COMMENTARY: Time to tighten the belt

c. 2008 Religion News Service(UNDATED) During the current economic crisis, the public has focused on a lengthy litany of woes: stomach-churning stock market declines, housing foreclosures, shrinking retirement pensions, frozen credit lines, growing unemployment … need I go on?Because this economic meltdown is so pervasive, every aspect of our personal and national life is impacted, […]

c. 2008 Religion News Service(UNDATED) During the current economic crisis, the public has focused on a lengthy litany of woes: stomach-churning stock market declines, housing foreclosures, shrinking retirement pensions, frozen credit lines, growing unemployment … need I go on?Because this economic meltdown is so pervasive, every aspect of our personal and national life is impacted, including our religious communities.Even though big changes are inevitable, I doubt that tax deductions for charitable contributions will be ended. Nor do I believe the traditional tax-exempt status afforded religious properties _ churches, synagogues, temples and mosques _ will be repealed.But I suspect that increased tax scrutiny will be given to income-producing activities that take place in houses of worship _ renting space for exercise and dance classes, for example, or computer training, vocational instruction, remedial reading learning centers and a host of other programs that provide needed income for congregations. It’s clear we have more religious institutions, facilities, buildings, organizations and schools than we can now afford or adequately maintain. But the trend toward closure and consolidation has been well underway before the economic meltdown hit America. Just ask the Catholics.In addition to the nation’s economic troubles, the long-held commitment to church-state separation and the increasingly diverse religious demography of our nation makes it unlikely that scarce public money will be allocated to support any faith community’s schools _ at least in any large-scale way.At least among Protestants and Jews, I see a growing number of financially strapped institutions unable to maintain sound financial footing. As a result, churches that share few doctrinal and sacramental differences will explore combining their resources _ first it will be libraries, then educational facilities, buildings, social services and, finally, clergy. Episcopalians and Lutherans are already doing just that.Naturally, many congregations will resist the inevitable. Financially challenged mainline Protestant churches will have little choice but to come together as their members ask: “How many Presbyterian/Methodist/Baptist/Lutheran/Episcopal/Congregational churches do we really need and support in our community?”Proudly independent evangelical congregations, even large megachurches, will also feel the financial squeeze. The hunt for audience donations to TV preachers will only intensify.Christian seminaries will seek partners in a common market approach involving both faculty and students. In large cities with a host of clergy training centers, it is cost efficient to make better use of libraries, computers, academic research facilities, dormitories and faculty.Similar forces are at work within the Jewish community. In the booming post-war decades, hundreds of new suburban synagogues were established and Jewish community organizations and charities were amply funded. No more. Harsh choices, including job freezes, staff layoffs and spending caps, have already arrived.In some communities, two struggling synagogues _ one Reform and the other Conservative _ will meld their resources even though their worship services and national affiliations may differ. If looking down the barrel of a loaded gun provides a threatened individual with clarity of vision, staring at mounting fiscal deficits and declining income provides rabbis and their lay leaders with equally clear vision: combine resources and survive, or go it alone and die a slow death.The so-called “edifice complex” _ building bigger, newer, more luxurious religious facilities _ is over. To borrow from domestic diva Martha Stewart, that may be “a good thing.”Clergy will be compelled to cease being CEOs and program directors and return instead to the tasks they were trained to fill: spiritual counselors to the ill, lonely, frightened and troubled folks in their midst; teachers of Scripture and exponents of great and ancient religious traditions; repairers of a broken world; and role models for others to emulate.(Rabbi Rudin, the American Jewish Committee’s senior interreligious adviser, is the author of “The Baptizing of America: The Religious Right’s Plans for the Rest of Us.”)KRE/JM END RUDIN625 wordsA photo of Rabbi Rudin is available via https://religionnews.com.

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