Unlike the title of this sermon, I have been unsure of just what I want to say this morning as today we will be considering what to do next about the proposed building project. One of the ways I procrastinate is reading my electronic mail I get from people all over the country. At times, it's like having hundreds of pen pals. The next to the last message I received Wednesday night from a favorite correspondent on the West Coast had attached a delightful story that I thought might help me get this sermon off the ground:

THE CONGREGATION OF A SMALL COUNTRY CHURCH DECIDED THAT THE BUILDING WAS SORELY IN NEED OF REPAIRS, NOT THE LEAST OF WHICH WOULD BE A NEW COAT OF PAINT. THEY SCRAPED TOGETHER ALL THEIR MONEY AND WENT TO BUY THE PAINT. IT WAS MORE EXPENSIVE THAN THEY EXPECTED AND THEY DECIDED THAT THEY WOULD HAVE TO GATHER MORE MONEY, OR JUST BUY WHAT THEY COULD AND THIN IT ENOUGH TO COVER THE WHOLE BUILDING.

AFTER THINNING THE PAINT AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE, THE CREW STARTED PAINTING AND BARELY HAD ENOUGH TO FINISH THE JOB. JUST MOMENTS AFTER THEY HAD CLEANED THE BRUSHES, A STORM SWEPT IN. A LARGE, DARK CLOUD PARKED ITSELF OVER THE LITTLE CHURCH AND RELEASED A DELUGE; ALL OF THE FRESH PAINT WASHED AWAY. THEN A LOW, RUMBLING VOICE WAS HEARD THROUGH THE CLOUDS: "REPAINT, AND THIN NO MORE."

I think some in the congregation are feeling a little thinned out at the moment as we stretch to cover the cost of this addition without knowing whether we are going to experience the kind of growth your young energetic minister expects. What has been missing from the discussion about this building expansion, and I take the blame for this as a failing in my leadership, has been the development of a vision of what kind of congregation you want to grow here. Just what will this congregation look like in the year 2000 and what kind of facilities will we require?

Part of this vision is already in place. By calling me as your minister without a size of congregation and income to support me, you took a calculated risk that this congregation would grow. If I am to be here longer than three years, we must grow to a size which will support the presence of a minister within about the next three years which is about 110 members at current pledging levels - unless some generous individual wins the lottery.

This congregation's energies up until about the end of January were consumed with finding, settling and installing a minister. Before we had a chance to catch our collective breath, our friend of the Fellowship, Bob Hansman, presented a plan for building expansion at the estimated cost of about $20,000 to provide room for a Religious Education program I have been advocating to begin in the fall. An anonymous donor then offered to cover the cost of financing for the first 18 months. The board supported the idea and asked the congregation for its support to investigate the costs, budgeting a very small sum to come up with some preliminary numbers. The $20,000 project soon mushroomed to $80,000 as we discovered the need for environmental retrofitting of our drainage, possibly needing to dig a lake. And with furnishings, cost overruns and any expected problems in the regulatory process could drive the cost to $100,000 and beyond.

The board's decision to recommend the investigation of spending $20,000 for a several-month building project without any hassles is quite different from the way things look today. The process we use to spend $100,000 needs to be different from the process we use to spend $20,000. How many of us would buy a larger house on the promise of a promotion or an inheritance? How much money would we risk on an initial offering of a corporation without a business plan? How many of us would arrange our investments based only on our financial needs for just next month. The most important missing element that cripples our ability to make this vitally important decision is the lack of clarity about our vision of this congregation in the year 2000.

Before we build, I believe we must do some long-range planning and carefully look at all our options before choosing one. This planning process has three important elements which will guide us in our decisions to build. The first element is assessing the realistic prospects for our growth. The second element of our planning process is assessing our options to accommodate that growth here or at another location. The third and most important element is investigating the congregation's idea of what kind of services we wish to provide for ourselves and to supply to the community.

As you may have noticed, our attendance has been up and there are many new faces here. I am no longer the youngest member of the congregation; in fact many more youngsters under 70 are here. If all the projections hold, Charlotte County is going to get a lot bigger in the next six years. I suspect that even without much county growth, there are many who don't know about us right here and right now who would be quite happy to make this their religious home. The $64,000 question is just how many.

I have spoken with members of congregation about this and some express concern about stagnant growth in previous years. The presence of a minister usually changes this dramatically. Over and over across the country, fellowships that had not been growing called a minister and doubled the size of their congregations in five to ten years. Ministers provide the continuity and the glue that can help a congregation hold people long enough to get connected, a process which usually takes six months to a year. And I see this happening here as well.

Will this congregation grow 5% this year? 10%? 15%? This is where statistical methods can be very helpful. There is no way to know for sure, but we can make an educated guess. Even though we are NOT a business, we can learn from their methods. A business has no idea how many customers it will have two or three years down the road; it must project ahead as best it can so that it will have the capacity to meet the demand. We too must try to figure out how many people we will be serving, or put out a NO VACANCY sign and turn people away once the parking lot is full.

One way to forecast into the future with some degree of accuracy is using the science of demographics. Based on what we know about Unitarian Universalist beliefs, backgrounds, professions, involvement and interests, we can come up with a profile of a person likely to be attracted to this congregation. We can compare this profile to this congregation and see if it fits us. Using that information, we can compare the U.U. profile with those now living here and come up with an estimate of how many potential U.U.'s now live here and how many more are likely to move into the area in the next six years. My guess is that these numbers will be very surprising. Of course everyone who is a potential U.U. will not become one - but a predictable percentage will.

Another way to get a sense of what kind of growth we can expect is to compare our congregation with other congregations who are like us and in an area that is demographically similar. This is an example, once again, of how the money we send to Boston is working for us here in Port Charlotte. I spoke with a woman, Carla Kent, in the extension department of the UUA who told me about a congregation much like ours up in Traverse City, Michigan. This congregation is way up in the northern part of Michigan with no major urban center or university nearby. It is a place of great natural beauty that attracts conservative retirees who don't mind the weather. The major employers, like here, are hospitals and the service industry. They did not have a minister until 1989 when Rev. Emmy Lou Belcher was called to serve as their minister. In those five years the congregation has grown from a size of 80 members to 185 members. They began with 12 kids and now have 100 children in their religious education program, and have outgrown their building. The Traverse City congregation has decided to expand their facilities to the tune of $700,000. Their budget last year was about the same as ours, this year it will be $83K and next year $122K as they assume the debt service for the expansion. I suggest you find Traverse City on the map. It's out in the middle of nowhere!

The congregation in Falmouth, Massachusetts, at the beginning of the Cape Cod peninsula, also has a high percentage of retirees, including one of our own former members, Connie Burgess. They have experienced significant growth over the last four and a half years, adding about fifty members to 160 and doubling their attendance on Sunday morning. Their religious education program had 12 children when the minister arrived, and now has 82 registered. The Falmouth Congregation has just raised $230,000 to build their $750,000 facility. Most of these donations were in the range of $3 to $4 thousand spread over three years.

Of course each situation is unique, but many congregations are experiencing rapid growth as the baby boomers start seeking religious education for their children. And many come to us.

As I see it, the linchpin of our decision to expand is Religious Education. Our facility will be fine for the next six years without expansion if we have no religious education program. We certainly don't need to expand so I can have a plusher office. We don't need to expand to add a lanai or more meeting rooms for our current level of activity.

This is where the vision and the commitment of the congregation are absolutely critical. We must decide collectively that religious education is one of our priorities. It is not enough that it is one of my priorities. Making R.E. a priority will mean that members will be expected to participate in the program. Making R.E. a priority will change the format for this service. Making R.E. a priority will bring in many younger people who won't see things exactly as you might see them.

And there are great benefits that arise from the mingling of the old with the energy and vitality of the young. I see it in people's faces as they see my son Andy running around before the service. And the young have much to gain from your wisdom. I hear it in the voices of youngsters in their sixties as they speak with Betty Phillipoff and Annette Furst, two of our elders.

This is what we will be discussing at our Saturday workshop on religious education. It isn't just about children - its about all of us and the kind of religious community we wish to create together. I hope that many of you will be able to come and express your feelings, ideas and dreams.

If we do want to include children as part of our religious community, we will need space that we do not currently have. But we have more than one option. The property next to us is on the market - do we think about purchasing it? Do we think about buying or renting a condo in the Oaks across the street? How about a portable classroom or two? A mobile home, even? And I'm sure that even more ideas are floating around in your heads too. Each one has a cost and benefit associated with it that can be tabulated and compared.

These are my thoughts as I recommend that you delay your building decision for the moment, until we can do more investigation. I do not make this suggestion with disappointment, but rather enthusiasm. I realize there are those among you who have had faith enough in me to support this present building expansion even though you weren't confident about the numbers. I greatly appreciate your trust in me and your willingness to express that in pledges of financial support. I am very pleased that we have gotten this close to making a decision. Your willingness to risk expansion for an R.E. program that doesn't yet exist demonstrates a strong interest in expanding the embrace of this congregation to include families with children.

We have so much to offer each other and Charlotte County and I am very happy to be here working to help open the way for this congregation to flourish. A few intelligent decisions now will make a big difference in the year 2000 and save us a lot of future grief. Our best work is done when the head and heart cooperate.

When we come together again having a clearer vision of our mission, our growth potential and our options analyzed, I expect we will be fully ready to commit to an expansion plan that will have broad support. And I expect the money to do it will be there as well, judging by how much has been offered for our current building proposal. I believe this because I have faith in the spirit that draws this community together and has gotten it this far on so little. My faith comes from the warmth of this community and the way we welcome the stranger into our midst. My faith comes from the solid financial base this congregation has established. My faith comes from the presence of skilled financial advisers in our midst.

Let this recommendation of delay not quench our enthusiasm, but rather quicken it as we prepare for a bright future.

Copyright (c) 1995 by Rev. Samuel A. Trumbore, All rights reserved.