About a year ago, while speaking with a group of clergy colleagues about the complexities of ministry during a continuing pandemic, one of my colleagues said something that that I found particularly compelling and unsettling: “There will be no returning to normal following this pandemic,” she said, “because normal won’t exist anymore, Not the way it did a couple of years ago, no matter how much people wish for it. Instead,” she said, “churches are going to have to figure out how to navigate the new territory of a world that will never be as it was.”

I am not at all sure that I wanted to believe her assertion that day. Over time, however, I have come to understand the urgency of the truth she was communicating. In a post-pandemic world, churches are going to have to figure out how to navigate the new territory of a world that will never be as it was. Some people stepped out of the rhythms of church during the pandemic and have never rejoined those rhythms, for a variety of reasons. The demographics of American cities changed over the last three years, giving rise to new challenges concerning everything from mental health to a reconfigured workforce, everything from political fatigue to a deeper distrust of institutional religion. In addition to all that new territory, Christ Church is in the process of a reconfiguration of its church staff, including the arrival of a new senior minister in February and two new staff hires on the immediate horizon. 

My colleague’s words continue to resonate with truth for me: “Churches are going to have to figure out how to navigate the new territory of a world that will never be as it was.”

Here at Christ Church, we are committed to being proactive in the work of navigating the new territory in which we currently live. To that end, we are entering a time of discernment and vision-building that we are calling Navigation 2023, with the subtitle, “Ministry Priorities for a Post-Pandemic Christ Church.” 

Often, when churches go about the work of vision building, they limit that work to a staff or a leadership team, which often leaves the larger congregation feeling somewhat voiceless in the process. It is painfully clear to me how foolish a methodology that would be in a congregation that is as diverse, visionary, and immensely gifted as the Christ Church congregation. And so, I am inviting you the congregation into the visioning process because we urgently need your help. Early in the month of May, we will be sending out a survey widely to members and friends of Christ Church, asking for specific input from you related to our church’s present and future ministry and the ministry priorities that you would identify. In addition to the survey, we will also be holding a lunch following worship one Sunday in the near future for the purpose of sharing the results of the survey and getting your sense of what those results mean for our church’s future ministry. 

I do not know how you feel about surveys and visioning, but I see this as an exciting time in the life of Christ Church. However, if the season is going to reach its highest potential, we need your help, your input, and your commitment. When the survey is available to you in early May, please give to it the kind of time and focused attention that reflect your love for the church and its ministry. And then, when the lunch discussion is scheduled later on, please do your very best to be present for it, so that our entire congregation might be part of the navigation that I believe God is calling us to engage in this time.

Author James Lane Allen once wrote, “Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so you shall become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall one day be; your ideal is the prophecy of what you shall at last unveil.”  I am inviting you to dream some lofty dreams with me about what God might be calling Christ Church to be in this post-pandemic city and world. There is important navigating to do for the sake of Jesus Christ. I am asking you to be a part of it.

I am grateful for you, friends, and I am grateful to be alongside you in the navigation.

Rev. Dr. Eric Park