8. Local Ministry

The theme of Local Ministry was always going to be a key element of my sabbatical. I won't bother to list all the blog entries that mention it...

At the end of my sabbatical I simply want to reflect that local / mutual / shared / total / collaborative forms of ministry are absolutely key for the future of the church and that I will continue to prioritise this area of work over the years ahead.

3. Mutual Ministry Methods

I've spent a lot of time investigating the way people do Mutual / Total or Local Shared Ministry. It is probably impossible, if not unwise to import and adopt such methods wholesale, but there are a number of tools worth borrowing:

• Discernment Processes: Why not use some of the collaborative discernment processes used in Mutual Ministry? Calver Calver has been experimenting by giving out lists of members and asking which individuals would make good church wardens. She thinks this was reasonably successful. Why not extend this further and do an annual ministry discernment process? (See The Wisdom of Crowds for my reflections)
• Deploy Enablers: I met Alister Palmer who served as an enabler in Tazmania - in fact he set up the system there! He sees himself as an Enabler in his work in Bristol and is doing interesting things. There is absolutely no reason why we shouldn't employ clergy as enablers and give them appropriate job descriptions. David Robertson tells us a lot about how to do Collaborative Ministry in a traditional setting, but it is possible within Anglican structures to appoint clergy in creative ways...
• Do Collaborative Ministry: Likewise it is possible to go for a fully collaborative model within existing frameworks, as long as everyone has a shared understanding. Experiments at Water Eaton, Loughton and elsewhere are already proving this in practice...
• Practice Withdrawl: Clergy need to avoid the tempatation of dependency. It is possible (and extremely wise) to back off and try not to be there all the time. This is the only way that congregations can grow towards maturity. Once again, it is possible. Why aren't we doing it more?
  

In summary, we can achieve quite a bit by borrowing from the Mutual Ministry tool-kit without neccessarily adopting the whole model.

The Wisdom of Crowds

Why the Many are Smarter than the Few
JAMES SUROWIECKI

This is a wonderful book on collective intelligence filled with a great deal of good sense and practical wisdom. Surowieki's main argument is that a crowd of people with great diversity in ability and knowledge, can consistently outperform the experts - as long as they are able to think with relative independence and there is a system for aggregating their collective mind.

The three conditions essential for good collective wisdom are diversity, independence and decentralisation - of a particular form.

Surowieki begins with the illustration of a scientist in 1906 who was convinced that 'normal' people were not able to make inteligent decisions. He attended a farmers exhibition and watched a group of people bet on the weight of an ox. He was convinced that the sum of their 'average' minds would provide evidence for the weakness of the 'herd'. He gathered the betting skips together and was surprised to find that the mean average guess was 1,197 pounds. The ox actually weighed 1,198 pounds - pretty close!

This is, of course, a fairly basic example, but the book is rich with theory and stories, ranging from psycological and sociological experiments to real world examples drawn from business, inteligence and nature. I am particulalry taken by the observation that a large group of people with limited knowledge can produce better and more consistent results than a few experts.

This is a good book which I have found very helful in my continuing reflections on collaboration, mutuality and the church...

It brings to mind the silly little exercise we used to do with congregations when we asked them, during a service, to list three things that they would like to see happen in their church within five years. This may seem like a daft exercise but it fulfils Surowieki's criteria. The whole bredth of the congregation were able to contribute, and their responses were fully independent, since there was no discussion and the small pieces of paper were gathered in without being seen. The results could then be grouped in themes to indicate the common mind of the church. Once again, you may say this sounds insignificant, but I would like to point out that the Watling Valley churches who did this in 2000-1 produced the list of six partnership values which still seem incredibly relevant eight years later!

The thing that has really got my mind spinning is that this concept of collective inteligence may be really helpful in developing a theory of collaborative discernment. The issue of discernment (particularly of new ministers) has been raised locally as we move towards a more collaborative appraoch. Who should decide which local people are called to take up particular roles. Clearly the issue of gifts is highly significant, but who is responsible for identifying them? Should people self-select? Do we trust the clergy to do it for us? Does discernment only work if it's done by people on the outside? Do we need a diocesan selection conference for vergers and coffee makers?

In some ministerial models it is common to present people with a list of members and ask them to indicate which individuals are called for particular roles - or ask them to put names on a piece of paper and drop them in box - after prayer, of course. Is this merely an exercise in consultation or is something more significant taking place? Can a congregation, filled with the Spirit, opperate as a collective inteligence, thus producing an authentic piece of group wisdom?

In some places the "nomination" from the congregation is then processed by a central panel who pick people who fit with their own objectives. This would be one way of processing the information - similar to the process used to develop Linux.

A more authentic way of "agragating" the information may be for a co-ordinating panel to approach the most frequently identified individuals and invite them to explore their call further through a process of mutual discernment, further exploration, formal interview or election - depending on the post. Surowieki is correct to say that the more people who are involved in the agragation process the better.

Interesting... I'm going to think some more about some of the strands in this book. It has a lot to say about leadership, decision-making, group processes and collaboration. It's a very useful theoretical tool.

Mutual Ministry in Bristol

I had a super day in Bristol today. It involved getting up at five o'clock and spending several hours in a car, but it was worth it.
I met with a very interesting man called Alister Palmer who is working in one of the estates in South Bristol where he's doing some really interesting work with "transformation" - particularaly with the non-church community.
He was instrumental in setting up Enabler Supported Ministry in Tasmania with a group of six (now nine) congregations, and has recently been back to review the life of these communities as part of a sabbatical. He was particulalry interested in looking at the missionarly life of these communities (which he thinks is developing) and at their leadership. I've already seen the first draft of his report which is fascinating...
Alongside Alister I also met a group of people, most of whom had been part of a visit to Auckland a couple of years ago to take part in Enabler Training. We had a really good conversation about Mutual Ministry which I hope they found encouraging...
A couple of issues came out of the day. First, there is the whole question of leadership/mission. This visit confirmed my suspicion that the Church of England is currently focussing on a model of leadership which is primarily individualistic, heroic and inspirational - and laying this model on vicars, priests, LLMs etc... who are to be "Leaders in Mission". This tendency has some major weaknesses, not least that it doesn't recognise the richness and diversity of call - the Spirit may have other ideas... It also reafirms the traditional identification of clergy with ministry - if we are to have churches which are thriving as missionary/ministry fellowships we need to encourage collaborative approaches rather than heroic leadership.
I mentioned the book Wikinomics which I've been rereading recently - "How mass colaboration changes everything". As churches we often think that we need to learn the "command and control" techniques of business, when, in fact, there are people in the business world who are promosting and exploring a very different way of doing things... There was a rich strand in this conversation about chaos theory, self-organisation and collaboration. Some interesting stuff here...
The second lesson I took away from today was the need to do more work on helping people to understand the underlying theology of collaborative/mutual/local shared ministry. The Bristol group were plunged into enabler training in Auckland without first taking part in the AMEND course which is normally used in NZ to introduce the concept to members/ministers etc...
This fits in with some of my recent reading, e.g Thew Forrester's "I have called you friends..." and David Robertson's very helpful book, "Collaborative Ministry". Both of these contain some very deep and moving theology, which is probably needs to be grapled with before people can begin thinking and acting in a collaborative way. I've begun toying with the idea of a short course which I'm going to propose to the LSM Project Group...
We all agreed that this had been a good day and we'd like to keep the link alive. Maybe "mass colaboration" will help us all...

So back to MK and time for a bit of sleep...

"I have called you friends..."

by Kevin L. Thew Forrester

This is a wonderful little book by the Ministry Development Coordinator for the Diocese of North Michigan. It tells the story of Mutual Ministry in North Michigan (briefly) but also explores some of the underlying thought. He borrows heavily from feminist theology, and picks up Walt Winks' concept of "domination". He also hints at choas and organisation theory, implying that order emerges from chaos through a process of self-organisation. Hence church leaders should resist the temptation to impose order, since a liberated community will generate more creativity...
Although he does have a lot to say about the practicalities of Mutual Ministry, this is not a "how to" manual, so much as a "why do" introduction. Thew Forrester acknowledges that Mutual Ministry became possible to meet the needs of small rural communities, but sets out a strong and enthusiastic case for change based on a Christ-centred call for justice. Patriarchy and dominion are overcome by mutuality and awareness...
I liked this book, but recognise that the flow of his thought may not be to everyone's taste. Some of our more thoughtful reflector -theorists would probably love it, but some of my colleagues would wonder what he was talking about...
Jesus said, "I have called you friends..." Kevin Ther Forrester, would like to show us how to turn clerical domination structures into the kin-dom of heaven. Amen to that!