The FaithX Project

Strategic Missional Consulting

FaithX & Datastory at CEEP Conference | Feb 20-23

How can we love our neighbors if we don’t know who they are?

How do we answer the question, “Who is our neighbor?” when our neighborhoods are changing so fast that our traditional ways of learning about them can’t keep up?

How do we learn how to learn at the speed of change?

If answering these questions for your congregation is important to you and you will be at the CEEP Conference in Boston on February 20-23, drop by our booth and discover how FaithX and Datastory and are helping faith leaders engage in data-grounded discernment for the future of the Church.

Visit Us at Booth 29

We’ll give you a complimentary Missional Intelligence Report about your community. 

FaithX and Datastory help faith communities and the organizations that support them answer these questions and more with Datastory’s MapDash for Faith Communities missional intelligence program and missional strategy development consulting from FaithX.

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Dioceses of Georgia and Central Gulf Coast begin the Mentored Missional Journey

This week’s blog post will be a little shorter than average, because Ken is away in Tallahassee much of this week guiding two dioceses – the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia and the Episcopal Diocese of Central Gulf Coast – through the first of four sessions of the Mentored Missional Journey consultative program.

 

What is the Mentored Missional Journey?

A 6-month program of guided strategic missional assessment and planning designed to prepare dioceses to identify and engage emerging missional opportunities through strategic ministry development, congregational redevelopment, and new church starts using MapDash for Faith Communities. It was developed in collaboration with the Episcopal Church and shaped by input from diocesan and congregational leadership from around the U.S.

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Missional Planning for Dioceses: Where Do We Go from Here?

by Ken Howard

This the 7th and last post in a multi-part series. Click here to read the previous post.

Step 4 – Where Are Our Future Opportunities and Threats? (Investing in The New). Think of this in term of ice hockey legend Wayne Gretzky’s immortal wisdom: “I don’t skate to where the puck is, I skate to where the puck is going.” In other words, it is insufficient to just know where there are people in need of ministry, to whom your churches could uniquely minister. You must also understand where you have no presence, and what you would have to do to be present there.

To do this, you would want to start by identifying all areas of your diocese which are not within 15 minutes of another congregation of your denominatiuon. These are areas where your diocese does not have a functional presence (since 70% of people will not drive more than 15 minutes to attend a congregation) and which merit more research as possible sites for new congregations, using the same three community population trends identified above to refine your search:

  • Population Growth. Growing or shrinking? (Growing is better)
  • Diversity. Increasing or decreasing? (Increasing is better)
  • Generational Balance. More balanced or less balanced? (More is better)

Example – Assessing Sites for New Church Starts Based on External Sustainability:

 

 

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Missional Planning for Dioceses: Vision, Context, and Stewardship of Resources

 

by Ken Howard

This the 6th post in a multi-part series. Click here to read the previous post.

Step 1 – What is God calling us to be? (Vision). What we are looking for here is succinct statement of what you have collectively discerned that God is calling you collectively to be and to do. It is a description of what the diocese wants to be when it grows up, the belief that drives all other beliefs, the passion that drives all ministries and programs, a vision the people find worthy of their faithfulness, even in the face of failure. You should be able to reduce it to a one or two sentence “sticky meme” that anyone can recall and repeat. And you should revisit in any time you engage in strategic planning.

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Missional Planning for Dioceses: An Introduction


by Ken Howard

This the 5th post in a multi-part series. Click here to read the previous post.

In our last several posts, we discussed the what it means to be missional and how to go about developing a missional plan for a congregation.

In this next series of posts, we move up a level in the ecclesiastical food chain for a discussion of how to go about developing a missional plan for a diocese, district, synod, or other adjudicatory.

It’s harder to develop a missional plan at the diocesan level than at the congregational level: not because of the process but because of the politics. The process is easier because there are fewer demographic “moving parts” to track. But the politics are harder because an honest diocesan mission plan cannot avoid venturing into the political minefield of resource prioritization and reallocation questions. Because nothing opens up fissures in the fabric of a diocese like talking about opening, redeveloping, and closing congregations, especially closing. Because every congregation that needs to be closed has a “great,” emotion-driven story about why they shouldn’t be, while diocesan leadership haven’t had ready access to the information necessary to create a convincing data-driven story about why they should. Which is why many dioceses avoid this kind of planning altogether or abandon the effort after running into political roadblocks.

[Read more…]

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