Several years ago, the priests listened to presentations from Deacon Keith Strohm, founder of M3 Ministries. After years in the corporate world, Deacon Keith started a ministry focused on parish culture. A “culture” includes a lot of unspoken assumptions, attitudes, and practices. Rather than being taught in a class, culture tends to be passed down and picked up as we go along. Deacon Keith has tried to identify the assumptions and attitudes that go into parish culture. He believes that parishes in today’s world need to examine the culture they have inherited and be willing to make some shifts.

Culture Shift no. 1: From an Institutional Faith to an Intentional Faith

Culture is a difficult thing to assess. Because we pick it up as we go along, we often don’t notice what we have picked up. It takes effort to critically examine our attitudes. Let’s start by examining the Catholic Church as an institution. It is obvious that the Catholic Church is headed by the Pope and Bishops, owns property all over the world, has members, and expects its members to keep to certain rules and perform rituals. When we view the church as an institution, tithing is seen as membership dues. Membership benefits include going to heaven when you die. Older folks are sometimes concerned to make sure their membership is current so they can be buried from the church. A culture of institutional faith is about external practices and beliefs. Faith becomes “the Catholic faith,” that is, believing what the church believes and doing what the church asks of its members.

The Bible, however, means something different when it uses the word “faith.” Jesus is not checking his listeners to make sure they follow a set of doctrines or handing out membership cards. Jesus is looking for them to trust him personally -- that he speaks the truth, that he can be trusted to lead us wisely, and that he died for us because he loves us. A culture of intentional faith is concerned about helping parishioners come to know how much God loves them and be willing to trust Him with their lives. All are invited into this relationship and all parish efforts are focused towards helping people encounter Christ and grow deeper in relationship. Parish leadership will regularly gather to pray and discern the will of God when it comes to making decisions and guiding parish efforts. The head of the church is Jesus, and the Pope and Bishops are only stewards of Jesus’ flock.

Questions: 1) Do regular parishioners feel invited into a relationship with Christ? 2) Does the parish take time to celebrate relationships with Christ? 3) Do people have a chance to share with others how Christ has changed their life? 4) Do parishioners have a chance to hear these stories even if they aren’t coming to Mass regularly?

Scripture passage for reflection: Jesus and the rich young man, Mark 10:17-25.

2. From a Culture of Engagement to a Culture of Encounter

If you ask our Parish Pastoral Council, “What concerns you the most right now?” They would probably answer, “The 75% of parishioners who rarely attend Mass.” Finance Council members would answer the same question with, “The 45% of registered parishioners who give zero dollars.” When we focus on engagement, we are working from an institutional vision of church where people are “paying their dues” and “being active members.” Through this lens, parishioners look like religious consumers and we are worried about sales and market share. That may sound harsh, but just because someone does lots of things around the parish does not mean they have a deep, personal relationship with Christ. But if I’m focused on the institution, then by necessity I want to see people engaged in the institution. And I’m assuming that they have faith because I see them in the pews and paying their dues. Should we be satisfied with good attendance, or should we be looking for more?

I no longer believe that a full church is the goal we are working towards. I think we need to focus on intentional faith instead of institutional faith. And that raises different and more important questions. Instead of, “Why is John not coming to Mass?” we should be asking, “What is John’s relationship with God right now?” Instead of, “Why is John not giving to his parish?”, we should ask, “How can we help John see himself as a Steward of the blessings God has given him?” Engagement is easy to quantify; if the events are well attended, people are engaged. Encounter is a little harder to understand. An “encounter” is an experience that changes us. It is the funeral that really puts something in perspective, the Confession where we felt God was talking to us, the family get-together where someone we didn’t expect took the time to really listen to us. Encounter means an experience where you feel valued, welcomed, heard, and loved – first by the Church, and then by Jesus through His Church. A culture of Encounter is about touching lives. It means nurturing and training of a stable group of disciples who are willing, and equipped, to help others encounter Christ. It means focusing on activities that help people have that deeper experience. A parish with a Culture of Encounter will change or stop every activity that doesn’t promote an encounter with Christ.

Question: How does our _______ facilitate an encounter with Jesus Christ?
The blank can be any parish activity: RCIA, fall festival, the registration process for a new member, Baptism or Marriage prep, funeral dinners, ushering at Mass, our Catholic school…

Scripture passage for reflection: Mary and Martha, Luke 10:38-42.

3. From Maintenance to Mission

What do a parking lot project and a belltower repair have in common? They are both examples of maintenance. A culture of maintenance focuses on taking good care of what we have. But when we lose sight of mission, then the majority of time, energy and resources become geared towards “making the trains run on time.” We want to find volunteers who will help maintain the processes and programs and keep the structures alive. When we only worry about our “registered members”, we are missing a large number of people in the parish. Bishop likes to remind us that the Catholic parish includes everyone within those geographical boundaries, not just the Catholics. It’s not wrong to maintain what we have. In fact, going on mission requires good maintenance of our resources. It’s just wrong to be content with maintenance.

The Church was made for mission. In fact, it was the mission to “go and make disciples of all nations” that created the Church in the first place. When we don’t begin to share the good news, we start to not believe and live the good news ourselves. A focus on mission is focusing our time, energy, and resources on sharing the message and power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ especially with those who have never heard the good news. We are concerned, and oriented, towards those who aren’t the “registered members” of the parish. Leaders understand that every parishioner is called to be a missionary disciple. Leadership creates pathways to equip ordinary men and women to live their Confirmation as missionary disciples.

You’ll notice that each of these areas begin to overlap and support each other. An intentional faith, rooted in a culture of encounter, will want to go out and share the good news. An institutional faith, rooted in a culture of engagement, will lead to worries about maintenance.

Questions: 1) How does the idea of missionary discipleship make me feel? 2) Am I more likely to worry about people thinking I’m “too religious”, or to think about how I can help them come to know and love Jesus as I do? 3) How would our priorities shift if reaching out became more important than inviting in?

Scripture: Jesus and the Samaritans, John 4:31-42.

4. From a Focus on Programs to a Focus on People

“Father, how can we get people back to church?” I get this question all the time. We all have family members, children, grandchildren, or friends that “should be coming to church” but don’t. Mass attendance of US Catholics peaked during World War II. Since that time, attendance has been steadily declining. In fact, the number of regularly attending Catholics has been falling faster than the number of priests. We don’t have so much a crisis of vocations as a crisis of faith. We keep looking for the right program to revitalize the church. We have tried Renew, Stewardship, Renew 2000, Catholics Come Home, Alpha, The Search… and many more. They bore good fruit. But they didn’t get your kids or grandkids back to Mass. We keep looking for the right program that will help people come back to Mass. I have a different idea: stop trying to get people back to Mass.

I must be the only priest who doesn’t tell people, “You should become Catholic;” “You should come back to Mass;” “You should come to Confession.” I used to tell people that; it didn’t work. They were already skilled at not doing what they “should be doing,” and my words wouldn’t make a difference. So what should we be doing? If you talk to folks who have come back to church and are now fired up about their faith, they share both big and little steps that brought them back. Maybe they came to a funeral and it touched them, they attended a Mass and felt the priest was talking to them, they had a friend who made them think in new ways, they decided to come back to Confession... One little step led to another, and another, and here they are in Mass every Sunday and loving it.

My new goal is to help everyone take one step forward in faith, whatever that might look like for them. There are plenty of great programs out there that can really help people. But what helps people the most is a friend who has faith. That friend walks with them, challenges them, encourages them, and helps them keep walking towards Jesus. The friend doesn’t know the whole catechism or the answers to everything, but they are a friend of Jesus and want to help their friends also discover friendship with Jesus. You could probably name a few key people that accompanied you on your faith journey. Are you ready, willing, and able to help others take a step forward in faith? Will you be a friend to someone who isn’t yet friends with Jesus?

Question: Does the idea of accompanying others make you feel excited or uncomfortable?

Scripture: The calling of the first disciples, John 1:35-42.

5. From a Culture of Avoidance to a Culture of Accountability

The Culture of Avoidance is the final culture shift in our series. When this topic came up at our annual priest retreat, you could see heads nodding. We all know that Church people are expected to be “nice,” and we don’t want to hurt others’ feelings. We often tiptoe around that difficult volunteer, staff person, or even priest. A culture of avoidance prevents us from implementing a solid vision because of the potential to upset people and change “the way we’ve always done things.” This leads to a lack of accountability, sustained dysfunction, and poor morale. A culture of avoidance is what led Bishops to move priests around instead of addressing their wrongdoing in painful, public, and very necessary ways.

A Culture of Accountability is not about pointing fingers and being “mean”. Rather, it is about building relationships of trust that are strong enough to support difficult conversations and confront disfunction. Accountability sees leadership as discerning and pastoral, concerned with fruit and effectiveness. It won’t tolerate passive-aggressive behavior, protecting one’s “turf” in the parish, or avoiding the big important questions. However, accountability is also about handling these kinds of conflicts in a way that is kind, professional, respectful, and pastoral.

For all the talk of “respect” and “non-judgement”, our culture doesn’t teach us how to talk about difficult things. We aren’t generally taught how to have difficult conversations. Because we don’t know where to start or how to say it, when we do bring things up it can cause a fight and hurt feelings. Then we resolve to never, never bring up something like that again. And the problem gets worse. Holding people accountable in a loving, respectful way is a skill we need to learn. I would recommend the book Crucial Accountability and Redeeming Conflict. Patrick Lencioni’s The Five Disfunctions of a Team is also an excellent read. While it’s never fun to confront bad behavior, it’s a whole lot better than letting things simmer and go unresolved. It’s time to stop avoiding our fears and learn to be accountable.

Question: Have you had a difficult conversation that went well? What did the people involved do to help it be fruitful?

Scripture: Jesus confronting James and John, Mark 10:35-45.

Culture Shift: Where Do We Start?

Did you notice how these five “paradigms” reinforce each other? A concern for the Institution leads to a focus on finding the right Programs that will drive Engagement. We might say we want to see growth, but our biggest concern is actually stopping people from leaving so we can Maintain what we have from the past. We Avoid holding people accountable because we don’t want them to get mad at us and leave.

The rubber hits the road when people tell me, “Father, we need to find a way to get people back to church (including, but not limited to, my kids and grandkids).”
I respond, “I no longer believe we have a mission to get people back to church. What do you think our mission really is?”
I get various answers which eventually circle back to, “We need to get people to heaven?”
To which I respond, “Getting people to heaven is Jesus’ job. Our job is to get people to Jesus.”

When people really encounter Jesus, they can’t help but fall in love with him. Despite a Catholic upbringing and years in the pews, many of our people have not actually encountered Jesus for themselves. Until you meet Jesus the Catholic church is just a fat old institution with a bunch of pointless rules. Once you’ve met Jesus, the faith becomes an adventure, a journey of discovery, a romantic comedy, a gold mine of Truth, a lifeline, a pearl of great price, an infinite source of peace and joy.

I first encountered these “paradigm shifts” three years ago at our Diocesan priest retreat. The task of changing our whole parish culture seemed monumental… where would you even start? As I rewrote these articles to republish them, I realized that I had already found the answer. We change culture, not by focusing on what’s wrong with the institution, but by changing one heart and one mind at a time. We focus on People. We help those people to Encounter Jesus so they can begin to live an Intentional faith. Accountability flows naturally when we hold ourselves to high standards. I refer to this as, “One step forward in faith.” Our Mission is to help every single person to take one step forward in faith, whatever that looks like for them right now.

This brings me to the question that I never tire of asking:
Is your faith Intentional or Institutional, focused on Engagement or Encounter, Maintenance or Mission, Avoidance or Accountability, Programs or People?
What is the “one step forward in faith” that God is calling you to right now?
The culture shift starts with You.

Scripture: Jesus and the Woman at the well, John 4:1-42.