Shit We Don't Have Time For

Consumer Church Needs to End

Let’s face it: the country is a hot mess. People are suffering and the policies being enacted are only making it worse. Unless you’re a billionaire who has an option to vacate the planet, the crisis is real and it does or will affect you.

Meanwhile, back at the abandoned umbrella factory (aka your church) good, compassionate people are wasting time and energy. They don’t mean to. They want a better world too, but they’re in consumer churches that have taught them that if they complain, they will get what they want. It’s the “customer service” model of church governance, and it works.

Or it did work before we had more important things to worry about.

So, while some of us are piling into senators’ offices or organizing a general strike or building mutual aid societies to catch the people who’ve been pushed out of the social safety nets, others are complaining that the church newsletter isn’t printed and mailed to them like it was 20 years ago.

If we’re going to meet this moment, we have to start by getting real about Shit We Don’t Have Time For.

This is a culture we have to change and FAST. Really FAST. Doing it will hurt people. I’m sorry about that. Best I can say is that they might be reminded about who they are, laugh at themselves, and join the work. Or not. Not everyone is cut out for big, bold thinking. Slide by them quietly and hope over time, they’ll find their way back in.

So, here’s my list, compiled not from my personal experience (generally) but from everything I’ve been hearing from church leaders over this last year. (I’m a Good Officer; I hear about a lot of shit.) I’d love if you’d add to it in the comments.

Shit We Don’t Have Time For…

• · Shadow Boards

• · Data Crunchers

• · Child Hushers

• · People Threatening to Leave If They Don’t Get What They Want

• · Gossip

• · Hidden Agendas

• · NDAs

• · People Stuck in the Past

• · Complaints about Language

• · Homophobes

• · Transphobes

• · Misogynists

• · Purity Tests

• · Arm Chair Coaches Who Tell Everyone What To Do Without Doing Anything Themselves

• · Egos

• · Micromanagers

• · Committees for Complaining

• · Toxic Member

  s

• · Critics

• · Cheapskates

• · Obstructionists

• · Perfectionists

• · Triangulators

• · And anyone who thinks they should personally get whatever the hell they want

  We don’t have time for that shit!