Dissertation Proposal
San Francisco Theological Seminary
Advanced Pastoral Studies
D. Min. Dissertation Project Proposal
Student: Duncan Macleod
Date: February 2003
Revised Topic
TITLE: A Uniting Church ministry training program focusing on changes in generational culture in Australia
PROBLEM:
Results from the National Churches Life Survey taken in New Zealand and Australia in 1997 and 2001 show that Uniting, Presbyterian and Methodist congregations have a low percentage of attenders from the generations born after World War II. Conflict in many congregations occurs when Baby Boomers (born 1945 – 1960), Busters (1960 – 1980) and Millennials (1980 – 1995) (Strauss & Howe) call for styles of worship and ministry appropriate to their generational values. There is a rising level of conflict relating to contextualization of ministry styles, in some cases linked with an understanding of theology and ministry that is uncomfortable with postmodernism, and emerging models of leadership and worship.
PURPOSE:
1. Given the problem what do you want to CHANGE?
I would like to develop within Uniting Church leaders skills of discernment that will equip them to respond effectively to the continual changes that each generation is bringing to the church.
2. What GROUP will join you in bringing about this change?
I will work with four teaching staff in the Trinity College, Brisbane, with two fellow mission consultants in the Queensland Synod, three members of the Youth and Children’s Ministry Unit staff.
3. What will you DO to bring about the desired change?
I will guide ministers in processes of theological reflection, with particular application to the development of ministry styles appropriate for work with emerging generations. The immediate context for this is the training and continued education/formation of ordained ministers, deacons and youth workers in Uniting Church in Australia.
METHOD:
What QUALIFIES you to do this D/P?
I have been involved in congregational programs that have been designed as responses to the needs of Baby Boomers, Busters and Millennials. Using Strauss and Howe’s dates, I am an early Buster. I have children who fit into the Millennial generation. I have experience as both an ordained minister and youth worker and am aware of the tensions that are raised in a congregation that attempts to introduce new styles of worship, leadership and decision making in response to emerging generations. I have an Arts degree in History and a Divinity degree in Church History, both of which have helped me to recognize and analyze historical trends.
How is this topic related to YOUR MINISTRY?
My role as Mission Consultant includes reequipping ordained leaders, and the development of leadership for emerging churches, particularly in response to postmodern trends in Australian society. I am a member of the Continuing Education for Ministry workgroup of the Queensland Synod of the Uniting Church in Australia. I am responsible for the development of a healthy culture of church planting in the Queensland Synod. I am working with the Youth And Childrens Ministry Unit to develop an emerging leadership training process.
SOCIAL ANALYSIS: What will you do to place the problem in its historical, cultural, and social context? Whom will you interview or talk to about it?
I will survey literature on Baby Boomer, Buster and Millennial generations, all written since 1986. In particular I will be working with material on generational culture and change by William Strauss and Neil Howe. I will consult by email with ten authors who have written on the topic over the last ten years, including Wade Clark Roof, Bill Mahedy, Tom Beaudoin, Tim Celek, William Strauss and Neil Howe. I will consult with leaders of ethnic congregations in Australia and New Zealand to test the relevance of Strauss and Howe’s material to their situations.
THEOLOGICAL RESOURCES: What are the biblical/theological lenses you will use to examine this problem? Identify 3-5 writers who help you deal with this problem theologically. With whom will you discuss the problem theologically?
Richard Niebuhr’s Christ and Culture will be a strong starting point. I will include material on Christian responses to postmodernity, including material by Brian McLaren, Stanley Grenz, David Lyon, Alan Roxburgh, Robert Webber, Paul Lakeland. I will use use and adapt theological reflection models developed by James and Evelyn Whitehead, Robert Kinast, Neil Darragh, Joe Holland and Peter Henriot.
How will you integrate IN WRITING steps 1-4, i.e. your reflection on experience, your conversations with others, and your review of literature?
I will describe the impact of generational culture on ministry, linking this with theological response to postmodernism. I will place this in the context of responses to cultural diversity in church history & research on generational values in Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand and similar countries. My conclusions will focus on skills that will be needed to respond to new generations in the next twenty to forty years in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand. These will include “cultural exegesis” and its impact on theology, worship and leadership styles.
What steps will you take to DESIGN & IMPLEMENT the Project?
The project will include a series of workshops in the context of an intensive ministry school, with appropriate resources. The workshops will launch a process of reflection on experience, theology and generational culture. A later seminar will tie together the reflections of those who have taken part in the process. I will test my findings out with six leaders who represent the ethnic and generational diversity of my denomination.
How will you EVALUATE & REVISE the Project? To whom will you Report it?
I will ask for feedback from participants and colleagues who help in the process of each workshop or seminar. Keys to the effectiveness of the process will be its application to more than one generation, as well as awareness of the complexities of specific ethnic or local cultures.
Select Bibliography
GENERATIONAL CULTURE
Beaudoin, Tom Virtual Faith: The Irreverent Spiritual Quest of Generation X, San Francisco, Jossey-Bass, 1998
Bessant, Judith et al, Youth Studies: An Australian Perspective, Melbourne, Longman, 1998
Carroll, Jackson & Roof, Wade Clark Bridging Divided Worlds: Generational Cultures in Congregations
San Francisco, Jossey Bass, 2002
Eeman, Carl G. Generations of Faith: A Congregational Atlas
Alban Institute, 2002
Flory, Richard & Miller, Donald GenX Religion
New York, Routledge, 2000
Howe, Neil & Strauss, Bill 13th Generation: Abort, Retry, Ignore, Fail?, New York: Vintage Books, 1993
Generations: The History of America’s Future, 1584 to 2069
New York: William and Morrow, 1991
Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation
New York, Vintage Books, 2000
The Fourth Turning : An American Prophecy
New York: Broadway Books, 1997
Mackay, Hugh Generations: Baby Boomers, their parents and their children, Sydney, Pan Macmillan, 1997
Miller, Craig Kennet, Postmoderns: the Beliefs, Hopes, and Fears of Young Americans Born 1965-1981
Nashville: Discipleship Resources, 1996
Roof, Wade Clark A Generation of Seekers: The Spiritual Journeys of the Baby Boom Generation, San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1993
Sample, Tex, The Spectacle of Worship in a Wired World,
Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1998
Contextualization
Bevans, Stephen B. Models of Contextual Theology
Maryknoll, New York, Orbis Books, 2002
Niebuhr, Richard Christ and Culture,
San Francisco: Harper & Collins, 1986
Tanner, Kathryn Theories of Culture,
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997
Theology and Ministry Formation
Darragh, Neil Doing Theology Ourselves: A Guide to Research and Action
Auckland, Accent, 1995
Killen, Patricia & De Beer, John Art of Theological Reflection,
Crossroad Publishing, 1994
Kinast, Robert L. Let Ministry Teach: A Guide to Theological Reflection, Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1996
Mahan, Jeffrey H. et. al. Shared Wisdom: a Guide to Case Study Reflection in Ministry, Nashville : Abingdon Press, c1993
Whitehead, James & Evelyn, Method in Ministry: Theological Reflection and Christian Ministry, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1980
Postmodernism
Best, Steven & Kellner, Douglas The Postmodern Turn,
Guilford Press, 1997
Grenz, Stanley A Postmodern Primer
Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1996
Lakeland, Paul Postmodernity: Christian Identity in a Fragmented Age,
Minneapolis, Fortress Press, 1997
Sweet, Leonard Postmodern Pilgrims: First Century Passion for the 21st Century Church
Nashville, Broadman & Holman, 2000
