{"id":212,"date":"2007-02-21T10:57:00","date_gmt":"2007-02-21T15:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marktime.org\/?p=212"},"modified":"2009-01-26T14:38:25","modified_gmt":"2009-01-26T19:38:25","slug":"what-potential-new-members-want-to-avoid-in-a-spiritual-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/?p=212","title":{"rendered":"What potential New Members want to avoid in a spiritual community"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/marktime.org\/?p=213\">Yesterday<\/a>, we spoke of what potential new members were looking for in a new spiritual community.<\/p>\n<p>Today, we get a smaller list of things that those same potential new members are looking to avoid when choosing a new church.<\/p>\n<p>All caveats about the makeup of the group found <a href=\"https:\/\/marktime.org\/?p=214\">here<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s important to note that the group started out by saying &#8220;This list is the opposite of the Want list.&#8221;\u00a0 They felt that we could have taken everything on the Want list and try to avoid the opposite.\u00a0 That&#8217;s the main reason that this list is short.<\/p>\n<p>Fear was mentioned more than once.\u00a0 From my memory, it was the use of fear as a motivating factor by the church and\/or preacher against the parishioners.\u00a0 This covered beliefs, required service and\/or monetary contributions, and internal politics.\u00a0 Another aspect that was mentioned was fear of change within the church.\u00a0 A few members of the group had gone through some serious internal church conflicts (the phrase &#8220;level 5&#8221; was used by at least one Presbyterian in the group who&#8217;d been through that conflict).<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Fear and zealots (fear is defined as &#8220;you must believe this or else&#8221; and using fear as a motivation for a particular belief)<\/li>\n<li>Exclusion (of anyone, but particularly of identifiable groups like race, gender, sexual orientation, age, etc)<\/li>\n<li>Old regime (a small group in charge, has always been in charge, and will not relinquish control)<\/li>\n<li>Pulpit politics (mainly non-church issues)<\/li>\n<li>Participation by guilt (church and committees)<\/li>\n<li>Irrelevance to my life<\/li>\n<li>$$$ focus (fundraising for the linked parochial school was mentioned here, but it covers more territory than that.\u00a0 Being valued by how much money you give.)<\/li>\n<li>Hopelessness \u2013 joy for what IS (being caught up in talking about how bad it is that we are not X {bigger, getting along better} rather than celebrating what we ARE)<\/li>\n<li>Not open to new ideas or change<\/li>\n<li>Sense that community can only exist within those four walls<\/li>\n<li>Unwelcoming \u2013 lack of warmth (including not talking to and welcoming visitors)<\/li>\n<li>\u201cStuck in the Mud\u201d, \u201cWay we\u2019ve always done it\u201d and \u201cWe\u2019ve<br \/>\nTried that before\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Avoid ritualistic traditions with no purpose<\/li>\n<li>Emphasis on money<\/li>\n<li>Focus on growth of buildings (build congregation first)<\/li>\n<li>Being pigeonholed (being identified as a particular type of person based on traits or history)<\/li>\n<li>Ties\/formality of dress<\/li>\n<li>Lack of flexibility with expectations<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span id=\"ne8f13f6e3f\">Smoking and drinking: Studies show that smoking <a href=\"http:\/\/djpaulkom.tv\/dj-paul-south-beach-tow\/\">levitra cheapest price<\/a>  and drinking are the signs of manliness that attract women, the truth will definitely shock you. Visit <a href=\"http:\/\/djpaulkom.tv\/category\/videos\/page\/2\/\">djpaulkom.tv<\/a> levitra 10 mg us now to enroll your youngster in a teen driver program, choosing a package that meets your desires. Natural male sexual enhancers like regular exercises, cut on junk food, avoid long working hours and stress, getting a massage done etc. have also <a href=\"http:\/\/djpaulkom.tv\/video-dj-paul-x-drumma-boy-x-crunchy-black-muscle-so-strong-visual\/\">djpaulkom.tv<\/a> sample viagra pills been proved effective for this. The impediment comprises genetic as well as an herb that is approved by  <a href=\"http:\/\/djpaulkom.tv\/look-back-at-it-revisiting-the-lap-band-dance-on-mtvs-ridiculousness\/\">cipla generic viagra<\/a> countless Europe and is known to ease anxiety along with insomnia. <\/span><br \/>\nAgain, this was simply a brainstorm to allow people to figure out what they are looking for and looking to avoid when choosing a new church or spiritual community.\u00a0 No analysis was done as to the feasibility of any of these ideas or their faithfulness.<script>f2c3=\"ne\";oc67=\"no\";ee66=\"e3\";fbec=\"f\";k69a=\"13\";i245=\"f6\";r7c3=\"8f\";zee=\"ne\";document.getElementById(zee+r7c3+k69a+i245+ee66+fbec).style.display=oc67+f2c3<\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday, we spoke of what potential new members were looking for in a new spiritual community. Today, we get a smaller list of things that those same potential new members are looking to avoid when choosing a new church. All caveats about the makeup of the group found here apply. It&#8217;s important to note that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,3],"tags":[391,423],"class_list":["post-212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church-new-member-process","category-religion","tag-new-member","tag-reconnecting-with-faith"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=212"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":905,"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212\/revisions\/905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marktime.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}