Free Range Priest helps ministers reimagine church in the digital age.
Hi! I’m Cathie Caimano (yes, I go by ‘Fr. Cathie’). In 2016, I started my own ministry called ‘Free Range Priest’. ‘Like the chicken?’, people ask. And I say, ‘YES’!
Because it’s still ministry, it just tastes better. It’s healthier and more sustainable.
Free Range Priest ministry is for those …
inside, outside, and alongside the institutional, denominational church who want to find their way back to serving their true calling - sharing the love of God, feeling the energy for building faithful communities - and who want the burden of supporting a dying church lifted from their shoulders.
I don’t think we can rely on a new diocesan program or a new commission report or a new youth ministry initiative to change the tide of church decline.
So what do we do?
We can ‘keep on keeping on’, doing things like we’ve always done them, whistling in the dark, telling ourselves it’s going to be okay despite the evidence (I think mostly that’s what’s happening now).
We can live in denial. ‘Well, my church is growing’, I hear over and over - even though the amount of growth in a few congregations is not enough make a difference in the overall system. People still try to debunk the church decline statistics, even though the trends are abundantly, consistently clear.
We can try programs that are just the same thing in different form - house church, pub church, garden church, even online church - that still presume the structure of a professional, salaried clergy person, a single gathered community, some buildings, or other gathering spaces, all sustainable only through the donations of people in the congregation (or a grant).
We can give up hope. We can give up church altogether - and many are. Clergy are leaving ministry in droves, echoing the leaving of people in the pews. We can prepare to shut the doors when the last member dies.
OR….
There is another way. There’s probably lots of other ways, but here’s some things I think about a lot and write about here on Substack:
Breaking out of the 20th century organizational mindset.
The burden of an administration-heavy structure.
How digital tools and skills built for small businesses can make this easier.
Remote administration and communication services for congregations.
Learning how clergy and congregations serve together in today’s church.
Sustainable Part-time ministry.
Clergy as ‘consultants’ supporting lay ministry.
Ministers as creative entrepreneurs.
Lay and ordained ministers serving as ‘faith practitioners’.
Re-imagining the context of ministry to include communities beyond traditional congregations.
Focus on deepening the spiritual journey of our members.
Introduction - and re-introduction - to the practices of the Christian faith.
Meeting people where they are with the framework of belief in God.
Broadening - and deepening - our view of ‘membership’ to include how we are in relationship with the whole church, the local community, and our relationship with God.
Moving from 75% focus on Sunday worship and 25% focus on keeping the organization running to 50% focus on worship, 45% focus on faith formation, and 5% on keeping the organization running.
I know a lot of you are thinking about very similar things. Or you’re thinking of different things along the same lines. Or you’re just tired of the burden of institutional decline and you want to get back to the energy you feel for following Jesus.
Free Range Priest is ‘cage free’ ministry. It’s re-discovering the joy of church - and sharing it with everyone. Come share it with me.
To learn more about the tech platform that powers this publication, visit Substack.com.
