Interim Rector s Remarks St. John s Episcopal Church Parish Information Meeting February 3, 2019 First, I want to thank you for being here this morning and joining with other parishioners for this brief gathering. I also thank you for this opportunity to come to you as pastor, priest, and interim rector of St. John s Church. Your warm and generous welcome amid so much change has been most heartening as a new clergy team joined you in the life and ministries of this parish church. The name, St. John s, McLean, was familiar to me from long ago. And I had seen St. John s from a distance many years ago. Returning this summer to first meet with the wardens and chancellor, it all came back in memory. The sight of St. John s from Georgetown Pike is a striking panorama as the lovely rich and historic yellow hue of the church and golden-topped bell tower shines like a lantern -- a beacon identifying the source of something more. With towering trees on all sides and everchanging seasonal skies, there is something majestic and 1
graceful about that tower. It both beckons and welcomes all whose eyes are drawn to its light. It invites them to explore the deeper meaning to be found in this stately ship of faith. That vista, like a guardian, is an ever present and strong reminder of the truest beauty of this church: the mystery of holiness that it embodies and offers, day to day, season to season, year to year. This view of St. John s and its beckoning tower light points to our greatest treasure and gift of infinite value: Jesus Christ. Christ born to us, in the midst of life revealing the heart of God, crucified, risen, ascended into the fulness of God, and present always as Spirit: Present to each of us in faith and also in the community where God gathers, forms, nurtures, and sends. We can do all the inquiry and analysis we want about the life, ministries, and mission of St. John s Church. We can reflect about the metrics and plans and hopes we hold for the present and future. But finally, all of it comes down to Christ, present and alive to us, in our lives, in our world, in the midst of the everyday. And that is why the most important thing we can do as God s creation and creatures is to come before God in worship 2
and prayer, and to give ourselves to that relationship. Everything else we do in the church is subtext -- not unimportant, but necessarily growing and rising from that primary relationship with God -- that fountain head of meaning and love. Still, we are entrusted with what happens here day to day, year to year, so we must be mindful and attentive as to whom we are and what we do. There are so many vital and vibrant aspects to this parish church. And before I begin to identify some of them I want to say a word about leadership. The vestry and heads of all the committees and guilds at St. John s Church reveal the spirit and depth that characterizes the entire parish community. I am deeply impressed by the willing spirit present in this community to love and serve God with devotion, compassion, and good cheer. One walk into our parish hall as lunches are being prepared for Martha s Table on Sundays speaks volumes to the character and spirit of this community of faith. To my great good fortune, one of the few gifts that I claim is an ability to choose good people to build a team. This was 3
true almost without exception where I served for 23 years at Christ Church, Georgetown. I didn t have all that many assisting clergy over those years because, once together, we forged a clergy team that opened onto friendships. I am still in close and regular contact with many of them to this day. There were two who stayed 10 years, another nine, and several four to seven years. As I am sure you know, at St. John s we have two very faithful and fine priests who serendipitously were brought together just as all the former clergy (rector and two assisting priests) were departing by late summer 2018. The Rev. Martha Johns and the Rev. Dina Widlake, assistants to the rector here, are most importantly, true believers who commend the faith that is within them by their words and in their lives. They give of themselves generously in living out their vocations as pastors and priests among us. We are very much blessed by their presence and leadership. They are trusted colleagues whose counsel and companionship I value highly in the day to day oversight and ministries of this parish family. 4
Now, looking across St. John s Church, our collective life here all begins with the reason we were created. In the words of St. Augustine of Hippo (north Africa, 430) we were created to delight in God. A primary experience of that delight is in the worship we offer to God. Here at St. John s, we strive to do that with seriousness, much care, and -- hopefully -- an evident joy. There are numerous opportunities across any Sunday and on weekdays to set aside time and come before the good Lord. Children and their spiritual formation are of high importance here. Teaching them and planting in their hearts the stories of our faith is accomplished with loving care, creativity, and much planning and time. We are so blessed to have those who do this with such faith and loving devotion. Mission and outreach are taken very seriously by this parish family. The evidence of that is difficult to easily quantify because it is not captured on a single church budget line. Instead it unfolds in myriad ways from the time, talents and offerings of all of you. It seems every time I turn around I am discovering yet another way, you, the faithful, seek to serve God 5
-- to be Christ s hands and heart in this beautiful and broken world. Christian Adult Formation takes place on Sunday mornings and from week to week through various small groups which meet. These smaller group offerings, so important to building up community, do not shy away from the hard work of joining the intellect to our faith, and the faith of the church, and the selves we bring to that endeavor. The content these groups choose to take on is rigorous and very impressive. I think this is, for now, the strongest part of our adult Christian Formation: the smaller groups of every kind. Lay leadership will be crucial to this in the future -- even as it is now. The community life of our parish is lively, energetic, and still in formation. People in this parish want to be with one another: To know friendships and share the journey of life and faith with each other. Still, there are probably many opportunities and numerous ways available for our community life to be expanded and enhanced at St. John s. Again, however, being busy amid rising metrics and measurables is not the goal here. It is important to remember 6
that. We do not grow to increase a profit margin or gain a greater market share of anything. Rather, we are the Lord s people who faithfully gather in this place to love, pray, and serve the living God. And our overriding mission and purpose is clearly stated. It is in articulated in one line in our Prayer Book and can be applied to every season and circumstance. That line is this: The mission of the church is to restore all people to unity with God, and each other, in Christ. If we are to grow -- and we will grow for the Lord s sake and by God s grace and leading -- it will be because we have stayed true to this central mission of the church. There is so much going well here at St John s. So much loyalty and dedication to this church, our life together, and our mission. Yet I can also see many places for deepening and broadening our ministries, for wisely and strategically aligning our resources, common life, and mission in ways that will enhance the strength and effectiveness of all we seek to do for God. There has been something of a scaling down over the last five years or so in several key areas. There are likely many 7
reasons for this. I would not presume to define them, or explain in any detail the reasons, but I can observe some symptoms. Our average Sunday attendance is somewhere in the 250 range across the year. Maybe a little less in this time of transition. That is with four services offered each Sunday. Our total number of pledging households is at an historical low. Our average financial pledge per household is at a historical high. We have been running a flat budget for several years. Eventually -- probably sooner rather than later -- this is going to mean a reconsideration of the way we order our life and ministries at St. John s Church. Changes will be inevitable in the scope of ministry, the resources we can bring to them, and the people we call to lead the parish from clergy to professional staff and support staff. While that may perhaps be the way forward in the nearer term, it will not sustain the ministry of this church as we know it now. We can reconfigure and reappropriate our resources, but in the end, we cannot cut our way to prosperity, or, to use a worldly term, to success. 8
Ultimately, the answer to these challenges will come as an outgrowth of the mission and ministry of our church: In holding before others, and offering freely as it has been freely given to us, the measureless gift we have in belonging to God in Christ, and doing so in compelling, attractive, intelligent, imaginative, inviting, and even sacrificial ways. The basic elements for this kind of multi-year transformation of our church in this community are mostly in place. Please hear that. There is so much right about this parish church: So much that works well. Yet, I could easily list ten areas or more where we could begin to address these parish/institutional issues in preparing for that period of transformation and realignment. But that is not my place or part of my ministry with you. This interim ministry is about holding steady the heart and center of this great parish church, to serve you as pastor and priest, and to prepare you to receive your next rector. And I encourage you to generously welcome him or her upon arrival, and then offer support during that time when there will be important stock-taking of what has been happening here, what is here now, and what could be. It could be a time for 9
doing the hard work of review and discernment in building a strategic plan for the nearer term. There is so much potential and upside in this parish church. It really is quite an amazing thing. There are likely a fairly significant number of broken churches in this nation, in this region. This church is clearly is not broken. Quite honestly, if I was 20 years younger I would find this a wonderful place for beginning the transformational work, that renewal and rebuilding out and up, and then setting a new course for the foreseeable future. I pray to God that you will hold that as a possibility with your new rector and one another, and then -- with care and patience, with trust and faith in the good Lord -- to turn to the new future of St. John s Church -- wherever God might be leading you. 10