Interim Report #2 - 8/1/24

A parable. Interviews. Step One updates. Finding my footing. Worship prep.

Permit me to begin with a parable and end with technical reports.  Feel free to skip down to the header “Interviews” for more granular information.

What is an Interim Minister for?

I am not going to belabor this point as several of your most recent Senior Ministers gave excellent sermons and wrote extensively about this.  (And here is yet another wonderful sermon by Rev. Roe, I couldn’t pick just one.)  You’ve also had the benefit of workshops and preaching facilitated by Rev. Jody Betten.  For those of you who have been part of this community for over two decades, you may remember some of the interim work that was done by a few of the titans of interim ministry in 2001-2003 - visionaries like Rev. Judith Walker-Riggs and Rev. Speed Leas and many, many others.  And in any case I wrote a lengthy prospectus that you can read here if you are having trouble falling asleep.

The interim period is liminal, creative, and exciting.

It is also technical, time-limited, metric, and sometimes profoundly boring - and it begins with an audit.  An interim is a trained church systems analyst.  My work in this regard is profoundly indebted to Rev. Richard Nugent.  Probably the best summary of his ideas can be found in Part II of this lovely volume of collected research.

Consider a parable:

Four friends have finally carved the time out of their busy schedules to embark on a week-long road trip together.  These are wildly creative individuals who get a kick out of improvised adventures.  They want to really see this country - no tour guides, no strict itineraries.  Together they consciously set aside the coming week for joy - and joy must catch us unawares.
This is something they’d been conspiring to accomplish for years.  One of them is only recently retired - another is between jobs - yet another is burning through some hard-earned PTO. They come from different lived experiences but they enjoy each other’s company and in any case the summer weather is glorious and the road is long and winding.

They’re well-provisioned, they have plenty of maps and good ideas, and the plan is to sort out their destinations as they go.  The first stop, however, is the local mechanic shop.  Patty is a fantastic mechanic, they all trust her advice and she knows her way around cars.  And their aging Volvo is, well, relatively dependable.  It’s a fine automobile.  But it never hurts to have Patty take a look under the hood.

As they pull into the repair lot and make their way into the cramped little office they can’t help but share a few ideas for the road.  “I really hope we can hit Tahquamenon Falls on our way to Iron Mountain.”  “Just so long as it doesn’t cost us any time getting to the Boundary Waters.”  “I brought a whole case of Red Bull!  No need to stop in Duluth!”

Finally a bell rings, the door opens, and Patty enters the rooms wiping the grease off her hands.
“Where you heading, friends?” asks the mechanic.

“Minnesota!”  “Madison!”  “Twin Cities!”  A lot of shouting and laughter.  Finally one of them asks, “Where do you think we oughta go, Pat?”

The mechanic looks at the four travelers and then looks out the window, squinting at their beloved old Volvo.  “Well, I don’t know much about that.  It sounds like you have a lot of great places you want to see.  But I do know this: if you want to see the other side of this zip code you better let me put that Volvo up on jacks, first.”
—

Interviews:

This past week I have conducted an additional eight interviews with FSC lay leaders and members and three interviews with former FSC staff members.
There is a deep well of love for this church and y’all have enough good ideas between you right now to operate a successful church for another 150 years.

If you haven’t already, please follow this link and reserve an in-person or Zoom interview spot.  I have a few formal questions and I really want to know what’s on your mind - but this is not your only opportunity to talk with me!
In any case, I underestimated how many spots I’d need so I opened up another six hours per week for conversations.
(If you previously tried to schedule an interview and discovered the slots were full, go ahead and try again.)
You can also write down your thoughts and send them to me in an email!  If you’re too busy to schedule an interview, go ahead and answer these questions and send them to ndannison@fountainstreet.org

1. What is your name and how are you connected to Fountain Street Church?
2. Tell me about a time when you felt especially proud of this church.
3. Tell me about a time when the congregation worked together to resolve a conflict.
4. What’s next for Fountain Street Church?

Understanding Your History:

I’ve been a gluttonous presence in your archives.  My kids have a pet frog named Mr. Arnold Lobel.  I love that frog but he will eat anything that fits in his mouth.  He’s been on my mind a lot, lately, as I have worked my way through the fascinating history of this utterly confounding church.  It’s time to stop eating and start sharing recipe ideas.
Note: My most heartfelt thanks to archivist Chris Crandall for generously sharing your time with me. I realize I can get a little intense talking about archival research. Thank you for answering so, so many of my questions and for your amazing ideas.
Thanks also to Chaplain Margi Derks-Peterson for introducing me to so many members of the FSC community who have encouraged me to seek out unique moments in church history.

You will receive invitations to engage in the history of FSC in several different formats.

1. We are bringing back Church Night.  These are Tuesday evenings when the church is open for activities.  I’m not going to make it any more complicated than that - and already a few marvelous congregational volunteers have agreed to help get things rolling.
Church Night begins on Tuesday, August 13th, from 6 pm - 8 pm.  Bring a dish to pass.  Or a box of wine.  Let’s not overthink it. I promise you will have a good time.

2. I’m in the process of creating an accessible podcast series of sermon recordings from throughout the history of FSC that will hopefully launch no later than October.

3. There will be a “history wall” - a visual representation of the life and growth of this church and its many transformations.  I’m privileging Art Prize in September so I’m still searching for a location for the history wall that will be accessible and not overbearing.

4. I will be calling your attention to a variety of historic displays that have been lovingly created by your church’s Art Committee and Archive Committee - these will be on rotation throughout the church.

5. Each month we will feature a voice from the pulpit - a beloved former member of the Fountain Street community - to help me remind you of who you are.  This special worship services will be followed with a Q&A reception.  I am literally vibrating with excitement about this.

Technical Work:

I am working hard to standardize a few simple, internal practices here at FSC for the benefit of transparency and keeping folks in the loop.  You have been through a great deal of staff/leadership transitions, much institutional knowledge has been lost, the old Volvo’s operator manual is scattered around the garage in bits and pieces, and I need to be able to get my arms around what’s happening in this community.  These items include basic stuff like
- staff job descriptions and scope of work
- a complete calendar of events
- understanding who is on which team/committee and which teams and committees still exist
- current security protocols, how the church physically opens and closes
- where important items are stored and how to get around in here.  My tours of FSC have all been self-guided - save for the wonderful, generous, and emotionally poignant afternoon I spent with Tim Chester learning about the history and architecture of your current building. I talked about this last time but I can’t get that conversation out of my head. I’ll remember it for the rest of my life.

Worship planning:

1. We are still working around the clock to hire a new organist.  I want to thank the choir team again for their efforts in this area.

2. For a constellation of reasons, I am strongly considering changing our worship times to
9 a.m. - Chapel
10:30 a.m. - Sanctuary
I have been reaching out to stakeholders this week.  If anything comes of this I’ll state my case plainly.  It has to do with current traffic and parking patterns, church demographics and the ongoing activities of the four sibling churches nearby.

3. In preparation for September 8th (Celebration Sunday) I have completed a survey of your liturgies throughout living memory - everything up until the pandemic - when the archives hit a brick wall.  (I am working on this, too.)

In selecting samples I try to gather one service from (at least) every five to ten years that:
1. Was led by the head of staff
2. Was not a high holy day or otherwise “banner event”
3. Occurred during the church’s program year (whatever that was at the time the sample service occurred)

If this sort of thing is of interest to you - here are a handful of scans galloping through the last 80 years of worship at FSC.

A draft order of service and a standardized protocol for worship planning will be ready in the next two weeks.
I would very much like for us to return to a half-sheet, printed worship bulletin for our two services. Our QR-code tech could be used to send people to The Beat and other worship aids.

Works Consulted this week included:
“Entering Wonderland: A Toolkit for Pastors” - Robert A. Harris
“In the Interim” - Barbara Child and Keith Kron, eds
“The Making of American Liberal Theology, V. II” - Gary Dorrien
(Professor Dorrien’s capstone sermon from your 150th anniversary celebration is currently my favorite sermon dealing with the history and future of the theology and purpose of Fountain Street Church)
“When Better Isn’t Enough: Evaluation Tools for the 21st Century Church ” - Jill M. Hudson
- I read thirty sermons by Duncan Littlefair and another ten sermons by David Rankin
- I listened to three full worship services under Christopher Roe
- An additional ten sermons/summer speakers on the youtube channel
I have a growing backlog of sermons to listen to.  If you see this, send me your favorite sermon and I’ll buy you a milkshake.

That is enough for now.  Thank you for taking the time to review these observations - and thank you for allowing me to look under the hood.  I think you’re about to embark on an amazing adventure. I’m going to make certain you have solid transportation.

Onward!

Rev. Nathan Dannison