Now, on a serious note, there are many small communities and South Dakota really is a place where towns just go out of existence from time to time. We are not denying the potential for small but healthy churches (and that is the defense often mounted by TEC loyalists around here – “Growth isn’t the only measure of success”).
But the numbers from the Diocese are not about small, healthy communities. The numbers show decline – in many cases precipitous. And the historic Reservation Missions are vitually empty save for funerals and drive-by baptisms. We still hear TEC folks from other places boast about how “We have a diocese where over half the members are Native Americans!” Yeah, guess that’s true on paper. But in terms of vital Christian community, well, you really need flesh and blood.
Just for fun, we looked in on Good Shepherd, Sioux Falls, a church teaching the Biblical Gospel and emphasizing prayer and strong lay ministry. Their ASA went from 42 in 2004 to 85 in 2006, and they report that Sundays this year frequently have more than 100 at worship.
That’s a lot nicer than what that “uppity woman” in New Jersey
had to say:
3/4 of a million dollar subsidy from TEC divided among 2,238 average Sunday attenders equals $335.12 per pew sitter. Divided by 52 weeks per year, that’s $6.44 per person per week. The way to grow TEC attendance in South Dakota is to tell everybody their local Episcopal church will give them six dollars and forty-four cents to come to church on Sunday.
Apparently not all of the LGBT people in the Dakotas move to Minneapolis. Sioux Falls used to have a Metropolitan Community Church (MCC). However, the Kansas City Star identified him as a former Roman Catholic priest who was defrocked for molesting young boys. I suppose that now all of the LGBT can go to the Calvary Cathedral.
Don’t miss the headline of the Northern Plains Anglicans’ newsletter:
“Buffalo Herds Doing OK; Episcopalians Endangered”
“The way to grow TEC attendance in South Dakota is to tell everybody their local Episcopal church will give them $6.44 to come to church on Sunday.”
How about Weekly Worshiper points good for trips to Las Vegas?
Why send them all the way to Las Vegas? Deadwood (SD) has had legal gambling for several years now.
PS to #5: If the ECUSA-Las Vegas connection is a bit obscure, would-be worshipers should remember that the PB comes from there.
Even more importantly, Trinity Wall Street can hold a Risk-Takers’ Mass, which will include:
— A celebrant dressed as a croupier
— A paten modeled on a roulette wheel
— A slot-machine-style handbell choir, with choristers pulling the machines’ levers at just the right times
— Lay eucharistic ministers garbed like blackjack dealers (no card-counting, please)
The Risk-Takers’ Mass will have great appeal on Wall Street. As captured in a Trinity Media DVD, it will (together with vegan watercress-and-mesclun canapes) invest the Pilgrimage to Las Vegas with a panache sure to appeal in America’s Heartland.
I visited South Dakota about 10 years ago…did the usual tour – Presidents, Corn Palace, Badlands……..was so appreciative of the Federal Government that built I-90 just for my trip….anyway, that’s how it seemed……..only one on the road, yet when I got to a destination, there were people…..still believe they came in on UFOs as they weren’t on I-90…..perhaps the E.T.s are going home….logical reason for TEC ASA being down….
Meant to add – the people were great and the state is beautiful…..
Calvary Cathedral (+Creighton’s’ cathedral in Sioux Falls) has been known as “The Gay Church” for several years now…which torques the jaw of a few people I know who continue to darken the doors down there. The displaced MCC church started out as “renters” about 9 years ago, but as they have failed to grow their own congregation…they’ve decided – why not just hijack the Cathedral congregation? Result? Membership down considerably, stewardship flat at best, a revolving door of deans over the past 8 years who have fought behind closed doors with +Creighton (I am not inventing this, it has been told to me first-hand by TWO of the clergy leaving the Cathedral), an aging congregation kept in the dark, Sunday school nearly non-existent, closure of what was a very large daycare center at the Cathedral, the retirement of the Canon To The Ordinary who is being replaced by a retired priest on a volunteer basis, and on and on. That giant sucking sound you are all hearing is the tall grass prairie reclaiming the land and absorbing the un-saleable church buildings out in the hinter-lands which well-known missionary bishop William Hobart Hare planted 120 years ago and THIS bishop is closing. The only bonus? +Creighton can’t fill his coffers with the sale of these places! Somehow despite all of this, +Creighton has announced the election of a coadjutor. I say…follow the money to understand some of the votes in the HOB!
#8, Dee – Did you miss Wall Drug on your tour? Well, don’t feel too bad.
“I say…follow the money to understand some of the votes in the HOB!” —#10
Interesting. So South Dakota joins Brazil, Navojoland, and the like as special dependencies of 815?
I worked for six weeks with Teen Challenge/Sundance Wy. While I would not recommend the program to anyone (a very authoritarian, legalistic, “do as I say without question” ministry), I would love to return to the Wyoming/South Dakota area. The people there were wonderful to be around.
My favorite customer is in Sioux Falls, SD. When I was last up there in February, I met with Fr. Timothy Fountain, the Rector of Good Shepherd and found him to be a wonderful person and a good man of God (from what I could tell at a dinner meeting). I love the mid-west and the people there are friendly and easy going and, generally, well grounded.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
#12 – it seems that way. From what we’ve read (and we are searching the archives for a quote), Bp. Robertson until very recently forbade SSUs. Granted, he took a moderate/institutional rather than orthodox/theological line – kind of a “Windsor” position, although he never signed on with that group or attended the CA meetings.
Recently, however, he has become more militantly TEC-line. He spoke of “A new American Revolution” (TEC-LGBT vs. everybody else). He called the DES Communique “offensive” (http://www.diocesesd.org/MayJun07.pdf – scroll down to p. 17).
Coincidentally (hmmm…maybe that needs quotation marks), cash-strapped TEC actually increased the GenCon grant up over $700,000. As Midwestnorwegian points out, this seems odd given the closure of churches, non-replacement of retiring staff, ASA and membership shrinkage and flat giving. On top of this, the call for a Coadjutor?
No proof here, just lots of inferences…so far. But it does appear that some interests in the Diocese of SD are dependent upon and obedient to the TEC-LGBT movement.
Wall Drugstore! Now there’s a memory.
Does Rapid City still have dinosaurs on the mountain running through the middle of the city? The first night I was there in December of 1979, no one had told me about them; it was a cold dark night, but there may have been a moon, as I looked up and there they were. It was a wonderful shock!
I didn’t see that! I was there in `94, but we’d only get to Rapid City very occasionally in the 6 weeks I was there. (February/March — I loved the winter! We all loved the snow! We had to come back to Florida! 🙁 )
I was transfered from Georgia to Washington back in 1983, drove throught South Dakota. The longest year of my life. A trucker told me it wasn’t a tripe it was a career!
It is a beautiful state, with many great and some whimsical features. The beauty can be severe, too, if that makes any sense. Anyway, a very blessed place to live. Our hope is to bless it with a healthy Anglican witness.
Mattjp- no I didn’t miss Wall Drug…..what a disappointment – really don’t know what I was expecting, but is was just a very large junk shop that needed a good dusting when I was there…..
NPA – yes…many of us who live here actually embrace and love the “severity” of the beauty…those who don’t live here or didn’t grow up here, probably could never understand. Probably something like someone from Arizona feeling the desert is “beautiful”. I lived in the mountains of TN for a few years, and always had this feeling of claustrophobia…because I never could see the horizon I was so accustomed to seeing!
Thank you ALL for your compliments about the people here. I feel we’re pretty up front, and honest-to-a-fault people up here.
Phil – although I do not attend Tim Fountain’s church, I can attest – he is a lovely person!
A joke – Why is it so windy in South Dakota? Because Iowa sucks. Just a joke….we love our neighbors…..even if they do drive too slow…
Have a gorgeous weekend all!
libraryjim and Words Matter,
Next time through, plan on visiting us in the ‘banana belt’ of SD, St. Francis of Assisi Anglican Mission, Hot Springs. We’re small, but we’re active. Good people and a milder winter season than East Tennessee (home is Chattanooga).
Once upon a time I applied for a job in Aberdeen, SD. About once a week someone in HR would call me to make sure I understood that the job would require relocation and to ask if I was still interested. I made the short list but withdrew from consideration for the Aberdeen job after getting offered a much better position with the same employer in Atlanta.
Keep Aberdeen in your prayers as they are still recovering from floods…serious enough that both state and federal resources are being deployed to help them.
BTW the Episcopal Diocese of SD, even with a parish in Aberdeen, did not send out an appeal for help. They did, however, ask all churches help a Luthern LGBT group solicit members from TEC pews.