Helping or Hindering? The Impact of Congregations’ Networks on Their Vitality and Sustainability

Commitment & Belonging, Ecology Frame, Featured-Fieldnote, Networks & Relationships, Resources Frame, Social Service & Activism

When we think about relationships in congregational life, we often think about relationships between attenders within a congregation. But what about relationships between congregations as organizations? These relationships can involve friendships between ministers, joint events, collaborations, and other partnerships. And different kinds of relationships can have different consequences.   My research has looked at two…

Exploring Congregational Connections

Clergy, Ecology Frame, Ecology-Feature, Interviews, Neighborhoods & Contexts, Networks & Relationships

No – those aren’t coronaviruses you see! They are connections between congregations! As much as we all may feel isolated these days, you have likely also been discovering just how interconnected your world is and how much we all need each other. And that goes for congregations, too. The ecology in which your congregation is…

Faith-Based Programming:
Four Tips for Congregations

Buildings & Spaces, Ecology Frame, Neighborhoods & Contexts, Networks & Relationships, Resources Frame, Social Service & Activism, United States & Canada

How should congregations aiming to initiate or expand their social service programming go about doing so? We recently published The Arc of Faith-Based Initiatives (2018, Springer) and have both examined congregational social services for about two decades. Our research suggests four critical considerations. What’s your programming focus and will it fill a void? The field…

Studying Congregations in a Pandemic

Attendance, Culture Frame, Ecology Frame, Focus Groups, Frames, Health & Wellbeing, Interviews, Resources Frame, Ritual & Worship, Theology Frame

In the midst of this pandemic, congregations have often been in the news (not always for good reasons). Newspaper columnists are writing about how we need what religion has to offer and how we miss the little things, like singing together, as well as highlighting the creative ways religious communities are staying connected. Meanwhile leaders…

A Good Time for a Walk

Buildings & Spaces, Catholic Parishes, Congregational Change, Ecology Frame, Ecology-Feature, Growth & Decline, History, Mainline & Liberal Protestant Churches, Walking Tours

During these long days of physical isolation, long walks around my community of West Roxbury, Massachusetts, have been a welcome respite. Those walks have also inevitably stirred my historical curiosity about this town first settled by Europeans in the 17th century. I realized that I had a question: There was something missing from our religious…