So Long Crystal Cathedral, Hello St Patrick’s Crystal Cathedral

I’ve always considered the Rev. Schuller to be a gambling man. In the 60’s he had a pretty good sized church, but it wasn’t enough. He decided to roll the dice in an attempt to win the big pot. His church went into debt and built the Crystal Cathedral, on the idea that if you build something totally magnificent, the people will come. He rolled lucky 7’s and won big. However, in the 90’s his church growth was stagnant, and he needed to do something big again. He should have retired and let a new generation move the church into the new century. Instead he rolled the dice again. His church went into debt, to the tune of 20 million dollars, and he built a Southern California Visitor/Cultural Center. His reasoning was the same as last time, if it is magnificent enough, the people will come. However, this time he rolled snake eyes.

This week the Diocese of Orange as officially taken over ownership of the Crystal Cathedral. The deal will pay off the debts of the church, but they are losing their home. In three years it will become a catholic cathedral. It will be interesting to see if Schuller’s church will survive the transition. The church has been run by a board of trustees for many years. The membership has been shut out of the decision making process. I would think that many long time members would demand that the board of trustees dissolve and hand over power to the membership. If not, it wouldn’t surprise me to see the members walk away from this debacle.

Most Mega-Churches are run by small groups of trustees, with a powerful minister pulling the strings. I feel that the story of the Crystal Cathedral is a lesson to large churches. The power of the leadership needs to be balanced by power placed into the hands of the membership. Too much power in the hands of a few can allow a church to spin out of control.

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Personal Ministry Versus Crystal Cathedral and Sarah Palin

The Crystal Cathedral in California, the first so-called Mega-Church, is in bankruptcy court. Too much mega-debt and not enough mega-giving. As they haggle with their creditors, Sarah Palin is traveling the northeast visiting sites associated with the founding of our country. She was at the Liberty Bell the other day, an object that is a total fraud, but makes for a nice photo-op. I’m going to use these two examples as a way to contrast what many of us think ministry is, with what ministry actually is.

The Crystal Cathedral offers so much more than our little First Baptist does. They have programs and services for everyone. They take polls and surveys and find out the needs of their constituents and address those needs with the best that money can buy. If they find out a large number of their people want special worship services for their pet Chihuahua’s, then by golly on Tuesday evenings, there will be a special worship service focused on cute little short haired dogs. However, if the people in the pews need personal ministry, that is more difficult. The professional staff is few in number, and the membership is large. The ministers can only provide personal ministry to a small percentage of the church. Volunteer ministers are called upon to reach out to the rest of the folk through small group missions. The system does work, but a lot of people just show up on Sunday and sit in the pews, and a chance to minister and be ministered to passes them by.

Famous people, like Sarah Palin, are even more distant. At the very least, a person who makes an effort can speak personally with the Senior Pastor, or one of the staff. The closest any of us can get to someone famous is a handshake on a receiving line, or ‘personal’ messages on Twitter. The cult of celebrity is creating the illusion of personal contact, without all of the messy bother of actual personal contact. Without saying whether I like her or not, I can say that she is great at establishing a bond with people without meeting them. This is not ministry, of course. But for many, like those who follow the infamous Harold Camping, the illusion of personal ministry is powerful.

But mega-celebrity is just a mega-sham. Ministry is personal. In the story of the Woman with Uncontrollable Bleeding (Luke 8:40-56), Jesus stopped his mission of mercy to a sick girl and asked the famous question – who touched me? A woman, who was healed by just touching his cloak, was sinking back into the crowd without further contact with him. Jesus insisted on speaking with her. He wanted to look her in the eye and minister to her personally. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus’ ministry is personal. He makes lots of speeches, but his most powerful ministry is doing good as he passed by.
Jesus’ handling of crowds is a different matter. The story of the miracle of the loaves and fish in the sixth chapter of John has Jesus walking away from a crowd of 5,000. He retreats to the other side of the lake for some quiet time. Some of the crowd follows him and what does he do? He scolds them by saying they are motivated by the desire for more food! Can you imagine a celebrity like Sarah Palin scolding her audience? It won’t happen, because today, numbers are everything. To Jesus, individuals mattered, numbers didn’t.

I was friends with a man for a brief time who was a big fan of a radio preacher. He thought the world of this man on the airwaves, even though he only met him once. He didn’t think so highly of me or my church family, and said so on numerous occasions. I tried my best to minister to him, but he cursed me out and disappeared. I hope he finds what he is looking for, but he was looking in the wrong place. He was looking for personal ministry, without the bother of getting along with people. Celebrities and Mega-Churches offer a lot. But ministry will always be one on one.

God bless you,

Pastor Bill