One of the hardest things I have found being on the Ministerial Search Committee has been learning about the areas where we as a congregation could be doing better. Last year, we were discovering all sorts of areas we could improve. At first, this made me kind of mad — after all, I love this church!

As we went on, I realized that this church is very good, yet we could be amazing. Carol Houde often says that we feel this congregation is poised on the edge of greatness! In order to be an amazing church, though, we need to continue to improve ourselves. These efforts will, in turn, help us attract an amazing minister who will help even more.

We consistently heard from the best ministers we interviewed that they want to come to a congregation where everybody is contributing in multiple ways. They know the most vibrant churches have many hands helping. Many of the ministers specifically asked us whether the whole congregation welcomes newcomers, does social justice work, and gets involved in church activities beyond coming to church on Sunday.

Me?

When you think about the different ways you can contribute to the vibrant life of our congregation, you may feel that you're not as competent at that job, or it’s uncomfortable for you to do that task, or the committee is already doing great, or your ideas aren't wanted, or you don't have much time.

Well, I'm here to say that nearly every committee would love for you to join in their efforts to make things better, and any amount of effort counts.

The music committee by itself doesn't make a choir, the minister and pastoral care team cannot serve all the church's pastoral care needs, the PR committee can’t tell your friends about our church, the RE committee needs volunteers to teach the classes, the social justice committee can’t assemble 10,000 meals by itself, the church can’t run solely on the endowment income, etc.

If we can each step up in many small ways to help with all the wonderful things our church does, we will become amazing!

The insecurity of being new

As a specific example, I'll talk about welcoming new potential members. When the search committee visited churches last winter to hear the pre-candidates preach at “neutral pulpits,” we glimpsed how these other churches treat newcomers.

In one, newcomers were asked to get a colored coffee mug in coffee hour. We and all the other people with colored mugs stood along the edges of the fellowship room, waiting for somebody to talk with us. Our search committee members finally went over to talk to the other newcomers, because nobody was approaching us.

Even though some of us are great at meeting new people, we felt awkward and found that we had to butt into people’s conversations to meet existing members.

In another church, several people came up to each of us and greeted us warmly, both before and after the service. They chatted and called friends over to meet us. They told us they hoped we would come back. Some even said they would save us a seat! The seven of us talked with probably over 25 people! We felt effortlessly included and welcomed. While we were not visitors who were potential new members, we all left talking about how good we felt and our positive experience at that church.

A statistic shared with the search committee: if newcomers don't feel welcome in the first one to three visits, they most likely won't return. However, if newcomers make a friendly contact or two, the odds improve drastically that they will return and will become the UUs they were meant to be.

Personally, I know that I am absolutely terrible at remembering names, I'm a bit uncomfortable talking with a new person, and I could never approach Sherri Woolsey’s ability to connect instantly with a visitor. However, I do feel comfortable hugging folks, I make an effort to talk to people in coffee hour who are either standing by themselves or I don't know very well, and I try to make eye contact when I sing in the choir. These are some ways I try to make our church a welcoming place.

It takes many of us to do this, not just Sherri and the membership committee.

Caring community

Pastoral care offers another example.

When Carol Lasselle had a stroke last December, many in our congregation wondered how we could help. Many volunteered to take one of Carol's spider plants or geraniums during the extended time they were away. When the Lasselles were finally able to come home, we set up a Lotsa Helping Hands website, and the Pastoral Care committee invited people to sign up to help how and when they could. We are now up to about 60 volunteers that are sharing the load!

Jon and Carol would have been overwhelmed to handle everything by themselves, and pastoral care team members could only help some. Yet with everybody pitching in a little, the workload is spread out and manageable. Our church is handling the load remarkably well.

There are many ways, in all sorts of areas, that each of us can help the church be even better. The opportunities are as varied as we are. If each of you share your ideas, your skills, your time, your sense of fun, your enthusiasm, and your money, we will be an absolutely amazing church — because of you!

From the Ministerial Search Committee — We welcome your thoughts and feedback, as one of our objectives is to foster a congregational dialog about what we have experienced and learned. One way to do so is to leave a comment responding to this or any of the other blog posts.