FAITH forum 7B WESLEYAN WISDOM Take a look behind UMC’s favorability ratings


BY DONALD W. HAYNES UMR Columnist


A recent survey by LifeWay, a


Southern Baptist agency, had interest- ing data on how the United Methodist Church is viewed by Americans. We need to ask ourselves what is behind the opinions uncovered by the poll takers. We need to avoid denial and ask ourselves how we can use these num- bers to become more creative, to enhance our profile, and to reach more people to become disciples of Jesus Christ. The survey found


Donald Haynes


that 62 percent of Americans have a favorable view of United Methodists. That might work as an upbeat headline, but digging deeper, one learns that only 15 percent have a “very favorable” view of our de- nomination. Forty-seven percent have a “somewhat favorable” view, and this does indeed give United Methodists a higher positive total than either Catholics, Southern Baptists, Mor- mons or Muslims. No other religious groups were fac-


tored into the survey. The good news is that when we approach a friend, a relative, an acquaintance, a neighbor, or a stranger about attending our United Methodist church, nearly two- thirds will not tell us that ours would be low on their list of churches they might seek as a gateway to a first-time or renewed personal, meaningful rela- tionship with God. Another telling stat was that


United Methodists had the lowest per- centage of respondents who have a “very unfavorable” evaluation of our denomination: only 6 percent. By con- trast, Mormons and Muslims gener- ated very high negative feelings. Now the disturbing “kicker.” Who


is growing and who is declining in membership, attendance and vitality? We all know the answer. We are de-


clining and the Mormons and Mus- lims are growing.


Vanilla denomination One must wonder what our image


really is. Perhaps it is the church of one’s family heritage, the “little coun- try church of my childhood,” the church with “dignity and high re- spectability” or some other rather be- nign or innocuous impression. After all, 47 percent rated us


“somewhat favorable.” That lacks a


cutting edge, a high curiosity, or any in-depth knowledge. Most likely, those who rate us “somewhat favorable” had no idea of our grace theology, the United Methodist Committee on Re- lief, or persons who we in the denomi- nation know have found “the living water of Jesus” through a life-chang- ing experience that happened in a United Methodist church! The bottom line question is: What


are we doing to capitalize on this “soft” favorable response? The LifeWay study has another


disturbing stat. Sixteen percent of Americans have no opinion at all about United Methodism. We have 37,000 churches in the United States and 16 percent of the people do not know we are here! We are not even on their radar screen! This anonymity is higher than


Catholics, Baptists, Mormons or Mus- lims. We are vanilla. We lack “brand” or “flavor.” So here we are. People have noth-


ing against us but little interest in us. Have we become part of nostalgic Americana like the white clapboard churches on every New England vil- lage green? Many of those have paint peeling from the steeples, empty pews on Sunday mornings and little influ- ence in the village where they were once the dominant cultural influence. Is that our destiny?


Re-branding Once upon a time, Methodism had


a “brand” and it was not vanilla! John Wigger, historian, writes of


the early Republic era, “Methodism provided a great many Americans . . . not only with a source of spiritual meaning, but also with fellowship and community, with comfort and aid in times of distress, in short, with a sense of belonging that all people crave. The extent to which Methodists were able to accomplish this is what most clearly distinguishes their move- ment from the other denominations of this period.” He continues, “Early American


Methodism’s leaders understood the nature of the post-revolutionary cul- tural marketplace, in effect designing an innovative marketing strategy to master what historians call ‘Jackson- ian America.’ No company could match Francis Asbury’s nationwide network of class leaders, circuit stew- ards, book stewards, local preachers, circuit riders and presiding elders. They led the movement’s system of class meetings, circuit preaching, quarterly meetings, annual confer-


ences, and quadrennial conferences— all churning out detailed statistical re- ports to be consolidated and published on a regular basis.” One conclusion is almost ir-


refutable: In the 19th century, 16 per- cent of the American people would not be oblivious to the presence of Methodism to the extent that they had “no opinion.” We were the most talked about denomination in every Ameri- can setting, from the country store to the political “smoked filled room.” Dr. Wigger calls Methodism “first and foremost a religion of the people.” One concluding appraisal of the


“muscle days” of Methodism’s decades of growth was the comprehensive ef- fects of spiritual formation, social support, missional outreach and nu- merical increase. Research by Roger Finke and Rodney Stark indicates that this gargantuan growth had such a head of steam that it continued well into the 20th century. Then comes the sad news. We


gradually evolved from what John Wesley clearly saw as a “counter-cul- tural” religious movement to be a sub- stantial part of dominant American culture. Now we are part of the wood- work.


Spiritual footage Diana Butler Bass’ Christianity for


the Rest of Us needs to be, at least for a season, our denominational “play- book.” She understands what hap- pened. She notes the evolution of mainline Protestantism from “congre- gations” to “denominations,” with a loss of spontaneity, fluidity, receptive- ness to change, and adaptation to local needs.


She continues as a prophet who


needs to be heard: “If American reli- gious institutions are to regain their spiritual grounding, they will need to listen to and learn from the spiritual practices of local congregations.” Then she gives us this word of wisdom: “. . . we are, again, in a time when faith would live through rebirthing its tra- dition, not through maintaining or improving its inherited structures.” These lessons are profoundly im-


portant. Methodism began with dis- enchanted, dislocated people seeking “spiritual footage.” That is the major spiritual and psychological need of people in our own time. Gradually though, we ceased to be


the “voice crying in the wilderness” and blended into the cultural wood- work. As Dr. Butler Bass put it of her home United Methodist church, it was like “my father’s Rotary Club at prayer.” Both in Sunday school and the pulpit, the message ceased to be transformational. Most messages cen- tered on personal morality and super- ficial ethics. With the 1960s, “social holiness” morphed into an insistence that a non-transformed people of “half-way covenanters” embrace a somewhat radical posture of social justice ethics. Can United Methodism be reborn


with some of the theological integrity, missional outreach and life-changing evangelism of the Evangelical United Brethren and the older Methodist churches? Dr. Butler Bass, a former Methodist herself and now an Episco- palian after a sojourn into fundamen- talism, says that we can. She warns though that “the old way of organizing religion in America has vanished.”


Her hope is that a new kind of


Protestantism is being born, building upon tradition, faithfulness and wis- dom. The new venture is that of a pil- grim who seeks a spiritual “growing place.” Pilgrims are looking for a place they cannot yet see: a future under- girded with faith, enhanced by hope and enriched by love. The key phrase in our Council of


Bishops-backed Call to Action reform agenda is “vital congregations.” To see more of those will require a loosening of authority, a lessening of connec- tional “costs of doing business.” It will require freedom for congre-


gations to have a voice in who their pastor will be and what their local mission is. It will require encouraging them to find out whether they have the “nerve to submit” to the lessons of our early heritage, before we copied corporate structures in the early 20th century.


Diana Butler Bass has an intrigu-


ing invitation: “There are many pil- grims on this road. Welcome to the way! We are glad for your company.” Let this be the hope and prayer for the outcome of the 2012 General Confer- ence. T.S. Eliot once wrote, “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” We must do just that: arrive at


where we started and, in our genera- tion, know the place for the first time.


Dr. Haynes is a retired member of the Western North Carolina Conference. He is the author of On the Threshold of Grace: Methodist Fundamentals. Email: dhaynes11@triad.rr.com


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UNITED MET HODI S T REPORTER | JANUARY 6, 2012


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