of these instances, these issues presented large, complex challenges that required significant adaptation and presented no easy solution. In many instances, pastors felt alone in trying to navigate these challenges. Thus, the substantial stress of responding to such issues has been enough to leave some pastors wanting a break.

But these issues also raised questions for many pastors about their relationship to their congregants and denominational leaders. Pastors risking COVID infection for themselves and, sometimes, their families to do ministry wondered whether congregants or denominational leaders cared whether they got sick. Pastors asked whether their white congregants were more attached to white supremacy than they were to Jesus' gospel of love for people of all races and nations. Pastors watching their congregants write vicious or false things on Facebook, either about the election or the pandemic, questioned how that fit with the Christian message of truth and love. Pastors wondered whether denominational leaders would support them in conflicts with their congregations over any of these issues and sometimes felt that those leaders did not.

These questions also undercut pastors' willingness to endure the challenges of ministry, challenges which were usually significant pre-pandemic, but which have only grown in the last year and a half, as described above. Why endure the stress if those for whom you worked didn't care and your work wasn't going to change people's actions or hearts anyway?

So, an increased number of pastors have decided that they are done. They have left or are leaving ministry.

This trend seems to be impacting pastors across the theological spectrum, in different denominations and polity systems, and in different geographic areas (as indicated in the breadth of news sources quoted above). Varying age ranges are also involved, though anecdotal evidence collected by my wife suggests that the trend is especially pronounced among pastors in their 30s and 40s and among women. While many factors are likely at work, this group includes parents of school-aged children, some of whom are also caregivers for older relatives as well, both groups negatively impacted by the pandemic. Women in particular have borne a significant amount of the pandemic-related parenting stress.

While the resolve and faith of those pastors staying in ministry is certainly to be praised, we must be careful about treating those who choose to leave as "failures" or their complaints as unimportant. Such responses lack compassion and seek to justify oneself. Decisions to leave reflect real issues in the church laid bare by the last year, and these departures will have real impact on churches. We as the church must take both seriously and seek to learn from them, rather than write them off.

What implications does this trend have for churches? I see several.

1. Increased difficulty for congregations seeking a pastor. The number of congregations, while shrinking overall, does not seem to have reduced as sharply as the number of pastors in the past year. Thus, fewer pastors = fewer possibilities of filling open pulpits. This trend will play out in different ways in denominations with call vs. appointment systems, but it will impact them both. This impact will be manifest immediately.

2. Increased pressure on struggling congregations to close. There is already pressure on such congregations. Small, impoverished, or dysfunctional congregations will have the greatest struggles attracting new pastors and had the most significant pre-pandemic challenges. If they are unable to find pastors, that creates yet another incentive for them to close their doors. While the pressures may be immediate, the resultant closures are likely 2-5 years down the road.

3. Disruption of leadership pipelines. Especially if it proves true that a disproportionately high number of early- to mid-career pastors are leaving, that means that there will be fewer pastors to develop into leaders for large congregations and denominational positions. This impact won't be felt immediately. Instead, it will become increasingly manifest in the next 5-15 years.

Thus, the impact of the pandemic on clergy supply in the United States will last much longer than the pandemic itself, serving as a drag on Christian ministry for years to come. Clergy are not and should not be solely determinative of the health of Christianity, but it would be foolish to pretend that clergy leadership does not matter to the quality of the church's mission and ministry.

While these forces pushing pastors away from ministry are cross-cutting, there is something that congregations and denominational leaders can do. Pastors that feel supported by their congregation and their denominational leaders are less likely to leave. Tangible support can reduce stress levels from responding to the pandemic and other social forces, and the existence of support reduces the questions pastors have about their relationships to their congregations, colleagues, and supervisors. Pastors are often looked to as sources of love and comfort, but they need these mercies as well.

Organizational vs. Cultural Explanations for US Membership Decline

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Gallup recently reported that the percentage of US Americans who are members of a church, mosque, synagogue or other religious institution has fallen below 50% for the first time in the 80-some years that Gallup has been tracking it. According to Gallup surveys, the downward trend in religious membership has been driven primarily by the increase in the number of Americans who do not identify as being connected to any particular religion and secondarily by a decrease in the number of religious Americans with membership in a specific congregation.

It is worth reflecting on membership trends in The United Methodist Church in the light of this news story and the large number of similar stories about the "rise of the nones" and decrease in US religiosity that have come out for a decade or more.

The United Methodist Church has, famously, been dropping in US membership since the year it was created. This long-term trend has been the source of much hand-wringing and many schemes to reverse the downward trend in membership.

Most proposed plans to address US UMC membership decline take what I would call an organizational approach to the problem of membership decline. The assume that the cause of decline is internal to the organization and thus can be solved by making changes to the organization.

The variety of proposed changes varies: Some involve bureaucratic retrenchment. Other solutions involve new programs to be adopted by US congregations. Both strengthening and abolishing the church's teachings against homosexuality have been touted as ways to reverse membership decline. Focusing on organizational factors draws on the valid insight that there are choices organizations can make that impact their health, either positively and negatively.

But what all of these proposals miss is that UMC membership decline is not occurring in a vacuum. This organizational trend is part of a much larger cultural trend in the United States away from organized religion, especially Christianity.

That trend has affected almost all aspects of the US religious landscape, cutting across race, class, and theological traditions. To be sure, there are variations in how significantly religious membership has declined according to race, politics, theological tradition, economic class, education, and other factors, but the trend everywhere has been downward. It is just a question of how much. Even the vaunted growth of evangelical Protestantism in the 1980s and 90s has stalled out in the past 20 years, and membership decline has impacted that sector of the religious economy too.

This does not mean that there is nothing denominations can do in the face of a cultural move away from Christianity. To be sure, there are denominational traditions that have managed to grow in membership within this overall current of decline. They tend to be small, relatively young, and conservative denominations, though small and young may be the most salient features. There are too few small, relatively young, and liberal denominations to make a fair comparison.

Still, I'm sure these counter examples of membership growth give those forming the Global Methodist Church some hope, and there is a chance that their US membership will grow, at least in the short term. Unless something changes in US culture as a whole, though, they will likely find it difficult to sustain membership growth in the United States a decade after their creation. And the remaining UMC will almost certainly continue to drop in US membership.

That does not make organizational changes unimportant. Again, organizations can actually make choices that lead to greater or lesser health. Yet, US Methodists (and US Christians generally) are fooling themselves if they think that they can solve a cultural problem with organizational solutions. Such an approach is an example of what leadership expert Ron Heifetz refers to as a technical solution to an adaptive problem.

I don't know what the adaptive solution to the cultural problem of US religious decline is. I wish I did. But I am sure that understanding the nature of the problem is the first step in finding the solution.

A New Era in United Methodist Politics: New Parties

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

As detailed in my last post, The United Methodist Church is entering a new era of politics, one in which old patterns are being disrupted, leading to fluidity and unpredictability. Four major issues will confront the church—sexuality, unity vs. division, regionalization, and denominational institutions—that cannot be reduced to one another. These different issues have varying significance for individual United Methodists, and individuals’ opinions on one issue are not necessarily good predictors of their opinions on the other issues.

Within that context, this post will try to identify some of the different parties or groups within the church based on the issue or issues they find most important and their stance on issues. There are eight such groups identified. These groups also overlap at points. This variety of overlapping and intersecting groups should underscore the complexity of UMC politics at the present moment.

Traditionalists
Traditionalists have historically been defined by a traditional understanding of sexuality, though not all with a traditional understanding of sexuality count as members of the Traditionalist bloc. Rather, Traditionalists are those who have prioritized engaging in social issue and theological fights within the denomination. This is a significant bloc within the United States with allies in Eurasia, the Philippines, and Africa. The Wesleyan Covenant Association, Good News Magazine, The Confessing Movement, the Africa Initiative, and the Institute on Religion and Democracy are just some of the organizations associated with the Traditionalist bloc.

While historically the Traditionalist bloc has been most concerned with the UMC’s stance on sexuality, a shift has occurred, and the top priority issue for Traditionalists is now passage of the Protocol, which would allow them to leave the denomination relatively easily with their properties and a $25 million payout. Traditionalists appear ambivalent or hostile to efforts to regionalize the church or reform denominational institutions.

Exiting Liberationists
At the other end of the theopolitical spectrum, but in some ways mirroring the Traditionalists, are Liberationists who are planning to exit the denomination. This is a fairly small group of US United Methodists, mostly associated with the Liberation Methodist Connexion, but a number serve as General Conference delegates, making it a notable position. Although the group is defined by its views on sexuality, like Traditionalists, Liberationists’ top issue is currently leaving the denomination. Unlike Traditionalists, however, they are less focused on the Protocol as a means to do so. Like Traditionalists, they are ambivalent or hostile to what happens to the denominational structures they are leaving.

Progressives and Remaining Liberationists
There are a significant bloc of United Methodists in the United States and Europe who plan to remain in the UMC and whose top priority remains changing UMC policy to allow for the ordination of LGBTQ+ individuals and gay marriages. Reconciling Ministries Network and The Liberation Project are expressions of this group, and Progressive concerns are also included in UMC Next and Out of Chaos: Creation, though these groups also contain other elements (as indicated below). For many Progressives, anti-racist work is also a significant issue, though for Progressives in the United States, racism is understood in predominantly US-centric rather than global terms. Progressives and remaining liberationists are open to other issues, and some individuals are also part of other groups advocating for institutional reform, unity, and/or regionalization. For many Progressives, though, these other issues continue to be interpreted through the lens of their impact on sexuality.

Institutionalists
There is a significant group of United Methodists around the world who may best be characterized by their loyalty to the institutions of the church and their concern for the future of those institutions. This group includes many bishops, cabinets, and agency staff. Some members of UMC Next are primarily Institutionalists. I believe the term Institutionalist is more helpful than Centrist, since this group is not primarily defined by their position on questions of sexuality but rather by their attachment to the institution; attitudes to sexuality (and other issues) vary within this group, and thus it overlaps with other groups, especially the Progressives, Internationalists, Regionalists, and Localists.

The primary political goal of this group is to preserve the current structures of the UMC to the extent possible. However, the “to the extent possible” phrase indicates the difficulties in achieving this goal and the diversity of approaches toward that goal. There is internal conflict among Institutionalists over how best to preserve structures and how much to spend on this effort. Most Institutionalists, though, form their opinions in response to various official proposals (GCFA proposals, episcopal study committee recommendations, calls by the bishops, etc.).

Innovators
There is another group that is also primarily defined by their views on the institutions of the UMC. However, rather than trying to preserve those institutions, this group sees the current moment in the church as an opportunity to make significant changes and reforms to those institutions. Many also support regionalization as part of those larger changes. There is diversity within this group over how best to innovate, with a variety of unique solutions set forward. This is a very small group of inside players, including some bishops, agency staff, and church planters, but because they are inside players, their views garner attention.

Internationalists
There is a significant minority of United Methodists throughout the world who are primarily characterized by their commitment to preserving some sort of organic connection between different regions of the UMC, that is, unity. This view is strongest in the central conferences and finds expression in groups like the Christmas Covenant, central conference bishops, Africa Voices of Unity, and Out of Chaos: Creation (though that last group also reflects Progressive views).

This group is generally supportive of regionalization as a means to preserve (and reform) international connectional structures. Many are critical of colonialism (and its associated racism) in the church as a hindrance to international connectional structure. Members of this group hold a variety of views on denominational institutions, but they generally recognize a need to make some changes and reforms. This group also holds a variety of views regarding sexuality, with those views mainly falling out along geographic lines. Nevertheless, they are generally willing to let that issue be decided locally.

Regionalists
While the groups mentioned thus far are primarily defined by their stance on denomination-wide issues, the last two groups are characterized by a more limited geographic focus. Regionalists are those United Methodists who are most concerned with the future of the UMC in their region, regardless of what happens to the rest of the denomination globally. This is a significant position in the Western Jurisdiction in the United States and throughout the central conferences.

Regionalists may be either progressive (e.g., the Western Jurisdiction, Germany) or traditionalist (e.g., Africa) on issues of sexuality, but are mostly focused on finding local solutions to conflicts over sexuality, regardless of the actions of the rest of the denomination. Regionalists are generally supportive of regionalization (e.g., through passing the Christmas Covenant) as a means to facilitate a primary focus on regional issues. There is a significant overlap with internationalists, though the two groups differ in the emphasis given to the two parts of the formula “unity through regionalization.”

Localists
It is easy for United Methodist insiders to forget that the single largest group of laity and one of the most significant groups of clergy around the world is primarily concerned not with denomination-wide issues, but with church, district, and annual conference issues. Such a focus is almost non-existent among US General Conference delegates because of the nationalization of politics within the United States, but Localists are still a notable group among African, Filipino, and Eastern European delegates. These delegates are elected to General Conference not because of their position on denominational issues but because of their prominence within the annual conference. Indeed, some Localist delegates may be relatively uninformed or not have strong opinions on many denomination-wide issues. Because of their geographic background, Localists tend to be traditionalist in their understanding of sexuality, but this position does not necessarily predict their position on other pressing issues such as the Protocol, Christmas Covenant, or reforming denominational institutions.

An Era of New Parties
As I hope the above makes clear, it is difficult to predict any given United Methodist’s stance on the whole range of issues before the church based on their stance on any one issue. There are differences both among and within parties on the salience of issues and the right solution to those issues. This means that there is both a significant amount of uncertainty around how the church will move forward on its most pressing issues and a significant opportunity for forging new coalitions between various groups. Indeed, the politics of the UMC going forward will be determined by what new coalitions arise and how strong those coalitions prove to be.