It became clear after our visit with Robin Gill that there are yet more tensions to be juggled. At one level there is the clear evidence from observation and from Robin's detailed research that church attendance is and has been, over many more years than most realise, in decline. While this may seem a given, Robin's research findings helped put flesh on the bones of what we thought we knew.
This brings us to another level of knowing to be juggled, the knowledge of long standing members of our congregations who remember full pews and full Sunday Schools. Their memories are not invalid, but in a longer term view provided by Robin's research, decline has been there, at least in Australia, all along.
Facing this decline is what Weaving Connections is about. It was almost comforting to realize that we Christians may not alone in this. During one wakeful night I listened to Part 1 of a BBC radio play called The Attractive Young Rabbi. My interest was piqued as I listened to the struggles of an aging rabbi who, while recognising that attendance at his synagogue was constantly diminishing, was unable to come to grips with both addressing this decline and the realities of life in the twenty-first century. The tension in this situation was heightened with the arrival of an attractive, young, female rabbi who opened a synagogue nearby in the local high street.
This seems to have more than a few similarities to situations we are grappling with in our churches. It is all too easy to mock the old rabbi's inability to notice and effectively respond to the changing world that seems to have left him behind, but we all seek the safety of what is known and familiar and equally struggle when reality has to be faced. Part 2 continues next week and I'm not promising that I'll be awake at 2 in the morning to hear it.
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