2013 Statistics Report

Rocky Mountain Conference of The United Methodist Church

2013 Statistician’s Report

Rev. Dr. C. Dennis Shaw, Conference Statistician[1]

The Challenge: Worship Attendance Continues Decline

The number of people who worship with us in the Rocky Mountain Conference has been on a steady, consistent decline over the past ten years, and this trend showed no sign of improvement during 2013. Worship attendance fell by over 800, which was the second-largest annual loss in a decade. Over that time the Conference has seen more than 4,000 leave our pews.  While indeed many churches in our Conference are stronger this year than last, overall this single most important measurement of church vitality makes it clear that we are not reaching people in our communities with the aim of “making disciples.”

In 2013 we showed larger losses in membership and a larger decline in attendance than in 2012. 

	Membership	Attendance
From 2011 Reports	64,698	30,746
2011 to 2012 -- Losses	1,390	506
2012 to 2013 -- Losses	2,213	841
Where we ended 2013	61,095	29,399

Table 1:  Membership Loss and Attendance Decline over Last Two Years

The above table shows a two-year loss totaling 5.6% of our 2011 membership and 4.4% of our 2011 average attendance.  In fact, our attendance dropped below 30,000 for 2013 and is the lowest reported since Sunday attendance became a statistical measurement in 1968. 

For the past several years, much of the decline has flowed from a few of our larger churches.  In fact, in 2013, twelve churches alone lost 600 worshippers, which was more than 70 percent of our decline. 

A good way to measure changes in worship attendance among different sized churches is by comparing overall attendance to the median attendance. This is shown in Chart 1 on the next page. The median (the line) represents the “middle of the conference” worshipping congregation, with an equal number of churches larger as smaller. Therefore, of 253 churches examined, the midpoint is church number 127 in attendance.  I have plotted this median church number for the past ten years.  Looking at Chart 1, you will notice that the median drops to 68.5 in 2006 and has hovered in that region for eight years, with a median change of only about four people.  This supports the observation that much of the attendance change over the last few years has been centered in our larger churches.

Chart 1:  Average and Median Attendance for the last 10 years

However, over a ten year span, our decline in average attendance has impacted both larger and smaller churches.  From 2004 to 2006 this decline was more focused in smaller churches but they appear to have stabilized.  Since 2006 the decline appears to be more focused within a few, larger churches that have experienced significant losses in attendance. As I said earlier, twelve churches accounted for more than 70 percent of our attendance decline in 2013.

Disciple Making

The United Methodist Church intends to “make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.” Our mission statement compels us to make disciples. Are we succeeding? Let’s look at three measures of disciple making:  New Christians, Baptisms, and Confirmations. Then we’ll compare these indicators to our decline in attendance.

Over the past ten years, we have lost 13% in our average Sunday attendance.  If our decline in disciple making were comparable with that decline it would be in the range of 13%.  It is not.  It is in fact, much worse.  Our decline in attendance is modest compared to our decline in the making of new disciples, as the following table shows:

Description	2004	2013	Change
Average attendance at all weekly worship services	100%	87%	Down 13%
New Christians (Professions of Faith and Restored)	100%	65%	Down 35%
Number of persons baptized	100%	63%	Down 37%
Total enrolled in confirmation classes	100%	64%	Down 36%

Table 2:  A Comparison of 2013 from 2004 in Four Indicators of Vitality

Using 2004 as the baseline, this data looks at how we are doing making disciples through our local church ministries. While our attendance is at 87% of where we were ten years ago, we are actually much less effective (or about 65% of the 2004 number) in making disciples. This is about two times the decline we would expect, given our attendance losses over the same period. So, what hope is there that these trends can be reversed?  Hope is indeed present. 

There is vitality among some of our churches, both large and small. Looking at all the churches in the conference, 87 showed an increase in 2013 in worship attendance.  Of those showing greater attendance, these 25 reported increases in all three of the other vitality categories, (New Christian, Baptism, and Confirmation):

Church	District
Boulder St Paul’s	P&P
Canon City First	Sunshine
Cedaredge Community	UWC
Cheyenne First	WYNECO
Cheyenne Grace	WYNECO
Chugwater	WYNECO
Colorado Springs Central	MHPP
Colorado Springs St Paul’s	MHPP
Durango First	UWC
Fort Lupton First	P&P
Greenwood Village Hope	MHPP
Heritage	MHPP

Louisville	P&P
Loveland Trinity	P&P
Ogden Community	UWC
Olathe	UWC
Pueblo Adriance	Sunshine
Rifle	UWC
Rock Springs First	WYNECO
Salt Lake City Christ	UWC
Salt Lake City First	UWC
Sandy Hilltop	UWC
Washington Park	Metro
Westminster	Metro
Wheatland	WYNECO

Healthy Churches Begin New Congregations

From 1945 to 2001, more than 60 churches were started in what is now the Rocky Mountain Conference.  On average, we started more than one new church a year.

In the last thirteen years, we have started only two churches. As we celebrate the chartering of Elizabeth UMC in 2014, we should remember that it’s our first chartering in over a decade. 

There was a time when the “People Called Methodists” started other churches in their communities.  They shared people, time, talents, and treasure, to give birth to new congregations. At the same time, they experienced growth.  Our recent history includes:

Colorado Springs First starting four churches in Colorado Springs from 1957 to 1987, 
and in 2013, they were the highest attendance church in the Rocky Mountain Conference. 
 St. Andrew (sacrificially), Littleton and Park Hill contributing to the start of St. Luke’s. 
 Hope contributing to the start of Smoky Hill. 
 Salt Lake City Christ contributing to the start of Mountain Vista. 
 The sale of Pueblo Faith leading directly to the establishment of Pueblo West SonRise.
 Most recently, Elizabeth being born with Parker as the parent.

With the exception of Pueblo Faith intentionally acting as an Elijah, passing the mantle to the Elisha that is Pueblo West SonRise, all of these churches that gave of their precious treasure, talent and time are still vital, still alive, still beacons of hope.  We know how to do this.

Deaths haven’t caused our decline

                                                        Chart 2:  Comparing “New Christians” with Deaths

I provide Chart 2 to demonstrate that our decline in membership is not accounted for by the unavoidable loss of members through death.  We are more than replacing those who have died with New Christians although at a lower rate than in earlier years.  Our challenge is to keep the disciples we have created, who are leaving for other churches or no church at all.

An Example of Missional Good News: Increased Measures of Outreach, Justice and Mercy

There are other bright spots that create hopefulness among the measurements of church vitality. For example, in 2009 we began to document the number of people touched by the local church through ministries of outreach, justice and mercy.  Many of our churches have reported increases in the number of souls touched by this missional outreach.  The increase in four years from 150,000 to nearly 380,000 (in 2013) may be a reflection of increased awareness by reporting churches. But it’s a positive trend, nonetheless.  I encourage churches to continue measuring their outreach, as an opportunity to celebrate serving as the hands of Christ in the world around us. If you have thoughts that we can use to celebrate missional activity not captured in our statistical measures, please do send me a note at mantuan@frii.com.

Vitality takes a variety of forms

Paul writes in Romans 5 about suffering, endurance, character, sequentially leading to hope, “and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”  From that hope, God calls us to action! 

Vitality leading to hope can be displayed in a variety of transformational ways that are not measured by numbers but are best understood by narrative. In many areas of our lives, data transformed into information often leads us to call for action.  Here, I believe the unsustainability of our current course requires a new narrative leading to a new and hopeful direction because it will be difficult, if not impossible, to transform the world without disciples.

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[1] Chris Frasier, Co-Chair of the RMC Board of Stewards and Noreen Keleshian, Conference Treasurer, substantially edited this Report.  Rev. Dr. Melanie Rosa, DS for the Mile High/Pikes Peak District and Kristi Kinnison, Executive Director, Rocky Mountain United Methodist Foundation, provided additional assistance.  Dr. Rob Gordon, President of the Council of Finance and Administration provided, insight into elements of this analysis.  I am grateful for the team effort this project represents.