Many of us were pleased—even proud—when we saw that series of four ads for Unitarian Universalism in Time magazine last year.  The ads, which raised awareness of our faith tradition across the country, were paid for with Association Sunday collections.   The whole idea is to fund this as a campaign to grow Unitarian Universalism.  Other funds from last year went to support the recruitment and placement of ministers of color, and some of those funds were returned to the districts to support growth initiatives.  Within our Mid-South District, this has led to UP!, or Unlimited Potential Program [1].  Part of what’s going on is to offer workshops on growth at district gatherings like last weekend’s Healthy Congregations Conference in Birmingham.  One of the growth models I’ll talk about was introduced to me at that workshop—I wish some more of us had been able to attend.   You see, we as individuals can certainly be proactive in growing our tradition.  But it’s also a matter of collective effort, both at the congregational and associational levels.  It’s about asking one another, “How does your garden grow?”  We have wisdom to share, and achieving healthy, diverse growth in our own garden can result from observing how other gardens grow successfully.  

          A survey of UU congregations [2] three years ago showed considerable potential for growth in congregations, but very few congregations—about 7 percent—see growth as a central part of congregational life.  Unfortunately, when someone mentions growth, we are apt to think of numbers—number of members, average attendance in religious education classes, number of pledging households, and so forth.  Numbers give us only one way to view growth, however, and maybe not the most important way.

          Indeed, the survey in 2005 revealed no clear pattern—or set of causes—for numerical growth.  In the 2000-2005 timeframe, some congregations grew while others declined.  Over a third of UU congregations stayed about the same.  In that timeframe, the aggregate growth across our whole association was only about 7000. 

A colleague, The Rev. Charlotte Cowtan, has analyzed the 2005 survey results.  She says, “(T)here is no magic bullet for growth.  And it’s not merely a matter of demographics.”  Within particular geographic communities, some congregations grow while others contract.  She also writes, “Growing congregations don’t necessarily see themselves as working to grow (numerically).”  Instead, growing congregations work to serve; they’re more likely to have a mission that they can describe. 

Permit me to insert a sidebar.  A describable mission statement is apt to be short yet comprehensive.  Northwest has a mission statement, but how many of us know it?  It’s there, every Sunday, on the back of the order of service, but I’ll bet that few, if any, of us can recite it from memory.  Is it easily describable?   Perhaps not.  At last week’s conference, we were reminded that clear, concise statements of vision or mission work best.  Here’s a challenge: Is the thinking, the spirituality, behind our mission statement still valid?  And can it be expressed in one sentence?
Back to Rev. Cowtan’s analysis.  She notes, “It seems that growth is an outcome rather than a goal for our growing congregations.  You do things well and people will come.”  Most of you have heard something hauntingly similar from me.  I say that “Numerical growth should not be a goal unto itself.  Rather, it is an outcome, a result of doing church well.”

But what does that mean, doing church well?  I’ve said that growth is multidimensional, that there are two other dimensions of growth that are necessary for numerical growth.  These can be characterized as internal growth, or a strengthening of our connections to one another in beloved community and of the policies and processes by which we operate.  Is this kind of growth happening at Northwest?  Absolutely.  If you are a Second Hour participant—in one of the adult sessions or in children’s R.E.—you are helping us all to grow in community with one another. 

The other necessary dimension is to grow in importance in the wider community.  Are we doing so?  Yes, again.  Outreach Ministry has brought us together with groups such as Planned Parenthood and PFLAG, or Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.  Thirteen of our youth last Sunday participated in a service project preparing meals at Open Hand of Atlanta.  And don’t forget the Earth Ministry team that is both building community with its green efforts and working toward highly visible, social justice projects that will impact the wider community as well as our own.  There’s some pretty strong evidence that we are indeed “doing church well,” and that, my friends, is an important start.
Scholars of church growth widely agree that numerical growth is only one of several ways in which our gardens grow.  A graphic model for sustainable congregational growth appears on the cover of today’s order of service.  This model comes from last week’s Healthy Congregations Conference and is based on the work of Loren Mead, a church scholar and President of the Alban Institute, a highly regarded church think-tank and consulting organization. 

I’d like to talk a little about this model.  If you’re interested in learning more about it, you can read Mead’s book, or you can download this (Show report) report on congregational growth from the Unitarian Universalist Association website [3].  As an aside, let me add that it seems it won’t be long before sermons have to be accompanied by Power Point presentations.

To begin, a congregation must grow—not necessarily numerically—in order to survive.  And don’t forget, growth means change.  Mead proposes four dimensions of growth as you can see on the graphic.  They are Organic, Incarnational, Maturational, and Numerical. 

In a congregation where none of these types of growth is occurring, something must change, or the congregation will die.  A new shoot of growth, somewhere in that field, will emerge, we cannot be sure where.  That emerging shoot of growth can eventually lead to a return to vigorous congregational life, but how shall we, in shared ministry, tend to these shoots?  In most congregations, including this one, the promising green shoots of growth occur regularly.  They just happen.  So leaders must select those shoots that best match the mission of the congregation.  Those shoots need water, light, nurturing, and protection from being trampled.  They need to be honored as new life in our garden of community. 

Next, consider Organic growth.  It’s about building community, as we are with the Second Hour experiment.  It’s about developing the organizational structures, the processes and practices, that contribute to a strong, stable network of relationships.  An example is the formation of Ministry Teams that has been emerging over the past several years.  It means equipping leaders and creating systems that support the collective undertakings of the congregation.  It’s about strength. 

Incarnational growth has to do with a congregation’s relationships with its outside environment.  It’s basically what I called our growth of influence and participation in the wider community.  It’s about growth in action and justice making. 
Finally, there is Numerical growth, which speaks for itself.  The point of the graphic model is that these dimensions of growth need to be in balance in order for sustainable growth to be possible.  Leaders need somehow to manage growth, in all its complexity, to try to ease a congregation into that middle, sustainable-growth segment.  I think it’s important to note that congregations are apt to drift around in terms of their placement on this model’s domain.  You cannot push or shove a congregation—especially a UU congregation—into the sustainable middle.  You won’t find topiaries in our gardens.  It takes sensitive, balanced, mission-driven leadership to discern where new growth shoots are emerging and to encourage growth toward the center.  Or, once there, to help the congregation stay there.  You see, congregations change incessantly.  There is no tendency toward equilibrium in that middle piece.  If, for example, a congregation turns inward, becomes separated from the wider, incarnational community, it will drift out of the sustainable state. 

So, if that center slice where we can achieve sustainable growth is most desirable, where would we place Northwest on this graphic?  Well, we’re certainly not on some other page.  We’re in the domain of the graph somewhere.  I’ve given examples of organic, incarnational, and maturational growth that help to define Northwest.  There may be some signs of numerical growth, too, but I think it’s premature to conclude that we’re inside that region where sustainable growth can ensue.  At the same time, I don’t think we’re very far from that center region, either.  Indeed, this congregation carries great promise and we can show pride in moving toward the middle, but let us not forget that movement does not occur without change.

You see, in the final analysis, growth and change must go hand in hand.  We plant our gardens in hope that they will change—from bare earth and seedlings to a diverse cornucopia of fruits and vegetables.  Managing that change is not easy.  Let me illustrate with a story that appears in the growth report I referenced.  It’s about a small UU congregation, one with no minister, no staff, and no building.  They were experiencing the usual cash-flow problems, and leaders sought some sort of catchy gimmick to encourage giving.  Someone gave the church a basket with a sort of quilted, fabric chicken attached to the top—you know, one of those baskets that’s designed to keep biscuits warm that your great aunt used to have.  Leaders glommed onto that chicken basket to use for the offertory.  Their mantra became “Stuff the chicken!” on Sunday mornings. 

It worked!  Parishioners began to “stuff the chicken” enthusiastically.  The offering increased dramatically…for a while.  People grew tired of “stuffing the chicken” and their enthusiasm—and contributions—started to wane.  Visitors thought the chicken basket was just a little weird, and leaders eventually retired the chicken—to the free range?—and got a more traditional offertory basket. 

Several members bemoaned the loss of that chicken basket because it had been a symbol of success as well as an inside joke appreciated by the in-crowd.  This led to complaints and eventual conflict.  However, in spite of emotional conversations at coffee hour, the chicken was not resurrected.  The resentment of pro-chicken members simmered just below the surface. 

Years later, when the congregation had called a minister, engaged a staff, and had a building of their own, they were ending another particularly turbulent period in their history.  One of the church elders spoke to the congregation.  She recalled the Great Chicken Controversy and admitted being one of the resurrectionists.  The congregation, especially newer members, enjoyed hearing the story about “stuffing the chicken.”  But she also said what she had learned from that experience.  She said: