Saturday, April 12, 2014

Terminally ill church will be in need of an autopsy shortly.

My 46 year old son is angry with me and when he has run out of negative things to say he comes up with, "And I'm not a Unitarian Universalist so don't invite me to any more god damn pancake breakfasts!"

Under my breath, it made me laugh. Those god damn UU pancake breakfasts are the scourge of the earth, and the things people can attack you with when they have nothing else can be infuriating to the angry person in and of itself.

So what about those god damn pancake breakfasts? Well, they didn't work. The small UU church we tried to start is almost dead. It too 3 years to build it up for admission to the UUA and then 2 - 3 years to let it slowly die on the vine. What happened? Would an autopsy help so we can determine the cause of death? I'm working on it. Stay tuned.

2 comments:

  1. One of the biggest problems with failed churches is the lack of differentiated leadership. Everyone is afraid to take a clear position on a topic, especially if it might cause controversy and conflict and so people are "nice" and walk around on egg shells and when they are drained of energy they walk away and drop out. I've seen it happen over and over again.

    Leadership takes courage and what Edwin Friedman calls "nerve". It is in short supply in most UU congregations that I have observed.

    To be a good UU takes bravery and there are few "brave" UUs in smaller congregations that I've seen.

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  2. The UUA does very little to hold poor church management accountable. The UUA has a hands off approach unless asked. They allow local churches to limp along on their own and do nothing to straighten out dysfunctional and incompetent management. It is a shame really because without standards for operation to which the UUA can hold churches accountable the local churches sink or swim on their own.

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