4055 Theme 6: Vital Congregations: Growth and Decline in UU Congregations

Presenter: Rev. Peter Morales, Director, District Services, UUA

Sponsored by UUA Staff

“I have the conviction that hundreds of thousands of people are longing for liberal religion,” said the Reverend Peter Morales at the start of his presentation. He believes that the Unitarian Universalist movement is not realizing a fraction of its potential. He warned the participants that his presentation would not be up-beat, but it would be hopeful.

Morales gave many examples of how the denomination is not growing. “We are virtually the same size as we were at merger (1961).” He pointed out that net growth last year was 352 members. Taken against US population growth, we have lost a lot of ground.

Six percent of our congregations account for two-thirds of our growth in the last ten years. Sixteen churches have added 200 or more members This 1.5% of our congregations accounts for a quarter of the denomination's increase.

Gross demographics seem to mean nothing. Congregational growth does not correlate with local population growth and vice versa. It turns out that it is the nature of the congregation which makes the difference.

What do growing congregations do differently? Rapidly growing congregations are more likely than rapidly declining ones to see themselves as:

• Spiritually and vitally alive
• Being a moral beacon in the community
• Having well organized programs
• Having a clear sense of mission and purpose
• Working for social justice
• Dealing openly with disagreements and conflicts
• Welcoming new ways of ministry and worship

Morales said, “Growth is the natural outcome of doing good church. . . The one growth strategy we have not tried is religion,”

Declining congregations tend to self-describe as a close-knit family. They appear warm and caring from the inside, but cold and inhospitable from the outside.

If we do not make visitors feel welcome on the first day we will generally lose them. The first few minutes of a visitor's contact with a new church usually makes or breaks the connection. Waiting until after the service is often too late.

Most congregations get as many visitors per year as their membership. They would grow if they repelled fewer visitors. The denomination would grow by 5% per year if on average each congregation gained four people.

The situation is not all bad. We do know how to grow churches. What works is to create a culture of quality in the congregation — do everything better. It is not the growth plan that we need. We need a plan to be a better church.

Morales closed with this thought, “Don't let the few who are afraid of growth (losing the warm fuzzy feeling) stop you from changing your church culture to one amenable to growth.”

Growth resources are available from the UUA Congregational Services and can be found on the web at http://www.uua.org/cde/education/.

Pat Emery, a participant at this workshop and a member of Jefferson Unitarian Church, Golden, Colorado, is available to do the workshop she presented at GA 2003 on “Volunteer Coordination and New Member Integration.” She can be reached at stardustpat@comcast.net.

Reported for the web by Dick Merritt; edited byJone Johnson Lewis.

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