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Interior of Franziskaner Kirche

17 Tuesday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Travel

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Austria, church, Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

Once you step into the church, your jaw drops because of the beauty inside.

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Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

The altar, like many churches in Europe is gorgeous and the focal point of attention.

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Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

I found the placement of the organ pipes to be rather interesting though.

I can imagine the conversation between the builder and the bishop.  “Well, we have to put them somewhere.  How about over here, there’s an empty space in the wall.”

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Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

But, the real beauty in the church is the artwork.

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Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

The artwork is just incredible.

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Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

It brings out beauty and a sense of worship so easily.

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Franziskaner Kirche, Salzburg

Franziskaner Kirche

16 Monday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Travel

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Austria, church, Franziskaner, Kirche, Salzburg

We continued to wander the streets of Salzburg, which is just one of the most pleasant things you can ever do on a beautiful sunny day…

Franziskaner Kirche

I mean, seriously, you just want to stop and sit at the cafe and buy a good beer or wine and enjoy time there don’t you.

But we didn’t – at least not right then.

We kept moving forward and came upon a church – the Franziskaner Kirche.

Franziskaner Kirche

Talk about having a cool name plate on your church.

At any rate, we wandered the grounds for a bit.

Franziskaner Kirche

And then went inside.

Franziskaner Kirche

Let’s just say, we weren’t disappointed.

Next travel post will be on some of the artwork inside – truly amazing.

Playing by the rules

11 Wednesday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Humanity, Organizational theory, Politics

≈ 3 Comments

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church, playing by the rules, predictability, rules, Seth Godin, Small is the New Big

I just recently finished an audiobook – Small is the New Big, by Seth Godin.  It’s been out for about a decade, but I found the book to be rather insightful still.  There were a few dated references, but if you can listen for some timeless principles, it makes it all worthwhile.

Here was one nugget that Godin gave -(I’m paraphrasing, but this was the general idea)

Never play by the rules.  Rules are established by people in power and meant to keep competitors to that power in check and to prevent them from getting power.  If you play by the established rules you will certainly lose.  Changing the rules is the safest option if you want to succeed and grow.

That’s a whole lot of insight in just a few sentences.

I have some additional thoughts on this.

Take the idea further.  Even people who are on your side will struggle with this.  Because the established rules provide something important – security and predictability.  It’s a basic human need to want to control one’s environment and life.  The best way to give the impression of control is through predictability.

In politics, 95% of the campaigns run will have a predictable result – you can see it pretty early on in most campaigns if you know what you are looking at.  They are predictable.

However, if some of these same candidates changed the rules, think of the way politics could be different.

Now take the idea to church.  Whoa!  Church is full of rules – so much so that many people complain about all the rules in church.  Imagine what would happen with church if we changed the rules.  This is a bit dangerous though to talk about when it comes to church.  Some will think that changing the rules means changing everything.  Not at all.  What I’m talking about are the man-made rules of church.  You know them well because you come across them in your own churches.  There’s a rule about where people sit.  It’s unstated, but there’s a rule.  In some churches there is a rule about who controls the temperature gauge.  In some churches there’s a rule about how communion is done or how the altar is set.  These all may be small, but I tell you what – they are extremely important rules to the people who benefit from them.

So what are the established rules in your church?

Getting back to the main idea though – much of these rules use predictability as an enforcement mechanism.  Many people won’t even try to change a rule because they can predict what the reaction will be and the reaction will not be pleasant, so they don’t do it.

Let’s say you are one of those crazy people who want to change this – to overcome the predictability factor.  What do you do?  My thought is this – make predictability your friend and high jack it.  Predict what will happen and prepare for it.  It’s like a chess game.  A great deal of chess is predicting future moves of your opponent and how you can respond or lead and get your opponent to respond.  In essence, chess is won based on how well you can predict your opponents strategy and make moves that don’t even allow your opponent to start carrying out their strategy.

What I’m saying is make predictability an asset.  Make changing the rules safer than sticking with the established order.

How?  Honesty is a powerful tool.  In many cases these rules are established with an interest in keeping the status quo.  The problem with the status quo is that it is not permanent, only temporary.  If you can look past the current situation to the future (not even far in the future), then you can make predictability your friend.

I’ll give you an example.  Let’s say there is one person who has set the altar for years.  And everyone knows not to mess with this.  But let’s say that you see this as unhealthy.  How do you deal with this?  By talking about the truth.  Maybe you talk about the fact that we need to plan for the future – person x is going to die someday, we don’t know the day, could be today.  Then what do we do?  Who will set the altar?  It still has to be done.  Do we want to be left stranded with no one knowing what should be done?  I can bet that, even though there will be resistance, you’ve just gained some people to seeing the truth of the situation long-term.  You changed predictability from focusing on the status quo to focusing on the long-term.  You changed the game from comfort in predicting the short to having to deal with the pain of not knowing long-term, especially when it could have been dealt with in the short-term.

So, I’ll ask it again, what are the established rules in your church?  Want to change them for the long-term?  What are you going to do about it?

Is Christian Education Failing?

10 Tuesday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

church, education, religous education

I didn’t expect to write this post.  It was never on my radar until yesterday.  A few days ago I wrote a blog post innocently asking what people would pay for in church, if they had to pay for it.  The point was to see what people valued the most.  I got great replies – it is wonderful to see so many of you take up the challenge to think about this question and provide me feedback.  Thank you.

I received a variety of answers – all really great answers.  But I was amazed at one consistent theme – education.  People would be willing to pay for Christian Education – or they currently are.  They would pay for it for themselves and (maybe even more surprising to me) they would pay for it for other people.

Probably the best response to why was by vonleonhardt2 – “What I want from my religious group and what they can offer me, is to not be so darn ignorant of their own religion.”

This leads me to today’s question – is the church as a whole failing at religious education?  If not, why would people be willing to pay for it?

I know of some really great educational programs in the church.  There are churches that have started an adult catechumenate program and it works great.  Some of these churches go even further and require everyone who is a member to go through the program, including the pastor, who already went through seminary.

So, here’s a follow-up question.  Do you accept the premise that the church is failing at religious education?  If so, why?  If not, why not?  Try to think of this from beyond your own church.

And more importantly, what do you think should be done about this?  Again, I’m going to ask for something concrete – I’m not looking for you all to have all the answers, but I am asking you to provide one thing that church could do that would improve Christian education.  Just one thing.

I want your opinion…

06 Friday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church

≈ 15 Comments

Tags

church, religion, survey, value

I have a quick survey for you and I really want your opinion.  Consider this a thought experiment.  I imagine this is a question you have never been asked.  I’m putting it in financial terms because, well, that’s how so very often we show that we value something.

If you had to pay for something that religion or church had to offer, what would it be?  Why would you be willing to pay for it?

Would it be some kind of service, information, something else? I am asking you to stay away from general and broad topics, things like salvation (that’s already paid for).  I’m looking for something concrete here.

Play along, I’m really curious what you find of most value in church/religion.

Thank you.

What do people want in church?

04 Wednesday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Humanity, Theology

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church, God, needs, people, wants

What do people want in church and religion?

I heard Seth Godin say in an audio book that I’m reading that people don’t buy what they need.  They buy what they want.  I agree with that.  So I took a moment to think about this in relationship to church.

So what do people want when it comes to church?

Based on my conversations with people, here is what I have heard:

People want to experience God in their daily life.
People want church to be relevant to their life, otherwise, it’s a waste of time and they have better things to do.
People want church and God to be approachable – not another institution that creates walls and barriers to entry and participation
People want church to be enjoyable – they don’t want to be entertained (it’s not a concert), but they also don’t want to be bored out of their mind.
They want a community of people who can support them and who they can support – think of an extended family.
They want to be told that even though they are screwed up, it’s ok – God loves them just as they are.
They want a way to live life a better way.

If these are true, then I have to ask – Church, what do we do with that?

Things I keep learning about church

03 Tuesday Nov 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Organizational theory, Politics

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church, ELCA, organization, politics, structure, synod

The longer I go through this seminary process, the more I am reminded of things I learned in my past and how important they are to my future.

A big one is that the church and politics are so similar in both good and bad ways.

I won’t spend much time here, except to list some of the negatives – there’s ambition to rise from some people.  There is politics in the church – both real politics and office politics.  Appearances, performance, and spectacle all rear their heads from time to time.  People love a speech from someone important in the church – especially if they can take a selfie with that person.

None of those should shock anyone – and they aren’t always bad.  In fact, sometimes, they can be quite useful in a good way.

And there are also some positives.  Again, I’ll just list them briefly – the church at it’s finest presents a vision of what can be.  It can rally and motivate people to be and do things differently.  The church has an organized structure that helps people to get things done.

I want to talk about this last point a bit more.  I hear people complain about the structure of the church – “it is too bureaucratic.”  “It prevents things from happening.” “What do those people in the central office know about our situation?”  Organization has it’s positives and negatives, just like anything else.  It’s a tool and if it is used effectively, can be a great tool.

I’ll take the synod structure of the ELCA for example.  (That’s the church I am a part of).  Does it have some challenges – sure does.  Anytime people are involved, there will be challenges.

A lot of people pick on the synod.  Let’s face it – it’s easy to pick on.  There’s a level of authority that is within reach.  Just look at the past – people want to lay blame at some level of authority higher than them.  In the Lutheran Church, it’s the synod that gets the blame.

But, I want to present something a little different – a different way of looking at the synod.

For me, the synod is like a state-level political party organization.  Now, hang in there for a few minutes while I make sense of this.

The state-level political party serves a few functions.  1. It’s job is to plan, prepare and carry out practical things that will fulfill the vision of the party – what it thinks is best for the country or state.  2. It actively recruits candidates who can win and in winning, can carry through the vision of the party.  3. It supports those candidates financial, with advice, guidance, staff support and other resources.  4. It provides financial and other support to the national party, so that the national party can do a similar job as the state-level party, but on a broader scale.  5. The state-level party has a chairman that becomes the spokesperson and main cheerleader and vision keeper for the party.

That’s how a state-level political party is supposed to be anyway – more like an ideal.

I could go on, but I’ll stop with five.  Now, instead of party, put in synod.  Instead of candidates, put in pastors.

It’s not a perfect analogy, but I would argue that it’s pretty good.  And again, it’s an ideal.  Politics and religion have something else in common – they have something intangible – what they sell is a vision for living.  A way of expressing how society should be set up and run.  This is unique to politics and religion and a reason why both of these are so close to people – if something is intangible, how it gets interpreted will vary from person to person.

As much as I keep running from my past in politics, I keep learning that this past is so very valuable for my experience in the church.

I wonder what other people would compare their church with.  Tell me, I want to know.

Visiting a Really, Really Old Church Site

27 Tuesday Oct 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Finland, Travel

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1200, church, Finland, Turku

While I was in Turku, a friend took me to a historical site – the location of a really old church.  What is left is the foundation of the church.

Old Church, TurkuThis church was built some time around 1200.  That makes it one of the earlier churches in existence in Finland.

Old Church, TurkuIn case you think I’m making that stat up, above is the sign.  Of course it is in Finnish and Swedish, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

At any rate, the site sits along the river that runs through Turku.  It’s a beautiful location, especially on a beautiful day.

Old Church, TurkuYou can almost imagine people coming to church and then sitting out on the grass to watch the river.

Farewell Stockholm

22 Thursday Oct 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Travel

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church, ferry, Stockholm, Sweden

At the end of our trip, we took the ferry back to Helsinki.

Farewell StockholmThe wonderful thing about taking the ferry is the beautiful views that you get from on the ferry.

Farewell StockholmViews that you can’t get anywhere else.

Farewell StockholmWhen you look at the same thing from a different perspective, you learn something new.

Farewell StockholmI wonder what would happen if we did this in the church…

Interior of German Church, Stockholm

21 Wednesday Oct 2015

Posted by laceduplutheran in Church, Travel

≈ 2 Comments

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church, German, king, Stockholm, Sweden, wealth

We ventured into the old German Church in Stockholm.  It was beautiful, of course – full of white and gold and dark wood.  All very elegant.

German ChurchThe windows alone are amazing works of art.

German ChurchSo lifelike and real, you can almost reach out and be a part of the scene.

The organ in the back is of course amazing.

German ChurchAs well as the side organ with the gold front to it.

German ChurchAnd when you look at the front, well…

German ChurchWhat you see if the altar, the kings box and the pulpit.  Yes, the king had his own box seating.  I guess church was the precursor to professional sporting events.  Wouldn’t want the royalty to have to mix with the commoners you know.

And then there was this:

German ChurchI don’t know what it is.  However, it looks like something at the beginning of a PBS series – something like Sherlock Holmes or Piorot.  You know, the person is there introducing the episode in a very stately manner.

Lots of gold, lots of wealth, lots of structure in this church.  I’m willing to bet there aren’t many people attending on Sundays too.  Wouldn’t want to many people to come in and mess things up now, would we?

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laceduplutheran

I believe that God, church, and theology are approachable, enjoyable, and relevant for everyone. I write about this a lot because people need to hear it. So many people feel lost, hopeless, alone, and are searching for identity and meaning. I'm an ELCA Pastor (Lutheran) who has a background in politics, business, and the non-profit worlds. I take churchy theological ideas and words and communicate them in everyday language that people can understand, in ways that relate, and show that God, church, and theology matter a great deal. Oh, and it doesn't have to be boring either - mostly because it's the best news ever!

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