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EDITORIAL
A question to ponder

Jim Coggins

In 1988-89, the Canadian Mennonite Brethren Conference asked Canadian MB churches to contribute $86.90 per member to Canadian Conference programs. Not every church could afford to pay the full “norm” of $86.90 per member. Some churches were small, some had recently been planted, some were struggling with various problems of their own, and some were in economically depressed locations. Nevertheless, the churches contributed almost three-quarters (74.6%) of the norm, for a total of $1,706,582. (It should be noted that, whatever local problems they were facing, the churches in the Manitoba MB Conference gave 100% of the norm that year.)

Ten years later, in 1998-99, the Canadian Conference asked Canadian MB churches to contribute $90 per member. That amounts to about a 3% increase over 10 years. However, given even modest inflation rates of 1-2% a year, this means that in real dollars the Canadian Conference is asking for considerably less per member from the churches than it asked 10 years ago. One might expect that since the Conference is asking for less, more churches would have been able to contribute 100% of the norm. Yet, in 1998-99, the churches contributed an average of only 61.4% of the norm. In fact, the percent of norm the churches are contributing has dropped steadily over the last decade. This is significant because these contributions provide the bulk of funding for Canadian Conference programs, even though some agencies raise some extra funds.

Membership in the Canadian Conference stood at 26,524 on Dec. 31, 1988. Ten years later, by December 31, 1998, membership had grown about 20%, to 31,824. Thus, even though the churches were giving less per member, overall contributions from the churches managed to increase slightly, to $1,758,086 in 1998-99. Of course, once inflation is taken into account, it is clear that a membership that is 20% higher contributed considerably less in real dollars than the smaller membership had 10 years earlier.

I am not complaining. Many churches and individuals continue to faithfully give a full norm, some of them sacrificing to do it. The Conference has continued to provide worthwhile programs, and even to expand into new areas. The past 10 years have seen the creation of the Chinese Herald, the development of Encounter (special evangelistic issues of the Herald), the hiring of a Webmaster and the creation of Conference Web pages. Stewardship Ministries have flourished. The Board of Evangelism has launched an aggressive new church planting strategy (the Key Cities Initiative, focusing first on Calgary and soon on Toronto). The Board of Evangelism has also hired an associate director to help existing churches do evangelism. The Board of Christian Education Ministries is planning to hire a half-time associate director to help develop a support network for MB youth workers. The Canadian Conference has promoted the ReFocusing Network System to help renew existing churches. The General (North American) MB Conference, whose funding is included in the Canadian Conference norm, has established a second site for our MB Biblical Seminary, in British Columbia. And this list does not even include all of the new programs.

Nor am I seeking more money for my particular ministry. The Herald has been getting by with inflation increases for several years, and I expect any increased giving in the near future would go to other programs, such as evangelism.

Yet, one wonders how long this can continue. The Canadian Conference cannot keep doing more with less indefinitely.

More troublesome, however, is that Canadian Conference budgets are approved each year (now each biennium) at conventions of delegates from the churches. The churches, by their own choice, are official members of the MB Conference. Yet some of them appear to be giving their obligations to the larger fellowship a low priority.

For instance, there are 40-50 churches which give nothing to the Canadian Conference every year. The Conference recognizes that many of these churches are small and struggling. The Conference has not threatened to withhold Herald subscriptions or other services from churches if they don’t pay. What the Conference has suggested is that these churches contribute between $1 and $5 per member to the Conference to symbolize that these churches have an obligation and that they would pay more if they could. Sadly, some of these churches have continued to send no money.

Members of other churches may think the problem has nothing to do with them, being confident that “My church pays its full Conference norm.” The members have looked at their local church budgets, seen that a sum of thousands of dollars goes to the “Conference”, and assumed that the full norm is being paid. In fact, the church may be paying only part of its norm. (To check if your church is paying its full norm, take your church membership – not attendance – and multiply by $92. That is the amount your church should be paying to the Canadian Conference this year, the norm having been increased in order to provide more funds to the Key Cities Initiative. Be aware, however, that MB churches are asked to send a similar “norm” to their provincial MB conferences – the highest provincial norm being $182 per member, in Manitoba – and sometimes both norms are lumped together in one line in local church budgets.)

One has to wonder what the future holds. The Mennonite Brethren Church in Canada has grown, in part due to aggressive church planting on the part of the Canadian and provincial Conferences. Given the decline in giving to the Conferences, it cannot be taken for granted that the growth will continue. Will the recent church plants be as generous in helping the next generation of church plants as the older churches have been in helping them?

I don’t want to oversimplify a complex issue. There are many factors at work here, including denominational decline; the rise of pseudodenominations like Willow Creek; generational changes in the way churches are run; decreasing accountability as the Conference grows larger; failures and weaknesses on the part of the Conference; the inherent unfairness in asking churches in different circumstances to pay the same norm; etc. Nevertheless, the problem is real. In all of church life, all of us need to constantly ask ourselves whether we are acting with integrity toward each other and to ponder whether we can expect God to bless us if we are not. The Conference is no more and no less than the local MB churches acting collectively. The Conference performs ministries assigned to it by the congregations. The Conference is us, and when some of us don’t do our part, others of us have to pick up the slack.

This winter and spring, the MB Herald has devoted nine issues to examining various aspects of “The Church”. This issue is the last of that series. I am convinced that the various aspects of the church are intimately related. For instance, the church as a covenant community surely has relevance for the church in conflict, but also for how the church is financed. Similarly, failure on the part of leaders to offer a clear vision can cause conflict, which can seriously harm a church’s finances, which are necessary for outreach, and so on. I hope that you have found these issues useful in helping Canadian Mennonite Brethren to be “healthy growing churches reaching their worlds”.

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Last modified May 26, 2000.

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