Workshops

What’s the goal of education in your congregation? Is it to provide historical background and information on your sacred texts? Or to teach how to effectively engage culture? Regardless of the specific content, it’s likely that you desire to form and transform the spirituality of your people. Congregational education is often not optimally designed for spiritual formation. Your educational approach might actually be hindering what you hope to achieve.

To help you better understand how to teach for spiritual formation, the Center for Congregations presents educator and author Dr. Israel Galindo, leading the workshop Teaching to Transform.

This full-day workshop explores a basic framework for what “spiritual formation” means and helps you understand educational approaches… more

Ministry effectiveness is a key component of success in the congregation. Speaker and author Stan Toler explores innovative ideas for transforming your congregation into a ministry of excellence.

This workshop provides information on how to evaluate the progress and performance of your various ministries and will challenge your congregational leaders to deepen servanthood and ministry effectiveness. Workshop material is based on Toler's book, The Five Star Church.

At this workshop, you will:

It’s hard to plan when you don’t have good information. This is especially true when you want to develop a new direction for your ministry or figure out how to connect with those in your neighborhood. Who lives in your targeted ministry area? What does your congregation look like compared to other congregations in your region? In America? Finding answers can be daunting. Thankfully, the ARDA (Association of Religious Data Archives) already has the answer to these questions and more.

You are encouraged to bring a laptop or tablet to this lunch program so that you can experience first-hand how to dig up the wealth of high-quality data available at www.thearda.com. Access to The ARDA is free.

Religious sociologist Jennifer McClure will introduce you to the website of The… more

While Americans remain deeply spiritual, they’re leaving congregational life behind. This is especially true of Millennials – about 1 in 10 regularly attend a congregational worship service.

Surveys report that young people feel more isolated and lonely today than at any other point in modern history. Your congregation can offer valuable connection to these young adults, but only if you are willing to adapt to meet the needs of those you want to welcome. Writer, speaker and podcaster Mike McHargue leads this one-day workshop. He will explore the sociological, psychological and neurological underpinnings of a generation leaving the church behind, and offer insights on how to invite them back.

By the end of this workshop, you will:

While Americans remain deeply spiritual, they’re leaving congregational life behind. This is especially true of Millennials – about 1 in 10 regularly attend a congregational worship service.

Surveys report that young people feel more isolated and lonely today than at any other point in modern history. Your congregation can offer valuable connection to these young adults, but only if you are willing to adapt to meet the needs of those you want to welcome. Writer, speaker and podcaster Mike McHargue leads this one-day workshop. He will explore the sociological, psychological and neurological underpinnings of a generation leaving the church behind, and offer insights on how to invite them back.

By the end of this workshop, you will:

Congregational life and activities are often absent from secular public media sources. It is assumed that these media outlets are not interested in stories about religion, but this is not necessarily the case.

In this luncheon workshop, you can learn how to create an awareness of what congregations are doing and showcase the good work being done in our communities by people of faith.

During her time at mainstream newspapers in Florida and the Philadelphia area, workshop facilitator Sharon Tubbs found that news outlets are interested in news from congregations because they reflect an aspect of community life in which the public is interested. Tubbs shares the story of how a short press release led to extensive newspaper, television and radio coverage of a local prayer… more

Every day we experience the reality that we are living in an era of change. But more importantly we are living in a change of eras. The models of faith formation and discipleship developed over the past decades cannot keep pace with the challenges of this new era. We need something new to address the lives of 21st century families, children, adolescents and adults.
    
In this live online workshop, you will envision a whole new way of forming faith—a new ecology of intergenerational relationships and faith experiences in congregations, lifelong faith formation from childhood through adulthood, family faith formation at home, and missional faith formation to the uninvolved and unaffiliated. LifelongFaith Associates President John Roberto explores these innovative approaches… more

Like most ministry leaders, you’ve probably heard ominous reports of the demise of faith all around us. From the disillusionment of young people to the aging of the church to the rise of the “Nones,” the list is long and disheartening. But what if that’s only part of the story? What if there are bright spots breaking through the clouds revealing energized congregations brimming with young people?  What if there are congregations that are actually growing young?

The good news is that those bright spot churches exist. The Fuller Youth Institute (FYI) team spent the past three years studying congregations effectively capturing the imaginations and hearts of young people ages 15-29. Through this landmark investigation of more than 250 diverse congregations of all sizes, FYI… more

This on-demand series focuses on learning gleaned from Indiana congregations by the Center for Congregations in 2015-2016. Tim Shapiro, president of the Center for Congregations, shares the six principles distilled from the Center's experiences with Indiana congregational youth ministries.

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