Voting is liturgical. It’s a ritual expression of love for others when we vote for candidates and for ballot propositions that help to assure the welfare of our vulnerable fellow citizens. Our votes are forms of tithes or offerings that deserve blessing or dedication in worship. By lifting up voting in worship, we take it to heart and commit ourselves to participate. With voter turnout in a steep decline in recent years, congregations are needed more than ever to make a difference. The time to plan election-related events in our churches is now!

Any human enterprise can succeed or fail. Silicon Valley startups, marriages, mall stores, schools, and churches -- there are no guarantees, no reliable formulas, no ideal preparation. The recipe for failure tends to be predictable. Conditions change, but for reasons ranging from sloth to distraction to inadequate resources, leaders don't change with them. Early success teaches the wrong lessons. Leaders dread failure more than they want to learn from it. Worthy ideas implode from lack of support, while bad ideas develop loyal followings.

If not Sunday worship, then what? As Sunday morning loses its hold on churchgoers and potential churchgoers, what comes next? How do faith communities nurture relationships? How do people draw closer to God? How can we engage the world outside our doors if opening the doors on Sunday isn't enough?

It's been in the news. Now it has been confirmed. As of this past weekend, Raymond Leo Burke, America's highest-ranking cardinal at the Vatican, was officially removed from the Vatican's Supreme Court, and demoted to chaplain of the Knights of Malta, where he will reign with much less responsibility.

Gretta represents a small but growing number of clergy who are best described as courageous. The have spoken the truth when others too often fumble for words or refuse to look any deeper than their online sermons.

The S curve -- shows what happens as a new idea takes hold, or a compelling vision, or fresh leadership, or a new mission thrust. If the idea or vision has legs, it will start slowly, then gather momentum as people buy into it and become excited by it. This new vision captures many imaginations. It puts into action the deepest values of the organization -- in this case, a congregation.

It is time for congregations to develop protocols for responding to hate initiatives on their doorsteps. As the intolerant lose any self-discipline in lashing out at others, we can expect a fresh round of cross-burnings, gay-bashing graffiti, and online vitriol.

Pope Francis and the Environment: Yale Examines Historic Climate Encyclical. What follows are the transcripts from the Panel on the Papal Encyclical held at Yale University on April 8, 2015.

The "face" of a congregation needs to be its key leader, not its handsome edifice. Prospects will ask whether they can trust the leader and find his or her message inspiring. They won't ask what the congregation did fifty years ago or why the liturgical space is the way it is. Social media will put the pastor out front. Instead of trying to reach people through a traditional church newsletter describing institutional activities, the pastor will be posting, blogging and writing essays -- on many subjects, but in the consistent voice of the author and focused on the reader's needs and interests, not on the church as institution.

Fostering Spiritual Depth in a Busy World • Small group materials help your members embed greater meaning in their lives. • Your participants quickly make deep connections with each other. • Proven materials and techniques help you lead your small group through transformation.

The final stage of an effective membership recruitment process happens when the constituent actually affiliates with your congregation ... always remember that recruitment of new constituents isn't the final stage of membership development. Now you need to work at retaining them and helping God to transform their lives.

If "touches" are the many thousands whom your church touches in any way, "prospects" are touches whom you stimulate to take some interest in who you are as a faith community and what you do, especially in mission and ministering to people. Take it as a given that, at this point, they aren't the least interested in how you worship, the traditions you observe, who presides at your altar, the quality of your facilities, or your history. If that's all you have to tell them, you are lost.

A day did exist when a church could grow and thrive by opening its doors on Sunday and welcoming whoever arrived. Knowing how to welcome regulars and visitors was as much evangelism as a congregation needed to do. That day ended long ago. Nowadays, most churches don’t have enough visitors to offset the inevitable attrition that happens when people die, move out of town, or lose interest. And “regular attendance” now means one or two Sundays a month, not three or four.

No longer can congregations focus all of their energies on Sunday morning worship. They can’t just open the door on Sunday and expect people to walk through. The flow of visitors isn’t enough to compensate for attrition, and people’s needs are too varied.

Tom makes the audacious claim here that faith communities are uniquely situated to lead the evolution of human consciousness to help create a more just, caring and sustainable world. Crazy Wisdom is dedicated to answering how we just might go about doing that.

I am coming to see that the hardest work facing a church isn't finances, facilities or failing programs. The hardest problem is trying to be multi-generational. That is, trying to nurture a congregation that embraces the elderly, active retirees, middle-aged persons, young adults, youth and children in one fellowship.

Since starting to attend the Episcopal Church nearest to our new home in Upstate New York, I have learned five real-world lessons about membership development.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Sunday Assembly. Clearly it addresses a felt need of many people for a community without religious content. I sensed that some folks were there in reaction against religion, but it looked like most were just looking for a wholesome community with which to connect.

Francis Macnab has been teaching the place of Faith in psychology and theology, in health and growth for decades. He claims that the churches have lost vast numbers of people because their Old Faith has lost empathy and relevance in the 21st Century. He advocates the need for a New Faith.

It does mean that each gender should recognize that their opposite may have a naturally different way of perceiving and weighing things and not label it as either inferior or superior but as something to be understood and learned from. This, I believe, provides one of many good reasons for society and its institutions, including religions, to actively seek ways to include women at all levels of leadership and decision-making.

Whatever paradigm a community may favor (or more than one among community members), the core of Christian faith and what Jesus emphasized — the centrality of love in action — can be the community emphasis as well.

The recent horrible shooting incident at a premier showing of “The Dark Knight Rises” in Colorado has focused attention, once again, on some aspects of what has gone wrong when a person takes such a violent and antisocial turn.

In The Watchman’s Rattle, sociobiologist Rebecca Costa argues that civilizations collapse because they reach a cognitive threshold, a level of complexity that overwhelms

This report examines an American religious movement called progressive Christianity and what it can tell us about religion in the modern world.

How do I believe? (How do I understand faith that seems to conflict with science and pluralism?) What should I do? (How do my actions make a difference in the world?) Whose am I? (How do my relationships shape my self-understanding?)

Regarding Heaven and Hell; Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for? - Robert Browning. An evangelical pastor of a mega-church, Rob Bell, creates a stir when he writes a little book, suggesting when it comes to a place called heaven, there's room for everyone. What the hell?

The Pope’s War offers a provocative look at three decades of corruption in the Catholic Church, focusing on Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI.

Richard Wagner's latest book, SECRECY, SOPHISTRY AND GAY SEX IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH; The Systematic Destruction Of An Oblate Priest, provides an intimate and disturbing look into the unseemly inner-workings the Catholic Church.

We have much to be excited about here at ProgressiveChristianity.org- new staff, new projects, new website, new liturgy. Here is a summer's end update from the President.

Rest now Peter, the next footsteps you see will be us, carrying you in our hearts.