“I read what was in the bulletin insert and heard what was said in church on Sunday, but I still don’t really understand the Nicodemus Project. What’s behind it? What is our parish supposed to do? What can I do?”

I heard those words from a friend following the launch of the Nicodemus Project in parishes across the diocese on Jan. 31. I wondered how many other New Brunswick Anglicans were asking the same questions. I hope the following provides helpful answers.

In approving the Nicodemus Project action plan (it’s on our website) Diocesan Council clearly said “... enduring transformational change must begin with individual Anglicans and parishes. If we are to grow in our understanding of the Gospel and in our ability to proclaim it, and if our parishes are to become stronger and healthier – then individuals and parishes have to assume the greatest responsibility for action and change.”

The first step for any parish is for vestry to make a deliberate decision to engage the congregation in an open and honest assessment of the current situation. Many tools are available to help including “10 Marks of a Healthy Parish” and “Natural Church Development.” The important thing is to pray about and talk about our ministries, identify what’s going well and what should be improved. This process puts all kinds of things under a microscope — worship, spiritual growth, fellowship, welcoming and numerical growth, structures, leadership, mission, community outreach and stewardship. A good process will ensure that a vision statement is developed to paint a verbal picture of what the church could be like in three to five years if the necessary changes were made. This vision should be one that will please God, unite and inspire current members, and signal to potential members that our church is alive in Christ.

These self-assessment processes take time. A visioning weekend might get the ball rolling but a leadership team has to be commissioned to follow-up, to develop the priorities, to propose a series of change-oriented action steps and to ensure resources are allocated to important areas. Then the whole congregation has to be involved so everyone fully understands the implications and accepts the changes that may be in store. Ideally, a new vision and transformational action plan would be approved at a special congregational meeting.

We can all be involved in helping our church/parish/congregation to use God’s compass in re-charting its course. We can ask our rector or wardens what plans have been made under the Nicodemus Project and then volunteer to help. It takes many hands and many prayers to help our parishes become healthy, mission-focused, welcoming, growing, and active in proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ for the making of disciples.

One of the golden rules of any major change initiative is “communicate, communicate, communicate.” The planners and the organizers of any major project know well what it is all about and what is supposed to happen, but the experts tell us that much too often those most affected by the changes and those most responsible for action, remain in the dark.

In the case of our Nicodemus Project, the people who will be impacted by the program’s changes and the people most responsible for making those changes happen are the same … and we are those people. We are the people who worship each Sunday and have long ensured the presence and strength of the Anglican Church in New Brunswick by our commitment to the Anglican Church in our community.

This review of the Nicodemus Project may be old hat for some of us, but we can all benefit from a restatement of this project and our vital role in it. A reminder that this is a grass-roots, bottom-up initiative helps us maintain that important perspective too.

The Nicodemus Project, named for the man whose life was transformed when he saw Jesus, is a response to the needs of this diocese. Synod 2007 called for two task forces, one to study rural and/or struggling parishes and recommend appropriate responses to their condition; another to address the parishes’ support of the diocesan budget.

The Rural and/or Struggling Parishes task force was creative and conscientious. The message from us was clear: “one size does not fit all parishes, so please don’t dictate solutions to us – just set the priorities, point us in the right direction and support us when we need it”. So the task force read widely, consulted extensively and presented Synod 2009 with an accurate assessment of the problems and a comprehensive list of recommendations to inspire solutions.

The Budget Support task force conducted an in-depth investigation of a proposed 10-10-10 budget structure (parishioners tithe to the parish, which tithes to the diocese, which tithes to the national church). It too delivered a comprehensive report with a long list of recommendations.

Synod 2009 carefully analyzed and discussed the report findings and resolutions and recognized the Anglican Church in New Brunswick is in trouble. Without significant renewal in our understanding of being Christian and Anglican, preparation of our ordained and lay leaders for change, new communication strategies, and more attention to missions work, many parishes will continue to decline and may eventually disappear.

Synod called for transformational change. The Nicodemus Project exists to inspire and enable that change.

Most of us need only to look at our own parishes to see at least some of the signs and trends — declining offerings and attendance, the aging of the most faithful and generous, fewer young families, dwindling Sunday school attendance, and neglect of the needy in the community.

In many parishes today income does not keep up with the expenses of maintaining buildings, whether modest or magnificent, and may no longer support a full-time priest. Sometimes the beautiful old buildings don’t even meet the needs of today’s worshipers, attendance at Bible studies and other spiritual growth programs is sparse, and leaders (ordained and lay) feel ill-equipped to guide the parish into the future.

That feels like a lot of discouraging and bad news, but we still have the Good News. God is with us in our most difficult times, and through the Holy Spirit he will help us become the church that he wants us to be. First, though, we have to understand and accept the gravity of our situation and invite him into our lives and into our parishes to help us.

Jim Morell chairs the Administration Team of Diocesan Council, the team responsible for implementation of the Nicodemus Project

Diocesan Communications

09 February 2010