Right, I need help! (Back to Church Sunday might appear in this thread)

[nickelbabe]

Our church has been losing congtregation steadily since we got a vicar that ruined the whole thing for everyone.
noone will come back who left when he started alienating them all.
and a lot those that were left were old.
Quite a few have died, or had to go into old people's homes.

Now one of our choir members has broken his hip and had to have a replacement (our only decent bass) and his wife, one of our sopranos has been quite ill and had a fit a while ago and is still not allowed to drive, so we've lost her for a while too.
and last night, our good Tenor has announced that he can't cope with the drive from where he lives (10-15 miles away) every friday for practice, or witht he driving in the winter (he's not only old, but also got a disability which is really starting to affect him now), so he's leaving after October evensong.
there is noone in the congregation that we can draw on, because those that aren't old have mental disabilities or have important jobs that take their time during the services.even two members of our choir have to do church warden duties so can't sing most sundays.

I'm at the end of despair now - this town is quite non-churchy - those that will go to church already seem to and noone else is interested.
and then at the end of the month we've got back to church sunday and we've got noone to invite!
and, i have to be honest, for which i feel awful, but i can imagine anyone coming to our church would be put off by the congregation we have.

so what do i do?

ps praying doesn't work - it might make us all feel better and know that God's on our side, but it doesn't bring practical solutions (we are praying as well, but i need solutions this time!!)

I've made a choir flyer to send to all the local senior schools and adulteducation sentre, which is a start.
we seem to get people who come once and then never come again (it's even so bad that we've only had 8 weddings this year - including mine! and that's an all time low - normally we would have 15-upwards)

I agree that you can have more than one style of "church" within the same people - and that people will go between them.

We have our "said" HC at 8am on a Sunday morning, then Family Holy Communion (kind of middle of the road one - good mix of hymns - becase I like everything from Palestrina to Tim Hughes , at 10am, once a month this is the "family service" - where the uniformed groups attend.

Then our evening services are done alternate fortnights (not enough to have weekly evening servives) - evening services come in all shapes and styles - Evensong (well evensaid ), Evening Worship, Praise Service, Night Prayer, Taize, ermm, err - think that's all

Then once a month after schoool we have a very lively "service" after school

We do have a music group - but I'm craving a drummer - that would just finish it off so much. Modern music group in a big echoey church CAN work - even with the drums - so long as the sound is done properly - and the drums in one of those little enclosure things.

I play the organ at most services, but piano for others.
I really believe you have to be open to try anything - with the right information on how to do it properly any music can be used in any church

We have four services each Sunday. A 1662 without music, an organ/choir/robed clergy and old form of the Lord's Prayer service at 9.30am, a contemporary music group/casual/modern language service at 11am, and a fresh expressions service at 7pm (could be anything).

It all works, and we are basically one big happy family. What is the same is that we are evangelical in theology and exposit scripture. We feel that our worship style offers something for everyone, but if someone has catholic or liberal leanings, there are parishes without our deanery (within 1-2 miles) that offer that kind of teaching.

One of the problems of having more than one church in your benefice is that you are spreading resources really thinly. Churches are costly buildings to maintain at the best of time, and it is very difficult when they are both old and listed. When your resources are scarce, your church ends up being uncomfortable (eg cold), and that makes it even less attractive to the unchurched. It also makes it look like you are not doing your best for God.

we couldn't do more than we curently do - evening services as they are non eucharistic are led by the trainee reader, or occasionaly the vicar - but on the occasions that she does the evening service she struggles with the 3 services in the one day (she was really ill 2 years ago and is still has to use her oxygen if she overdoes it.

Mamo,

You definitely need a drummer. I think we have three drummers, and if none of them can make it, the whole worship is really flat (although it takes you a while to pinpoint why).

I know - but there's no-one that plays - average music group size is - ermmm 4

Don't you have a teenager that could fit the bill, or that you encourage to drum lessons?

nope - we could really do with an adult one - we lose our teenagers at 18 off to university.

Do you not have any incoming teenagers for college/university?

we have no unversity in the town - closest University isn't really a great university - we get no students coming into the town, and many of our teenagers once they've been to Exeter, Brimingham, Cambridge, Bristol......stay.

see, we have that problem too - we don't have a college/univeristy in our town, so anyone taht joins will disappear when they hit 18.

How was church today, Nickelbabe?

oh, it was okay, thanks Mme

in the morning we had 4 sopranos, 2 tenors an alto and an organist, so it was okay, but it meant that we couldn't do the anthem we wanted to (and that was listed). we did a hymn instead.
the congregation in the morning was 37. we thought that was an improvement on last week, but realised that last week, they had put 36 as the congregation, when in actual fact it should have been 37 (36 over 16 and 1 under, as it was this week)
however, our presiding priest this week was one of our congregation who is a retired "vicar in charge" - he used to have that role in Zimbabwe, and left to come back to England a few years ago (for reasons obvious to most, I hope). he'd been quietly part of the congregation till this interregnum, and he got dragged in. His sermon this week (he's only allowed to do it once a month max, so we don't wear him out!) was all about his story from Dean to Vicar in Charge, so it was fascinating. :)

in the evening, we had the usual few in the congregation (i didn't count, but i think there were about 12). The choir consisted of 2 sopranos (the reader's wife was the one that said she wouldn't be singing in the evening, as she's quite old (her words!), and indeed she didn't come to pratice, but turned up as we were doing our last practice item, apologised for being late and joined in! - i was worried as on Friday she was very much sight-reading, but she didn't make many mistakes at all, and luckily all were made where I was confident with what we were singing!), 2 tenors (crap and good, as aforementioned), alto and organist.
we did all the pieces with organ accompaniment, which is unusual for us, but it went well, and it looks like that might be a regular thing if the chori doesn't increase.

On a less positive note, i have definitely discovered that the PCC spends too much time discussing and not enough time doing. apparently i was told this when i joined, but really didn't believe it could be the case!!
I mentioned in the vestry that the toilets (which are in Church House) should be signposted in the churhc, so that people would know where they were and how to get to them (they have to be taken there because we get rough sorts in the churchyard and can't leave the door to Church House unlocked in case drunks wee in there or steal things - that's true, unfortunately :( (and i don't mean wee in the toilet)). This was met with a resonding "no" from one of the deputy churchwardens, who stated that it would mean more people would want to go to the toilet and it would give the churchwardens more work to do.
Apart from the fact i was a bit shocked that it wouldn't ven be considered, it wouldn't be the churchwardens, it should be the sidespeople.

In the face of this negative response, I'm going to raise it as a formal request at the PCC meeting, along with a suggestion/request/demand that the sidespeople on duty wear BADGES so people know who to ask.

on a more positive note, from the choir, I have made/sent letters with info to 4 of the local senior schools (2 co-ed, 1 boys', 1 girls') asking for new members in general, along with flyers about choir for the advent and christmas services only.

I have sent an email to What's on of the newspaper asking to put our advert for advent and christmas services' choir in there.
and I'm going to approach our Guide unit to ask them to join us to gain their Music Group badge (where the "musical instrument" will be their voice)
and i've made a poster for outside the church, too.

Oh, the joy and fun that is PCC meetings.

I am absolutely convinced that having a united benefice is a bad idea - I feel like we have too many cooks.
Each of us wants the best for our own church, and althoug hwe all try to see it from both churches' POV, we're really all stuck in our own church. I know it wouldn't be so obvious/bad if we were doing better, but as we're doing badly, it all seems very cliquey.
and it doesn't help that "we've" worked on each church having its own separate identity/style of worship, as it makes us look like warring factions.

that's just my rant.
I'm trying hard to be positive about the whole thing and apparantly i have "enthusiasm" (that just means I go along with ideas and speak out)

then i spent the whole night not sleeping because i'm worrying about the politics of it all.

The worst thing about this whole united benefice thing, is that we're united in every aspect apart from financial.
apparently it's being worked on, but we're struggling to pay the quota, right? but if we add up what each church is paying towards the quota, it amounts to just under one full quota (literally about £4,000 short each year).
but because we're separate financially (and we have to wait for permission from the diocese to merge, and currently they're working on the wider deanery), we have to pay 2 quotas (even though for at least the last 10 years we've only had one priest-in-charge/vicar between us, one used vicarage, one set of staff...). 2 quotas is twice what we can afford as a benefice.
why can't they just let us have one quota?
it's total madness.

Your parish share is based on how many bums on seats you have. I don't think it matters if you have a regular PIC or not. If you don't, then you are not paying for him. Obviously you have to pay supply rates, but this wont cover the vicarage, pension, holidays etc.

Have you got your vicarage rented out for extra income?

I know that when we were in interregnum we saved loads. Our vicarage was providing income, and our services were taken mainly by lay people, friendly NSMs (mission partners who are employed by their own organisations) and diocesan staff. You should make good use of your diocesan staff (archdeacon, youth coordinator, publicity, mission etc.). They will do your communion services for just their travel expenses.

the parish share (as far as i can understand) doesn' just pay for our own PIc's wages, it pays for training, pensions, etc etc. so we have to pay the same regardless of whether we have a PIC.
It is related to bums on seats, but not in a way that actually reflects what they're giving IYSWIM. a parish with rich bums will get more income than one with poor/old bums.
because we're financially separate, we still ahve to pay two parish shares. which is, of course, killing us as a benefice.

We don't technically own the vicarage, as it's part of the diocese's purse - they supply a vicarage to each parish/benefice and when it's not in use (unless the building is owned by the parish - i know that's the case in some countryside parishes) the diocese decides what to do with it, and they decide whether they get the money or take it off what's owed for the parish share.
at the moment, there is no movement with the vicarage, but there discussions aboutrenting it out (we have been told) - nothing's happening, and it's unlikely that we'll get any financial benefit from it.
:(

the only thing we don't have to do is put our wedding money (the PCC share) into the diocese.
which is not helpful because we've only had 4 weddings this year, including mine...