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Robert A. Chesnut. Transforming the Mainline Church: Lessons in Change from Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Hope. Louisville: Geneva, 2000. Pp. x + 180. $19.95 (Paper). 549788
Rehwaldt-Alexander, Jeremy
Rehwaldt-Alexander, Jeremy
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BR50.pdf
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"How can mainline Protestant churches survive and thrive? That is the key question Robert Chesnut addresses in Transforming the Mainline Church. In 1988, Chesnut left a comfortable congregation in Evanston, Illinois to become the senior pastor at East Liberty Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh. The large urban church, located in a neighborhood facing significant economic problems, had lost many members over the prior decades. Chesnut describes his experience leading the congregation through a process of innovation and transformation. [2] His key thesis is that the entire life of the church - everything a congregation does - should be seen not only a service to members, but as a way for the congregation to grow. The focus must shift from meeting the needs of those "inside" to "reaching those outside whom we seek to draw inside" (5). Chesnut is writing from within a tradition of "progressive, ecumenical, mainline Protestantism," and his book is oriented toward that audience, asking readers to follow his journey with the challenge: "Are we able to be pilgrims, to risk drinking from some strange wells rather than adopting a defensive, circle-the-wagons stance toward the changes that are transforming the religious world around us today?" (135). [3] The engaging narrative weaves insights from a wide range of literature together with a description of the difficulties Chesnut and the congregation faced as they have struggled to survive. The focus on East Liberty provides an enriching depth of detail, but also limits the possibility of drawing directly from that experience to the experience of other struggling mainline congregations. Clearly, East Liberty - with its 18 million dollar endowment, 700 members, and established community ministries - is not a "typical" struggling congregation."(pg 1)
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2000
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With permission of the license/copyright holder