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04-26-2005, 04:29 AM
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CHICAGO TRIBUNE
April 22, 2005
RELIGION
Still-expanding `Purpose'
Evangelical Christians have hailed the "Purpose Driven" philosophy; now a local Catholic church will host a conference espousing it
By Sean D. Hamill
Special to the Tribune
April 22, 2005
Having sold more than 20 million copies of "Purpose Driven Life" and more than 1 million of "Purpose Driven Church" and having taught more than 350,000 pastors in the books' philosophy, it might be thought that Rick Warren's view of Christianity has permeated every branch of the faith.
But the internationally famous pastor of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., and his Purpose Driven staff know that mainline Protestant, and especially Catholic, churches have been slow to warm to the message readily picked up by more evangelical congregations.
They hope that a three-day conference at Holy Family Catholic Church in Inverness starting Monday will change that by attracting leaders of more conservative branches that have been reluctant to pick up on the Purpose Driven model.
"That's our prayer," said Pastor Brett Schrock, Purpose Driven's director of strategic relationships, who will be one of three people to speak at the conference, which will not include Warren. "We're excited by this because we're seeing God unify his churches."
The Purpose Driven conference, the first ever hosted by a Catholic church, is entitled "Implementing the Purpose Driven Church." And as the name implies, it is something of a church management seminar.
The conference will draw on the successful strategies that helped Warren turn his fledgling Southern Baptist church of the 1980s into what is now one of the nation's largest church congregations with 20,000 members attending every Sunday.
While Warren's five purposes for people's lives (ministry, evangelism, fellowship, discipleship and worship) have become almost a mantra in churches through the sale of millions of "Purpose Driven Life" books and the attendant "40 Days of Purpose" campaigns, his "evangelism strategy" for churches is probably less well known.
The strategy "is a mix of practicality and spirituality," said Rev. Robert Driver-Bishop, pastor at Grace Lutheran Church in Loves Park, Ill., and a consultant with Purpose Driven who will speak at the conference.
The nuts-and-bolts part of the recommendations include changes as simple as providing ample parking, adding live bands, shortening prayers, making sure a church is well lit, having a casual dress code and making sermons more practical and positive.
But the book and conference leaders will also talk about the same basic question that forms the essence of the Purpose Driven Life philosophy: Why am I here?
Through the day-to-day changes, and the self-exploration within the church, Warren and his staff believe churches will reach the "unchurched," as they like to call them, attract new members and grow.
"So often churches get caught up in, `Well, we've done it this way before,' and they have trouble thinking outside the box," said Driver-Bishop, whose growing church has been using the Purpose Driven strategies for the last three years. "I think at times we need to put ourselves in position to be open to being moved."
According to Holy Family, 140 people will be attending, most of them pastors, church staff and lay leaders from more than 40 area Catholic churches and more than 20 mainline Protestant churches.
"We can't help but learn from the experience and see how we can apply it to our own Catholic experience," said Rev. Bernie Pietrzak, pastor at St. Raymond Catholic Church in Mt. Prospect, which is sending Pietrzak and six staff and lay leaders to the conference. "We look at it as a springboard to help learn how to structure our wisdom."
Like many of those attending, Pietrzak and his staff had already been reading "Purpose Driven Church" when the conference was announced.
"One of the gifts of the evangelical churches is that they realize once they develop their own faith community, they still reach out to people to join them," Pietrzak said. "Whereas in the Catholic community, we've been expecting people to come to us."
The big question for the Catholic churches attending the conference, said Bill Leonard, dean of divinity at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., is "how far the church will let them go with this, especially given the new Pope (Benedict XVI) who has cast doubt about the `deficiencies' of Protestantism, and how much he'll let them use Protestant techniques."
For some of those attending, marketing or not, the conference's speakers will be talking about strategies they know have worked.
"I'm at a point where we really need to grow to maintain the ministry," said Pastor Andre Woods, who heads a struggling 25-member church, Greater Works Ministry, in Chicago's Austin neighborhood. "And Warren is a man who knows how to lead people to Christ, and with the stories he tells in the book, I think they can help us here."
For more information about the conference, which is free, call Holy Family at 847-359-0042.
Copyright © 2005, Chicago Tribune
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
April 22, 2005
RELIGION
Still-expanding `Purpose'
Evangelical Christians have hailed the "Purpose Driven" philosophy; now a local Catholic church will host a conference espousing it
By Sean D. Hamill
Special to the Tribune
April 22, 2005
Having sold more than 20 million copies of "Purpose Driven Life" and more than 1 million of "Purpose Driven Church" and having taught more than 350,000 pastors in the books' philosophy, it might be thought that Rick Warren's view of Christianity has permeated every branch of the faith.
But the internationally famous pastor of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., and his Purpose Driven staff know that mainline Protestant, and especially Catholic, churches have been slow to warm to the message readily picked up by more evangelical congregations.
They hope that a three-day conference at Holy Family Catholic Church in Inverness starting Monday will change that by attracting leaders of more conservative branches that have been reluctant to pick up on the Purpose Driven model.
"That's our prayer," said Pastor Brett Schrock, Purpose Driven's director of strategic relationships, who will be one of three people to speak at the conference, which will not include Warren. "We're excited by this because we're seeing God unify his churches."
The Purpose Driven conference, the first ever hosted by a Catholic church, is entitled "Implementing the Purpose Driven Church." And as the name implies, it is something of a church management seminar.
The conference will draw on the successful strategies that helped Warren turn his fledgling Southern Baptist church of the 1980s into what is now one of the nation's largest church congregations with 20,000 members attending every Sunday.
While Warren's five purposes for people's lives (ministry, evangelism, fellowship, discipleship and worship) have become almost a mantra in churches through the sale of millions of "Purpose Driven Life" books and the attendant "40 Days of Purpose" campaigns, his "evangelism strategy" for churches is probably less well known.
The strategy "is a mix of practicality and spirituality," said Rev. Robert Driver-Bishop, pastor at Grace Lutheran Church in Loves Park, Ill., and a consultant with Purpose Driven who will speak at the conference.
The nuts-and-bolts part of the recommendations include changes as simple as providing ample parking, adding live bands, shortening prayers, making sure a church is well lit, having a casual dress code and making sermons more practical and positive.
But the book and conference leaders will also talk about the same basic question that forms the essence of the Purpose Driven Life philosophy: Why am I here?
Through the day-to-day changes, and the self-exploration within the church, Warren and his staff believe churches will reach the "unchurched," as they like to call them, attract new members and grow.
"So often churches get caught up in, `Well, we've done it this way before,' and they have trouble thinking outside the box," said Driver-Bishop, whose growing church has been using the Purpose Driven strategies for the last three years. "I think at times we need to put ourselves in position to be open to being moved."
According to Holy Family, 140 people will be attending, most of them pastors, church staff and lay leaders from more than 40 area Catholic churches and more than 20 mainline Protestant churches.
"We can't help but learn from the experience and see how we can apply it to our own Catholic experience," said Rev. Bernie Pietrzak, pastor at St. Raymond Catholic Church in Mt. Prospect, which is sending Pietrzak and six staff and lay leaders to the conference. "We look at it as a springboard to help learn how to structure our wisdom."
Like many of those attending, Pietrzak and his staff had already been reading "Purpose Driven Church" when the conference was announced.
"One of the gifts of the evangelical churches is that they realize once they develop their own faith community, they still reach out to people to join them," Pietrzak said. "Whereas in the Catholic community, we've been expecting people to come to us."
The big question for the Catholic churches attending the conference, said Bill Leonard, dean of divinity at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., is "how far the church will let them go with this, especially given the new Pope (Benedict XVI) who has cast doubt about the `deficiencies' of Protestantism, and how much he'll let them use Protestant techniques."
For some of those attending, marketing or not, the conference's speakers will be talking about strategies they know have worked.
"I'm at a point where we really need to grow to maintain the ministry," said Pastor Andre Woods, who heads a struggling 25-member church, Greater Works Ministry, in Chicago's Austin neighborhood. "And Warren is a man who knows how to lead people to Christ, and with the stories he tells in the book, I think they can help us here."
For more information about the conference, which is free, call Holy Family at 847-359-0042.
Copyright © 2005, Chicago Tribune