Emerging Spirit @ The United Church of Canada Emerging Spirit @ The United Church of Canada

Sally hasn't gone to church much since she started university. Away from home, Sunday morning is more about sleeping than attending a church near campus. She still attends when she goes home-maybe once a month-but doesn't find the service "upstairs" very engaging. She is a veteran of every aspect of children's programming: nursery, church school, junior youth, youth group and even a year or two as one of the youth leaders. The one thing she has little experience with is worship: particularly everything after "Children's Time."

University is an exciting time for Sally. She began in a general arts program, a student in search of a major. At the mid-point in her four-year program, she has declared sociology her major, though she is equally interested in religious studies and history. Her extra-curricular activities include raising money for breast cancer research and playing ultimate frisbee. Recently she has inquired about starting a Right to Play group on campus.

Sally's life took a sudden and unexpected turn recently when she went to career day on campus. Recruiters from major Canadian corporations were on hand to explain who they are and what they do. Over in the far corner, away from the big displays, was a youngish looking woman sitting beneath a banner with the United Church crest. Taken aback, Sally met a member of the United Church Vocations Initiative, a new effort to promote ministry in the church.
 
The youngish minister explained to Sally that the traditional recruitment strategy-waiting for people to figure it out for themselves-had failed to produce the hundreds of new ministers the church would need in the future. She explained that in the 1990's the consensus was that churches would close at the same pace that vocations declined, and so no particular effort was needed to boost the number of new ministers. In addition, the rise in early-retired people seeking commissioning and ordination meant that the focus and preference in new vocations turned to older adults with generous amounts of life experience. The fact that most of these new ministers would only be able to serve for 10 to 15 years seemed lost on the church.

Sally explained to the recruiter that she didn't feel "called" to be a minister. No one had ever suggested it to her, and she wasn't even a regular attendee anymore. Then the minister-recruiter asked her a series of questions: Do you pray? Do you think it is important to help vulnerable people? Do you think the church does important work in communities? Do you think about the implications of buying something before you open your wallet? Do you enjoy thinking about religious ideas? Do you recall your time in church fondly? Do you see yourself back in church after graduation? When Sally answered ‘yes' to every question, her recruiter said, "sounds like a call to me!"

All of this, of course, is fiction. There is no UCVI, although General Secretary Nora Sanders' recent accountability report did call for a new generation of leaders in the church. Instead, we continue to do it the old way, with no real recruitment effort and an institutional bias toward candidates over 50.

My imaginings are one way we could look at finding that new generation of leaders. The lure of the marketplace is strong, and I would suggest that most young people have no idea how people become ministers. Even basic knowledge is in short supply on the matter of vocations, and few people receive encouragement to consider the church as an option.