A New Model for the Future?

[1smartdodog]

I was trying to think of a model the church cold employ for the future that wold keep it alive beyond just a money machine. The old model to me seems to be suffering fatigue. Guilt, absolute authority, pay to play, temple construction. These are all items the church employed during my lifetime and before to garner enthusiasm from members. Will enough members in the future be motivated by the old model? Some for sure always will be, but it seems the masses have old style religion fatigue.

Problem is I am not sure there is a new model that will appeal to enough people to make it viable. Maybe something based on community for the betterment of the community, but that may be a pipe dream.

It's like God has worn out his welcome, being all powerful but powerless. Demanding attention, but giving little. Is there a new God that can replace the old one to motivate the troops in mass? I rather hope so, just not sure what it would look like.

[Palerider]

I wonder what you were thinking might be included?

1. Belief in Christ? Belief in God?

2. Belief and study of Biblical scriptures? What/who determines doctrine?

3. Would donations be encouraged? Who determines usage?
4. Is a correlated belief structure always a bad thing?

5. How are people handled who create controversy or contention?
6.What is considered Sabbath worship? Does the Sabbath mean anything?
7. What is considered "sin"?

8. How is leadership determined? Is schooling required?

9. Does the church promote a message? Is it a missionary church?

Just getting started.....

[alas]

I was trying to think of a model the church cold employ for the future that wold keep it alive beyond just a money machine. The old model to me seems to be suffering fatigue. Guilt, absolute authority, pay to play, temple construction. These are all items the church employed during my lifetime and before to garner enthusiasm from members. Will enough members in the future be motivated by the old model? Some for sure always will be, but it seems the masses have old style religion fatigue.

Problem is I am not sure there is a new model that will appeal to enough people to make it viable. Maybe something based on community for the betterment of the community, but that may be a pipe dream.

It's like God has worn out his welcome, being all powerful but powerless. Demanding attention, but giving little. Is there a new God that can replace the old one to motivate the troops in mass? I rather hope so, just not sure what it would look like.

I think there is guilt and shame fatigue for sure. I mean, starting with Freud, psychology has been talking about the over use of guilt as a control method. Psychology has refined the discussion now to recognize that it is shame more than guilt that is harmful. It is one of the big ways that science really is attacking religion, with its use of shame to control people. Dump some guilt and shame on people and they try harder to please you/God. But dump too much and they start to hate you and God. I have long felt that this is why religious people get so nasty with each other. A steady diet of guilt and shame and people stop liking themselves and liking other people even less, and resenting the source of all the guilt and shame.

But the Mormon church has stopped using community connections, because they do nothing to foster community any more. They like the convenience of shuffling ward boundaries, and that destroys whatever community was there. Back in the “good old days” (1950s) people lived in small towns and each town had its ward and people grew up and stayed. But our culture has become big city and very mobile. Natural communities don’t exist. To develope community, you need lots of activities to get people associating with each other, but the church is moving the opposite direction to less meetings.

So, it is not going to be community based for Mormons.

I just can’t imagine Mormons moving to a service and charity based model. Goes against what they have been doing for too long.

So, realistically, I have no ideas on what the church could start using to stay relevant to upcoming generations.

[Jeffret]

But the Mormon church has stopped using community connections, because they do nothing to foster community any more. They like the convenience of shuffling ward boundaries, and that destroys whatever community was there.

This is on purpose. They don't want people developing loyalty to their ward members and local members. They want people developing loyalty only to the central hierarchy. They see it as a way of retaining their power and control. I'm not sure that's really working out for them, though. Community is what binds people together and keeps them involved. People join and leave churches for social reasons. People can develop adulation for the distant top leaders but they can't develop relationships with them. Adulation doesn't have as much long-lasting connective power. People fall out of occasional adulation, but they find meaning in personal relationships.

[Jeffret]

People have long correctly identified the Church's shift to the centrally-controlled, consolidated budget process as a major hindrance to the development of community. While the consolidated approach does make some improvements in making things equal across different areas, it also transfers control from the local community up the hierarchical chain.

People have also correctly identified Correlation as a major hindrance to the development of community. There used to be room for local variation to meet different needs, for innovation arising locally. Correlation has worked to bring everything into centralized control of the men at the top of the pyramid. They've brought everything under their oversight, including things that were originally entirely separate such as Relief Society. Where adult lesson manuals used to have more room for addressing local needs or interest, they've become more and more based on top leaders, their talks, or modern interpretations of their teachings.

At times the Church has enjoyed some valuable innovation from local units that bubbled up to be standard programs or practices. Primary was one of those. I think the Varsity Scouts. There have been a number of others. As best I can tell, though, the examples are historical and modern leaders have moved away from anything bottoms-up.

Years ago when I was a student at BYU (around 1990) there were various talks from top leaders about the need to distill the gospel down to its essence in order to export it around the world. They wanted to remove Utah things that aren't really part of "the gospel" or not locally relevant. This makes some sense. Pioneer Day or Trek really aren't meaningful in most of the world. Nor many other things. Even just the way wards are structured and the positions that are needed for them. A lot of this became an effort to remove things that build community, instead of promoting that local areas develop things that build community for them.

At the same time, the Church has increased things that venerate or elevate the top hierarchy. They hold big birthday parties to venerate the president. They increase the media-based promulgation of the words of the top leaders.

The Church follows the model that it wants. The model is centralized control, patriarchy, and investing more and more power and glory up the chain until the top man. Some might say that's not necessarily the model the members want, but the leaders have created the model whereby what the members want, or even what they might innovate, is irrelevant. Only what a top leader wants or decides is relevant. They decide what is important and what happens. The leaders are very happy with this arrangement and have no impetus to change.

The Church won't follow any new model until the leaders feel a sufficient amount of pain that causes them to make or accept change. They've got the money so they can continue their lifestyle as long as they live. The Church's growth has slowed, but hasn't yet gone negative. Maybe once it does they'll start some self-examination but the decline will probably have to be significant before that happens.

[2bizE]

The only model I can foresee that would work and be beneficial would be a model where you don’t have to believe in the historical aspects of the church. You can choose to believe in Christ, and then everything else is just extra. Sort of like JS intended when he said we shouldn’t be held to certain creeds like the Methodists.

[Mormorrisey]

The Church won't follow any new model until the leaders feel a sufficient amount of pain that causes them to make or accept change. They've got the money so they can continue their lifestyle as long as they live. The Church's growth has slowed, but hasn't yet gone negative. Maybe once it does they'll start some self-examination but the decline will probably have to be significant before that happens.

I think this is true, 100%. I think this model will continue to work for another couple of decades, until the boomers start to die off - they are the ones who seem to like this conservative, top-down hierarchy structure. It serves them well (well, they THINK it serves them well) and they will not want big changes. I've heard some boomers already murmuring about Nelson's more "progressive" changes, so I think real change won't take place for a few years yet - after that, I think ANYTHING and EVERYTHING will be on the table, change-wise, so they will survive past the boomer generation.

Gives me a little more perspective on the $124 billion war chest - seems they are already preparing for the boomer armageddon!

[Hagoth]

I think one reason for slow change is due to passing the ball on to the next generation of leaders. They want to look like carriers of the torch, and no one will do anything that will jeopardize their legacy or upset the cart let down their extended family who enjoy so much privilege and pride by way of their special connection to the elite strata of the culture. Also, there is no greater legacy in Mormonism than saying the kinds of things that your fellow leaders will quote over and over again. The more orthodox you are the more likely you are to join that canon.

[glass shelf]

I really can't think of what a successful new model would look like. I can certainly think of churches out there with better models, but many of them seem to be struggling with membership as well. Part of it is just the move away from organized religion even if it does come with more tolerant belief systems and a better activities committee.

edit: Part of this might be my own biases. Between dealing with my kids' activities and my career, I really have no time left to give to organizations that aren't directly tied to those nor do I want to invest any more in a church. Period.

[Angel]

I like what the Salvation Army does.... We have a Rotary club near us who is well organized too.

[wtfluff]

Well... In my useless fluffy opinion, the new "model" would need to be based on honesty, and, well; LD$-Inc. has proven themselves incapable of honesty for almost 200 years. I ain't gettin' my hopes up.

[moksha]

When my ward discontinued the pot luck dinners they had participated in for so long, I sensed something slipping. That activity along with a linger longer serving punch and cookies (coffee all other churches, although I do remember the Unitarians having wine and cheese) provided an easy mechanism for socializing, which is necessary for maintenance and growth.

Not having stuff like singles or men's and women's reference groups certainly doesn't help. Trouble is if they had such things, the Church would try to make them regimented and have attendance be mandatory.