Soul Searching - On identity, inertia and change in a Church

8/9/2019 Soul Searching - On identity, inertia and change in a Church

1/38

Management

Spring 2010

Soul Searching

On identity, inertia and change in a Church

Bachelors thesis

Staffan Birgersson & Jonas Bolin

Tutor: Torbjrn Stjernberg


2/38

2

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER ............................................................. .................................. 4

Introduction ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 4

The Church of Sweden ............................................................................................................................................................................ 5

The Capernaum church district .......................................................................................................................................................... 6

Research problems................................................................................................................................................................................... 8

CHAPTER 2: DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS ................................................................ ............. 9

Interviews .................................................................................................................................................................................................... 9

Respondents............................................................................................................................................................................................. 10

Empirical data ......................................................................................................................................................................................... 10

Analysis ...................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11

Structure of this paper ......................................................................................................................................................................... 12

CHAPTER 3: RAISON DETRE WHY SHOULD THE CHURCH EXIST? ..................................... 13

Theoretical framework ....................................................................................................................................................................... 13

Empirical data and analysis .............................................................................................................................................................. 15

Why does the Church of Sweden exist? ........................................................................................................... 15

What constitutes a good Church and what would make more people active? ................................................ 16

How aware are the people in charge, of the mission statement of the Church? ............................................. 17

CHAPTER 4: LEGACY AND TRADITION IN THE CHURCH ..................................... ....................... 19



Why does the Church of Sweden call itself a peoples Church? ....................................................................... 21

Organizational structure ................................................................................................................................... 22

What activities are essential to a Church? Which are primary and which are secondary? .............................. 23

What are the biggest Pros and Cons with the current organizational structure? ............................................ 23What has happened since the separation from the state in year 2000? ......................................................... 25

CHAPTER 5: STRATEGY AND CHANGE ................................................................ ................................ 26



How do they work with change? ...................................................................................................................... 29

What is their opinion on the forecasted financial situation? ........................................................................... 29

What do you think of your organization 20 years from now? ................................................................ .......... 30


3/38

3

CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSIONS ........................................................................... .......................................... 32

Discussion ................................................................................................................................................................................................. 32

Answering our research problem................................................................................................................................................... 34

APPENDICES .............................................................. ................................................................. .................... 35

References ................................................................................................................................................................................................. 35

Electronic references ........................................................................................................................................................................... 36

Interview framework in Swedish ................................................................................................................................................... 37


4/38

4

Chapter 1: Introductory chapter

IntroductionConfronted with the daunting task of spending ten weeks together writing a bachelor's

thesis, we quickly identified our shared desire to avoid writing yet another "How did the

implementation of Management-fad ABC go at Company XYZ?". Thus, the need for a

meaningful topic arose. After briefly exploring various shared interests such as the music

industry, we realized that our highest common denominator was one of exceptional

importance to us: our spiritual search for meaning. For Staffan, a life-long Christian, active

believer and youth group leader in a local parish, the subject was one of constant relevance

in his life. Also for Jonas, a seeker that more recently began exploring his connection to god,

questions of this nature were very much alive in his daily life.

With this in mind, we began looking at various sub-topics and organizations where we could

incorporate our spiritual interest with management studies. We discussed Scientologists,

Freemasons and various sects and that were appealing because of their secrecy. Later we

realized that there was an elephant sitting silently in the room: The Church of Sweden. An

organizational giant, created in its present form by King Gustav Vasa in the 16th century

when he decided that the Swedish state should own the Church, and not the other way

around. For a long time the Church was a government agency that performed various

services to the country. Since year 2000, this is no longer the case. It is now an independent

organization, free to pursue whatever course of action it deems appropriate. However, many

sources we consulted before launching this study suggested that not much have changed

within the Church, indicating a discrepancy between the organizational structure and the

new economic reality of the Church. Many also voiced concerns that the pessimistic financial

forecasts would make profound structural change inevitable.

From this situation we derived the core topic for this thesis: How does an ideology-driven

nonprofit organization find its purpose when underlying supporting structures disappear? To

answer this question, we concentrated our efforts around a church district, and conducted

qualitative interviews with key decision-makers such as priests and elected church officials.

The fact that Staffan was active in this particular district gave us great credibility and access

among the people we interviewed. Jonas, on the other hand, had no connection to this


5/38

5

parish or Christianity in general, other that growing up in a protestant country. We hoped

that this combination would enable us to merge the insider and outsider perspective on the

topic.

The Church of SwedenThe reason why the Church of Sweden is in a precarious situation traces its roots a long way

back in history. Sweden was first christened in between year 800-900AD but it took as long

as the eleventh century until Christianity prevailed over the pagan religions dominant at the

time. It was then the northern outpost of the Catholic Church, and the kings of Sweden were

in constant power struggle with the Church, because of its political clout. This changed when

King Gustav Vasa assumed the throne in the 16th

century. Inspired by German reformationist

Martin Luther, he decided that instead of being loyal to the pope in Rome, the Church of

Sweden should subject itself to the will of the king. Virtually all property belonging to the

bishops, monasteries and the cathedrals was transferred to the state. With time, the state

and the Church became deeply intertwined and during the 17th

century, the Swedish society

was characterized as unit society with the state, church and the people nearly inseparable

from each other1.

However, starting in the late 19th

century, calls for religious freedom became increasingly

frequent, and since 1953, freedom of religion is enacted in Swedish law. The separation

between state and Church increased further in year 2000 when the government

discontinued its ownership of the Church and made it an independent organization, though

the state still maintain some ties to the Church. Meanwhile Sweden has also developed into

one of the most secular countries on earth, with atheism numbers somewhere between 46

and 85 percent2. Merely two percent of Swedes attend some kind of weekly service

administered by the Church of Sweden3.

Nevertheless, this prevalent disbelief in god is not yet fully reflected in the membership

numbers of the Church. In 2009, fully 71.3% were registered members of the Church, giving

them the right to vote in church elections while requiring them to pay roughly one percent

1

p9-12, Ekstrm 20042P. 56, Martin 2007

3The Church of Sweden #1


6/38

6

of their income annually1. This means that a large body of inactive disbelievers supports a

small number of active members2. The membership number is constantly declining though,

and accelerated by media attention which highlights the cost of being a member3.

The present reality is in stark contrast of the internal goal of the Church. It is designed to

bring the message of the Kingdom of Christ to everyone, and is in some respect designed for

growth. The Bible famously quotes Jesus, standing on a mountain in Gallilee: Go ye

therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son,

and of the Holy Ghost (Matthew 28:19).

Concluding, the Church of Sweden is a very interesting organization, for three key reasons:

1) It has a history of being intimately connected with the Swedish state and its rulers. 2) It is

supported by a large, but increasingly shrinking inactive base of members. 3) It has a

profound mission from God to grow and reach all people on earth. This leads us to an

interesting investigation, because these key areas are in conflict with each. The relationship

between the second and the third indicates that the Church is in need of structural change:

stop shrinking and start growing. However, number one suggests that Church has a heavy

historical baggage and may not change very easily. So, how does an organization with such

an issue adapt to a new reality and find its purpose?

The Capernaum church districtTo investigate how the Church of Sweden can adapt to this new reality, we decided to focus

on the Church of Sweden in its local capacity, the pastoral level. Since Staffan already had

good connection with a district named Capernaum4, this gave us an excellent opportunity to

get deep access and credibility among leaders there, and a unique possibility to hear their

real opinions on these matters. Before launching the study we conducted a few informal

interviews, with some of the employees in Capernaum, to present our thoughts and to get

their input. These helped us in two ways: first by learning that they were very positive about

our decision to study them, and were very willing to help us get in touch with key decision-

makers. Many also expressed a need for change, claiming that not much has changed since

1Ekstrm 2004

2Kalin 2008

3

Interview4We have chosen to conceal the real identity of the parish to keep all respondents anonymous. The actual

Capernaum is a place in Israel where Jesus preached, according to the Bible.


7/38

7

the separation from the state in 2000, and hoped that we could shed some light on their

situation. Secondly, we understood that they were currently making their own inquiry about

how its organizational structure should be designed in the future.

The Capernaum church district is located outside one of the larger cities in Sweden, covering

an area where about 35,000 people live. Approximately 70 % of these are members in the

Church of Sweden and pay their membership fees to the parish. The district consist of two

parishes with separate employees and leaders, but with a common administrational

function.


8/38

8

Research problemsFollowing our background, we have drawn the following conclusion: the Church of Sweden

will not be able to sustain its current size, because if the trend is continuing into the future,

its financial base will shrink considerably. Pure business-minded downsizing is however not a

viable option, because the Church acts on behalf of God and therefore cannot simply shutdown its operations. Therefore, we conclude that in order to be sustained, the Church will

need to change its structure. From this we have derived our research problem: When people

gather in an organizational structure that is no longer viable, how do they find a new

structure that will support its purpose?

This is a very broad question, and not a very easy one to launch a study from. Therefore, we

have divided it into three research problems, with sub-inquiries that would enable us to

address the main question.

1. What is the Raison d'etre for the Church of Sweden-Capernaum?1. Why does the Church of Sweden exist?2. What constitutes a good Church and what would make more people active?3. How aware are the people in charge of the parish of the mission statement of

the Church?

2. What is the Church of Sweden-Capernaum doing onlydue to its legacy?1. Why does the Church of Sweden call itself a peoples Church?2. What activities are essential to a Church? Which are primary and which are

secondary?

3. What are the biggest Pros and Cons of the current organizational structure?4. What has changed since the separation from the state in year 2000?

3. How does the Church of Sweden-Capernaum work with strategy and change?1. How does the parish work with change?2. What is their opinion on the forecasted financial situation?3. Where do you see the Church 20 years from now?


9/38

9

Chapter 2: Data collection and analysis

Interviews

In line with our choice to use a qualitative approach to respect the sensitivity of the topic,

we wanted a data gathering method which also embodied this spirit. Additionally, due to the

exploratory nature of this study we needed to gather data in a way that would enable us to

follow interesting paths and not be stuck in a fixed template. Among many available

methods we chose to gather primary data from the Church of Sweden's annual production

of in-house reports, books and papers, and to conduct qualitative interviews with a sample

from the Capernaum district.

Academic interviews are commonly defined as unstructured, semi-structured or

structured1. In choosing between these, the researcher should be aware of differences and

which one to utilize for a specific study2. According to Saunders et al (2003) semi-structured

interviews are to be preferred when the questions are complex or open-ended and when

the logic and order of the questions may need to be altered. Saunders et al continues by

specifically defining semi-structured interview as interviews where the researcher has a list

of themes and questions to be covered, although the order of the questions and which of

those that is included can vary from interview to interview3. This captures, very accurately,

the way we conducted the interviews.

The interviews were conducted in different churches in the district, or at the administrative

office in Capernaum, for the most with one interviewee and both authors present. Because

of the close relationship of one of the authors (Staffan) to some of the respondents, Jonas

led the interviews during those sessions and Staffan acted mainly as an observer, and vice

versa for the other sessions. The interviews were between 45 and 70 minutes long with the

average at 50 minutes and were recorded on a taping device. All verbatim quotes used in

this paper are reproduced from those recordings.

1

Bryman & Bell 20072Lantz 2007

3Saunders et. Al. 2003


10/38

10

Respondents

For our survey we have chosen to interview people active as decision-makers, on both

operative and strategic level. The first group was employees in Capernaum, and the second

group was elected politicians in the district. As far as possible our aim was to choose

respondents primarily from chairman positions or executive positions. In the first category

with employees, 3 out of 4 could be classified as executives. Also we wanted the

respondents in this group to be engaged in ideological leadership and pastoral

responsibilities, therefore in the employees category, 3 out of 4 respondents were priests.

For the politicians, our aim was to search for representation in different position of the

Churchs political system. Thus, from our three respondents, two were chairmen, the first in

a local board and the second in a district level committee and one were a commissioner also

on local level.

We chose to disregard political affiliations of the church politicians, since our general aim

was not to cover the whole spectrum of ideological interpretations or political opinions in

the organization. Our research problems primarily focused on views of structures and

managerial issues rather than differences in religious or political beliefs.

Empirical data

Our empirical data consists of two main areas:

1) Facts and figures on economic activity, structural and membership trends, in the Church

of Sweden nationally as well as the pastoral level. This data was collected through qualitative

interviews and primary data from official church sources. It was important that this data was

accurate and great emphasis is therefore placed on the primary data, and the questions

asked in the interviews were mainly to confirm that the numbers produced elsewhere were

recognized as accurate by the Church employees.

2) Awareness and attitude questions: these were supposed to give us an idea of how Church

leaders view a certain topic. The important thing here was not that we received correct

answers. Indeed, if a respondent interpreted the question in an unintended manner, that

was useful data to us, because the unexpected interpretation could offer us further insight

into the organization.


11/38

11

When analyzing our transcribed interviews, we saw that some sub-inquiries were answered

by respondents in different parts of the interview. For example one respondent answered

sub-inquiry 2 while discussing interview question 7 and another answered it in question 5.

Therefore, when we created the empirical data and analysis chapter, we started with our

research problems and sub-inquiries and searched the data for information that would

answer the question, regardless of where it was located in the interview material.

Analysis

The analysis was conducted in two different ways: theory-based and reality-based analysis.

The first one meant looking at our fact-based and/or awareness/attitude-based question

and then discusses it through the eyes of our theoretical framework, and what this meant

for the organization. The second way of analyzing indicates that we have looked at attitude

and awareness around a certain topic, and compared it to what the Church's own data

states. From this comparison, we analyzed if the different data sources corresponded with

each other or diverged, and what this meant for the Church as an organization.

Importantly, while this study has focused on the local capacity of the Swedish Church; the

pastoral or district level, the analysis does not stop there. Because the data touches on

issues of finances and general strategy, where the local level have no decision-making

authority, the analysis will also extend to the national level.

For this study, we have chosen to fully disregard the philosophical debate around divinity,

i.e. does God exist?. This means that when a respondent have stated a belief in divine

intervention, that God will come and help the Church, we have not questioned if this is

reasonable or not. Our focus has been towards the implications of such attitudes for the

organization.


12/38

12

Structure of this paperThis paper will revolve around the three research problems outlined in the introductory

chapter, and as a consequence of this, we have found that answering each of them

separately would give the reader the best understanding of the topic. Therefore, we will

present a theoretical framework for every problem where we describe our findings on whatscholars have said before upon the subject. This will be followed by our empirical findings

and analysis for each of the problems. Naturally, the third chapter on change and strategy

will naturally draw heavily on the previous chapters since the reader inevitably will have a

thorough idea of two aspects that influences the concept of change and strategy within the

Church.

Chapter Three: Raison detre - Why should the Church exist?

This chapter will look into the reasons the Church has for existing today, if had it not existed

yesterday. We will begin by exploring the theoretical concept of organizations; why people

come together and congregate, and also the reasons for why religious organizations are

important to people. This will be followed by our empirical findings on the matter, and our

analysis.

Chapter Four: Legacy and tradition in the Church

In the second chapter we will look at the Church as it exists today, with a history and

baggage. The theoretical background will investigate why we as humans do things the way

we have done before, and in our analysis we will compare our empirical data with our

conceptual framework to see if this is true in the context of the Church of Sweden.

Chapter Five: Change and strategy

Strategy is something that emanates directly from ones mission or raison d'etre and thus

deeply connects with what we discussed in the first chapter. Change management also

draws heavily on this, but just as much on chapter two, as in the question: how can we

change what have today into what we want it to be tomorrow? This chapter will look

theoretically at how strategy and change processes work and how findings in the previous

chapters affects the topics discussed in this part, and also what the attitudes are towards

change and strategy.


13/38

13

Chapter 3: Raison detre Why should

the Church exist?

Theoretical framework

The first chapter will examine the raison d'etre of organizations, the purpose that justifies

their existence. We will explore various inter-related concepts such as ideology, identity and

mission and from this build our own theoretical framework which will aid our analysis of the

Church.

Ideology is not a well defined object in literature, in spite of its long history. Barbara

Czarniawska describes the phenomenon from late 16th century when ideology was created

a model of positivistic ideas describing sociological perspectives on society. In a narrow

context ideology developed and became a model describing organizational theory and

managerial ideas primary to legitimize authority. Later on the definition became more

adjusted to modern values, and Czarniawska states a more broad definition herself saying:

"We can say then that an organizational ideology is a set of ideas describing the

organization's relevant reality, projecting a desired state of affairs, and indicate possible

ways of reaching that state."1.

Ideology has also been defined more narrowly, making the definition more explicit. Thomson

states in Control and ideology in organizations that ideology as a way of describing reality

from a set of ideas which also serves as a selective measurement for the organization by

which it exclude itself from others2.

Ideology and identity in the organizational context are two closely related concepts, and

hard to distinguish from each other. Stuart & Whetten states that in the past the identity has

been defined very closely to the definition stated above as ideology, but the consensus is

that this is a not a elaborate description3. Hatch and Schultz claim that both culture and

image is significant factors when creating an organizational identity. "we argue that

organizational identity needs to be theorized in relation to both culture and image in order

to understand how internal and external definitions of organizational identity interact.

1

p. 6-8, Czarniawska 19882p. 231-233, Thompson 1980

3p. 89, Whetten 2004


14/38

14

Their conclusion is that the internal culture as well as the external image both reflects and

affects the identity of an organization1. Whetten presents a somewhat similar definition

model made in three stages, that each describes different perspectives on the subject. The

first stage contains features with essential characters that define the organization2. Whetten

calls this "the criterion of central character." The second stage means that the identity

should point out what differentiates the organization from other comparable organizations,

and therefore call it "the criterion of claimed distinctiveness". The third stage stipulates that

identity is something defined by those characteristics that remain consistent over periods of

time. This distinction authors call "the criterion of temporal continuity"3.

By considering both the ideological framework and the theories of what constitutes an

identity, we can form a brief understanding, for the raison d'etre of an organization. First we

presume that the ideology explains the overall framework and beliefs, which constitutes the

existential reason and give meaning to the organizational purpose. From that background

the organizational identity develops when it faces both internal cultural views and external

environments preconceptions of the organization.

A non-profit organization is primarily based on a common set of ideas or purposes, and is

not driven by reaching economic achievements. Peter Drucker states that non-profit

organizations have a different approach to money than companies usuallly have4.

Considering the circumstances they become more aware of the economic situation because

their money is never enough for their purpose. Therefore non-profits have to choose a more

purpose based strategy in the beginning of their work, to maximize their restrained assets.

This means that their organization becomes focused and creates a mission according to the

common idea of the organization. Drucker states that the primary function of the leader is to

make the vision clear to the members5. Thus, the mission statement should be both

understandable and operational, and different parts of the organization would be able to

understand the mission and contribute to its fulfillment. It should be a realistic description of

the organizations purpose and efforts6.

1p. 380-383, Hatch & Schultz 2004.

2Whetten 2004.

3p. 90, ibid.

4

Drucker 1990.5Ibid.

6p. 4, ibid.


15/38

15

Empirical data and analysis

Why does the Church of Sweden exist?

The first question we gave the respondents was: Why do you belong to the Swedish Church

instead of some other congregation? The latter part of the question was primarily offered to

respondents who expressed a Christian belief. A large majority responded by describing their

personal conviction and faith and also claimed that being a member of the Church of

Sweden was not the main issue for them. They could have joined some other Church, but

because they knew people that were active in Church of the Sweden, or lived close to a

church, they chose to join.

A common explanation why they continued to work for the organization was an overall urge

to help people. How this urge was applied varied: To offer people spiritual and mental

guidance, to be an active part of society and a place that serves the community. Many

respondents argued that the Church of Sweden was uniquely fitted for this purpose because

of its long history of being a central part of Swedish society, which according to many

interviewees gave the Church credibility. All respondents that worked as priests, in some

way expressed that they have had a sense of calling to serve in the Church. One person said

about this subjects that "God were more stubborn than me" meaning that he role as a priest

was not an obvious choice but a sense of outward calling. Among the elected churchpoliticians the answers were more varied. Some expressed an active decision to join the

Church while other claimed that their involvement in running the Church was of a rather

coincidental nature, not a conscious choice.

Analysis: We have seen here that a large majority of the people running the Church identity

primarily as members of a larger community of Christians, and not as members of the

Church of Sweden. Indeed, many respondents state that their affiliation with the Church of

Sweden is rather coincidental and not based on a conscious decision. No interviewee

mentioned any specific aspects that attracted them to the Church of Sweden or anything

that differentiated its identity from other churches. Albert & Whetten posits that identity

comes with features that create the central character of an organization and that an identity

should point out what differentiates it from other comparable organizations, but what see

here is that the people working in the Church attribute this identity not to the Church of

Sweden but to the Christian community at large. This sentiment is underlined by onerespondent who stated that if they had to choose a Christian Church today, it might as well


16/38

16

be another one. From this we conclude that people in charge view the Church itself not as

the holder of the identity, instead they see it as a container of a subset of the identity of the

Christian community.

What constitutes a good Church and what would make more people active?

Asked what constitutes a good Church, the respondents wording varied greatly, even if

general theme and interpretation seemed rather uniform. The most common phrasing,

though still not a majority, was that a good church should be relevant in peoples lives and

engage them. A commitment to helping people was also a common minority opinion. Others

expressed that Jesus was the most significant factor, indicating that faith is paramount.

Another respondent said that the Church should be an antipole to society, meaning that it

should offer another set of values than those prevalent in today's society.

Analysis: The respondents primarily focused on what the Church should offer other people

emotionally and spiritually, not on any particular activity that would deliver this experience.

Furthermore, all interviewees described how they thought the Church should be for others.

No respondent answered by stating what they themselves wanted from the Church. We see

this as an example of the core ideology of the Church. The people working in the Church

uniformly subscribe the idea that the Church exists to deliver some kind of

emotional/spiritual experience to others.

Another question we asked was what would bring more people to the Church activities? The

question has two parts: The first, what would result in new members to the Church; The

second, what would make inactive members to become more participating in the churches

activities?

The general answer is that the Church has to offer something that is relevant and personal to

the members. Some said that those who come to the Church must be seen by the people

there, and then they will come back. Some other said that offering a community is an

important factor that makes people stay. One respondent pointed out that both the form

and the message must be relevant, otherwise new visitors would not get involved.

Analysis:

The general picture upon this question is that the personal commitment is the important

factor to get people to come and stay in the Church. The message of the Church has to be

transformed into the modern society. At least in terms of how it presents itself.


17/38

17

How aware are the people in charge, of the mission statement of the

Church?

The Swedish Church is regulated by the Churchs' legal arrangement (kyrkooordningen). The

first chapter states the churches basic ideological principles of faith. They define the Swedish

Church, its beliefs, as founded in the word of God given in the old and New Testament, as

referred in the apostolic, nicean and athanasiasic creeds, and the Augsburg confession.

Further on the Church is legally recognized in Uppsala mte in 1593 and explained in the

Book of Concord1. The local churhes' purpose is summarized in 4 keywords in the second

chapter. The fundamental assignment is to offer mass, education, social welfare work, and

missionary work2. Further on the local unit is responsible to create a congregational

instruction. This document should consist of the actual congregation's policies and a pastoral

program where the four keywords is implemented and explained from a local level3.

Then we compared this data with an interview question aimed to find out how the mission-

statement (if they thought it existed) was acknowledged in the organization. We tried to

explain and define the mission statement as a brief summary of the organizations

operational purpose. The concept in itself seemed not to be well recognized, but when

explained, there were some clear opinions on the subject.

We got three different answers. The first answer was that there is no acknowledged mission-statement at all known to the respondents. The second answer was that the church had a

mission-statement but it was not as clear as you could hope for. The third answer said that

there existed a clear mission explained in the legal documents that the church is based on.

One opinion was that the unclarity may be a result of the churches complicated ideology. it

might be difficult to summarize the churches operational purpose into a punchy slogan. The

church is not only a purpose driven organization but also a part of a historical movement or

a flow that may be hard to describe as objectives and goals. Some respondents opined

that the lack of a clear mission-statement gave the local organization more possibilities to

shape its activity itself. The overall regulations and policies served mostly as a legal

document and were by one of the respondents described as nice ideas that look good on

paper, but with little relevance to the reality in the local church.

1

The Church of Sweden #22The Church of Sweden #3

3The Church of Sweden #3


18/38

18

Analysis: Our data show that while there are documents available that have the form an

operational mission statement, they are not perceived as such among a majority of our

respondents. The existing documents tend to be more instructional than visionary; and even

though many interviewees stated that they know of documents that could serve as a mission

statement, they do not use them frequently as guidelines.

Summary : It is clear that our respondents place belief as the primary reason for

commitment to the church of Sweden. It also seems like the respondents share very

consistent opinions of what they want to do and how they want to represent their faith. In

contrast, the views upon the Church of Sweden as an exclusive organization seem to be

more unclear. There is clarity when it comes to their belief and how they want to concretize

this, but ambiguity concerning organizational identity and the mission-statement.


19/38

19

Chapter 4: Legacy and tradition in the

Church

Theoretical frameworkFor the second chapter, we will look into why organization does things the same way they

have always done it. It has become increasingly common for social scientists to use the term

path dependency, a concept that originated within the field of economics, to describe these

kinds of observations1. To understand the general idea behind path dependency, it might be

fruitful to grasp the argument that previously dominated the discourse, which according to

Pierson attribute large causes to large outcomes, the irrelevance of timing and

sequence2. Essentially, things happen for a reason. This corresponds to what we discussed

in the first chapter, the underlying meaning behind decisions. Path dependency on the other

hand suggests that history matters3. That your reason for eating msli for breakfast today

might be none other than that you ate it yesterday, and the day before that. More narrowly

defined, it can be characterized as a process where preceding steps in a particular direction

induce further steps in the same direction. Thus, such a process becomes self-reinforcing;

for every additional movement, your likelihood to continue down that path increases4.

This narrow definition is the one we will discuss throughout this paper, and it is based on

another concept from economics, that of increasing returns. To illustrate the idea behind

and the powerful implications of increasing return processes, mathematician George Plya

devised a statistical experiment with an urn containing two balls, one blue and one red. One

ball is chosen randomly, and then put back into the urn together with another ball of the

same color5. This is repeated a hundred times and for every iteration, the total number of

balls increases6. It does not take much cognitive effort to see that if the first ball grabbed

from the urn is red, the probability of choosing another red ball in the next iteration

increases greatly. As Pierson notes, "Sequence is thus crucial. Early draws in each trial, which

have a considerable random element, have powerful effect on which of the possible

1Pierson 2000.

2Ibid.

3Ibid.

4

Ibid.5Wikipedia #1

6Pierson 2000.


20/38

20

equilibrium will actually emerge"1. Herein lays the true relevance to organizational behavior:

chance or accidents early on may therefore have substantial influence on organizations'

future decision making. Malcolm Gladwell gives a rather illuminating example in his book

Outliers; researchers studying key success factors among NHL ice-hockey players were

surprised to find that one of the strongest contributing variables to whether or not a young

kid would become a successful hockey player was whether or not he was born early in the

year. The reason for this, Gladwell says, is that at age nine when kids are selected to join

special training camps that clubs arrange, the biggest differentiating factor is how old you

are. Therefore, if you were born on January 1st and had up to twelve more months to grow,

you would have an almost insurmountable advantage over someone born on December 31st

,

hence the disproportionate ratio of players born in the first few months of the year2.

This prompts the question, is path dependency by nature a negative force? Is it not possible

that the early decision, accidental or not, can prove to be satisfactory in spite of initial

irrationality: that the msli can be good for you even though you are eating it for no

particular reason other than habit, as in the case with the hockey players, the kids born early

not be as good as kids born in the rest of the year? Deliberating on this issue, scholars

Liebowitz & Margolis posits three degrees of path dependency, with progressively increasing

negative implications. First type implies an intertemporal relationship (a connection

between events occurring at different times), with no negative side-effects. Second type

stipulates some kind error or negative effects, and the third type includes an error that is or

was avoidable, now or at some point in the past3. Thus, it is only when the third type occurs

that chance or accidents early on have a negative effect that could have been avoided.

Concluding, path dependency is a process where chance or accidents early on in a sequence

can have great influence on future outcomes because of increasing returns; for every

additional movement down that path, the marginal return of continuing, or cost of

switching, increasing. However, it is only a negative phenomenon when it creates errors or

inefficiencies that are avoidable, or were at some point in the past.

1

Pierson 2000.2Gladwell 2008.

3Liebowitz & Margolis 1995.


21/38

21

Empirical data and analysisThe second chapter will aim to describe the institutional issues of our local organization. In

many ways the Church is an administrator of many religious, societal and cultural

expressions that has been developed during a long period of time. This situation has also

created a type of organization with bureaucratic structures. Our goal is to find out how this

state affects the organizations mobility.

Why does the Church of Sweden call itself a peoples Church?

The Swedish Church could be said to view itself from a concept which is hard to translate,

but the literal translation is peoples Church, or folkkyrka in Swedish. This view originates

from many different perspectives. It could be explained by viewing in contrast to the free

churches and their organization. When free churches are often viewed as voluntary

organizations where membership is an active choice for the most part, the peoples Church

often is a nationwide organization, with automatic or semiautomatic membership. In many

European countries this system is common in traditional Catholic- or Orthodox societies1.

This topic is almost impossible to explain from an objective way, since it is covered from such

many angles, apprehensions and beliefs. The National Encyclopedia gives 4 different

viewpoints which could explain the phenomenon, but also supposes that the system relies

on the idea that the message of the Church is universal and therefore directed to everyone,

and in this case to every Swedish citizen2.

The first is a theological statement where the system is motivated by exegetic measures and

explains the Church as a justified system for gods purposes, which then results in a religious

system. The second is a national standpoint where the belief in god is not just a matter of a

personal assurance, but also a matter of a national belief, where a country conforms not just

to a king or a political system but also to a national religion. This nation-congregation

standpoint is a common mindset in many regions and in many different religions, even

though it is commonly criticized by secular commentators. The third category establishes the

connection between the Church and the state and proposes that the peoples Church and it

beliefs are not separated from the state and its opinions. Nowadays when the Church of

1NE #1

2Ibid.


22/38

22

Sweden is separated from the Swedish state, this motivation may seem obsolete, but

nevertheless the relation in some areas still exists. The end of the Church of Sweden as a

public one might not have affected its position as the peoples Church1.

The fourth viewpoint is the Church as a democratic organization. This is motivated by the

fact that the Church is built on a democratic order and the members are entitled to vote in

public elections2.

The Church of Sweden as a peoples Church results in an organizational system that is

nationwide in territorial measure.

Organizational structure

In the second article of the Churchs' legal arrangement a congregation is defined as a

geographic area with a responsibility for the members living there. Every congregation must

have a Vicar that serves as an executive chief and a Church council, which is the board. The

area that serves under the vicar is called a Parish. A parish might consist of one or several

congregations. Further on a church-district is an economic and administrative division, which

may consist of one or several parishes3.

The Swedish Church conforms to a democratic order where legislative boards are being

engaged. Every member that turns 16th years is able to vote both on national and regional

and local level4.

The district is divided into two separate communities with three church buildings in the first

and two in the second, is an organizational church district, which means that they have a

common administrational unit. But they are not a pastoral unit. This means that they have

two vicars, one for each of the two communities. The vicar has a managerial role, both from

theological an administrative perspectives.

1NE #1

2

NE #13The Church of Sweden #5

4Ekstrm 2004


23/38

23

What activities are essential to a Church? Which are primary and which are

secondary?

For this question most respondents answered in terms of what the national organization had

decided to be a central priority. Answers included mass, social work, deploying missionaries

and conducting bible teachings.

Another question gave the respondents the opportunity to answer what they believe are

primary activities for the Church, and second what they consider to be secondary activities.

This question was sometimes hard for the respondents to answer because of their

attachment to the churches activities, and to categorize this in important and unimportant is

a tough one. But the most common answer from an operational point of view is that the

Church service is the most Primary activity. Some of the respondents expressed that that the

service is utterly what makes them a Church, and without a service they wouldnt even

exist. Other church activities like baptism, weddings, and funerals were by some also viewed

as primary activities.

Further on the answers differed a bit. One answer said that secondary activities were those

that you could do every time else not doing the church services, to have a different choirs,

youth activities elder activities and individual meetings. Secondary activities were sometimes

the most engaging. Some other answers was quite the same, expressing that the church and

its mission was to be built on the four areas mentioned in the legal advice; social work,

missionary work, teaching the Christian faith and mass. Thus, all activities that could be

included in those four categories were by definition important.

Many respondents described a feeling that while some activities definitely could be classified

as secondary, they were not to be considered unimportant. Rather, they were just different

expressions of faith. One respondent claimed that everything that can bring a human being

closer to God is important.

What are the biggest Pros and Cons with the current organizational

structure?

This question aimed to shed light on how the present structure of the organization serves

the Church, and how it affects positively and negatively. The most common answer

describing positive aspects was the territorial aspect, that the Church of Sweden covers the


24/38

24

whole nation in congregational districts. As a Swedish citizen you can be sure to find a

church no matter where you are in the country. Another aspect that some respondents

expressed, was the consequences of democratic order, both because of the transparency

that this order regenerated and that every member had the chance to influence the

organization.

The negative opinions were mainly directed to the difficulties regarding the bureaucratic

structures affecting the possibilities to effective decision-making. One example given was

when someone applies for economic help to a project, this may take a lot of time to

handle. Another expression that a couple of the respondents used to describe the Churchs

structure was en koloss p lerfttter which is an expression originally aimed at describing

the Soviet Union during its period of decline. In this case it reflected a view on the Church as

a huge organization with many employees and administrative functions but with big issues

facing to control the organization. Many respondents complained about the political

structure. The first one criticized the amount of elected politicians, compared to how many

members they served. In this case there were twice as many elected politicians in this area

than the number of employees. Almost 50 percent of the respondents expressed problem

concerning politicians because of the fact that many minor operative decisions had to go

through the councils instead of being decided directly by the employees. Some expressed

their concerns directly to the political system itself, and meant that the organization in many

ways is ineffective because of the widely inclusive democratic system and would have gained

a lot if the political influence decreased.

Analysis:

We have observed that most of our interviewees were in some disagreement with the

present political way of decision-making. Thus, we have a situation where a majority of the

people running the Church believes that the system is flawed; some even consider it

fundamentally flawed. However, their disagreement is not with democratic voting per se,

rather they target their criticism at the way it is carried out within the Church. Right now, the

organization of the Church is shaped somewhat like a dwarf with a big head, with a

significant administrative overhead that consumes large amounts of resources. In the eyes of

both the people working in it, and, interestingly, the actual Church politicians themselvesbelieve that it is not a sustainable system.


25/38

25

What has happened since the separation from the state in year 2000?

A majority of the respondents had difficulties to explain how the separation between Church

and state had affected the Church and its organization in practice other than the obvious

ownership change. One respondent stated that the politicians, surprisingly, have increased

their influence over the organization. Another opinion was shared among all respondents:

the power had moved from the regional level to the local level. The vicar became more

responsible for the actual area, because the terms of employment changed.

Analysis:

The data here suggests that in the view of the people running the Church of Sweden in the

Capernaum district, not much has changed since 2000. Even though it supposedly went from

being a government agency to an independent religious institution, not much has changed.

This is certainly not in itself a bad thing. As long as the people involved are happy it is not to

be considered a problem. However, the data from our previous question suggest that many

people working in the Church find the current system too cumbersome. Now, why have so

little changed then? Our theoretical framework suggest that if a process is characterized by

increasing returns, the cost of switching path will increase for every additional step down

that path. The most obvious increasing return process in the Church of Sweden is the way it

gets its money. It is currently able to collect money from 6.8 million people, while serving a

mere ten percent of these that are active. In our opinion, this serves as a very real incentive

for the Church to do whatever it is capable of to preserve this income stream. If the Church

would like to decrease the voting power of inactive member, to make the organization more

flexible, it would also have to sacrifice most of its current turnover. Hence a significant cost

of switching.


26/38

26

Chapter 5: Strategy and change

Theoretical frameworkThe third chapter will discuss how the Church of Sweden deals with change management

and strategy. For this purpose, we have created a theoretical framework to aid our further

analysis. There is not very much written on how churches deal with change or how they

strategize, so we would have to look at change & strategy in other organizations for

inspiration. However, we believe that the Church differs fundamentally from other

organizations in that it aspires to serve a higher purpose. Therefore we have created our

own framework. It will describe how the change and strategizing process could be executed

within the Church.

We will begin to look at how management literature suggests nonprofit organizations to

design its strategy, and from there see how it can execute this strategy by reforming process

and structures through change management. Earlier, in Chapter Three, we mentioned Peter

Drucker's theories on managing nonprofits, and we will build on the lessons from that

chapter in this one. Clearly, Drucker's theories are not a perfect match when building a

framework for the Church of Sweden: Drucker focuses on independent voluntary

organization whereas the Swedish Church used to be a nonprofit with obligatory

membership. We do however find Drucker's book applicable due to the fact that the

economic outlook for the Church increasingly resembles that of a nonprofit.

Drucker claims that a non-profit strives to create something that is primarily a change of

mind. In contrast to a company that creates products and services a non-profit aim to create

human growth and development in society1. He argues that the most important key to what

makes a non-profit organization successful is that they have a mission. Many corporate

organizations may have a common idea of making money as the bottom line, and when they

cannot achieve that goal, they may have to reorganize their resources. When an

organization is not driven by monetary purposes it must put its focus on an explicit mission-

statement to define their organization. Drucker explains this as non-profits missing the

fundamental bottom-line as found in the basic fundamentals of capitalism, and therefore

1Drucker 1990


27/38

27

need to justify itself by making concrete goals1.From this we conclude that the people

joining a nonprofit on a voluntary basis must share the goals of the organization, or

otherwise they would not have joined. Furthermore, the nonprofit organization's goals could

be defined as an extension of the values of the people that join it, the operational

consequence of their personal conviction.

We will continue with the a simple yet powerful theory on planned change in groups, by Kurt

Lewin, who suggested that between two stable equilibriums; a present state, and a future

desired state. According this model, there are three things that have to happen before the

organization can arrive at the desired state. First, unfreezing, which is a process where old

paradigms are dropped and the need for change is highlighted. Second is moving, where the

organization is moved from the present to the desired state. Third is freezing where the

organization again stabilizes at a new equillibria2. An illustration of this is that for an ice cube

to turn into an ice cone, one first has to melt the ice into water, then mold it into another

shape, and then freeze it again.

However, Lewin does not address different types of organizations specifically and focuses

on group dynamics. Thus, we need to adapt his model to fit the organization we are

investigating. Discussing nonprofits specifically, Drucker posits that they must reflect its

members shared wish of human growth and development in society, and thus cannot be

molded into any form. To merge this with Lewins ideas, we suggest that the desired future

1Drucker 1989

2Lewin 1947

Stable equillibrium -> Unfreezing -> Moving -> Freezing -> New equillibirum


28/38

28

state for a nonprofit organization must be a reflection of their mission. Hence, change in a

nonprofit is not so much about defining a remote future state as it is returning to the reason

why people were joining it in the first place.

From the combination of these two theories, we have devised our own framework for

change in nonprofit organizations. In this we have two stable equilibriums, the first state

where we assume that the organization is in need of change, and the second state where the

organization is acting in concordance with its mission. The first state corresponds roughly to

what we have discussed in the theoretical framework of chapter two, where an organization

is on a positive feedback path which may not be in harmony with the organization's mission.

The second state corresponds with the discussion in chapter one, where we outlined an

organization's raison d'etre.

Unwantedstable

equillibriumUnfreezing Moving Freezing

Desiredstable

equillibirum


29/38


30/38

30

enthusiasm and activity that they sensed within the congregation, as exemplified by a

respondent saying for mass I would rather be in a gymnasium with 500 enthusiastic people,

than in this Church if it only was 200 mildly interested people coming.

Analysis: The indifference towards the financial situation which our data suggests was rather

surprising to us. Part of the premise of this thesis was that the Church is in a precarious

situation financially and therefore in need of change. As mentioned elsewhere in our data,

they do believe they need to change, but as we see here it is not for the sake fixing the

financials. Therefore, we argue that the people in charge of the Capernaum district to some

extent already perceive themselves as a nonprofit in the way that Peter Drucker portrays

nonprofit, since they clearly value the impact a member has rather than his/her contribution

to the financial bottom line.

What do you think of your organization 20 years from now?

This final question gave the respondents the opportunity to answer their thoughts about the

future state of the organization, both hopes and fears. The absolute majority of the

respondents meant that the Church would change in some way, from its present state to

another. No one described the Church in a pessimistic way, even though many believed in

major structural and cultural changes and difficulties. The general picture the respondents

gave as probable outcomes can be categorized in four areas.

Decentralization

The Church will exist but in smaller units that becomes more self-controlling. Because of the

size of the organization, and the wage ideological goals, many existing churches or parishes

will become more autonomous than today. One respondent described the thought of

smaller units as islands that takes control of themselves. On respondent even suggestedthat small fractions of the Church eventually breaks out and start a new organization,

instead of existing within the Church of Sweden.

Member activity

The Church in the future will be more driven by members that make an active choice to

serve the organization. This engagement will consider of both time and Money. If the Church

as described will become more separated and disseminated, the local church will be


31/38

31

dependent by economic support by its active members. Many respondents made

comparison with other independent churches that exist in Sweden today, that assimilate

with this thought already.

A smaller costume

The Church of Sweden will face a situation where many inactive members leave the

organization. This will reduce the size of the economic possibilities and it will also affect the

organizations' ability to exist in its present organizational state. How this prediction was

perceived among the respondents is very different however. Some described it as positive

in some sense; some said that would be difficult to manage but that it probably could help

the Church to reorganize. Some said that it would affect the Church in a negative way,

because it would not be able to serve the community as it does today.

A wake up

This category of opinions is not just referred from this question only, but also from the

whole conversation. A commonly expressed opinion was that God, might turn a difficult

situation into something that the Church in itself is not capable of. A spiritual revival is not

an impossibility according to several respondents. In fact the general picture among the

respondents is that despite the situation with members leaving and tight budgets, there is

also a factor of hope that cannot be left out.

Analysis:

We argue that the Church of Sweden is currently in a state of unfreezing, where the need for

change is evident, though not as carefully planned as in Lewins theories. On the contrary it

seems to be the result of a variety of factors that highlights the need for change. As we could

see the respondents had many different ideas on how the Church would look like in the

future, and many were conscious about the fact that the church will face a different

situation in the future. This indicates that the people in charge of the Capernaum district do

not have a shared view of what the desired future state should be.


32/38

32

Chapter 6: Conclusions

DiscussionFrom our data we have found three different factors that contribute to making the ideology,

identity and mission of the Church hard to define in explicit terms:

1. The people working in the Church consider their organization not only as a creator of its

own identity. Rather they see it also as a container of a subset of the Christian community in

Sweden at large.

2. The Church of Sweden's traditional affiliation with both the Swedish society and its

government adds another big and diffuse stakeholder that other organizations do not have

to take into account.3. The current political system leaves the Church at the mercy of a large crowd of

anonymous members.

We have found that these three together have created an organization where there is little

overlap between the wish of the people running the local parish, and the organizational

structure.

Following point one from the previous paragraph, one of our conclusions is that the people

running the Capernaum district have two different meanings of the Church that they are

active in.

1. The Church as the wider community of Christians, striving to fulfill the all-embracing

message of Christianity.

2. The material organization that is called the Church of Sweden.

This has implications for when we are to answer the core theme of this thesis. Because if we

study the decline of a physical organization with members, employees and property, and

what to do about it, and its representatives consider themselves primarily as members of a

larger spiritual community and not that particular unit. It certainly leaves us with a big

conundrum concerning the problem we are trying to solve: Do they really care about the

fate of the Church of Sweden as an organization? To some extent they surely do because

when we launched this study, everyone we spoke to was very enthusiastic about this study

and what we could achieve with it. Yet, when we interviewed them, their primary concern


33/38


34/38

34

Answering our research problemOur research problem was "when people gather in an organizational structure that is no

longer viable, how do they find a new structure that will support its purpose? Since our main

finding was that there is little overlap between the organizational structure and the identity

and ideology of the people running the local church, the obvious solution would be toincrease the overlap. A way to execute this could be for the Church to form a member

strategy. By doing this the organization could get a more firm grip of its own identity, and it

would be easier to form a general strategy for the organization in the future. Since the

number of member is one of the most significant distinctions of this organization, it would

serve a structural cause by outlining a policy for what they expect of its members. Further on

a strategy of how they separate the active members from the large amount of passive

members, would also help by patterning a structure for future analysis and change.


35/38

35

Appendices

References

Bryman, Alan; Bell, Emma (2007). Business Research Methods revised edition. Oxford University Press.

Czarniawska, Barbara (1988) Ideological control in nonideological organizations. Praeger.

Drucker, Peter (1989). What business can learn from nonprofits. Harvard Business Review, July-August.

Drucker, Peter (1990). Managing the non-profit organization: practices and principles. Butterworth-Heinemann.

Ekstrm, Sren (2004). Svenska kyrkan: historia, identitet, verksamhet och organization. Verbum

Glawell, Malcolm (2008). Outliers. Penguin books, Allen Lane.

Hatch, Mary Jo; Schultz Majken (2004). The dynamics of organizational identity, in Organizational identity: a

reader, edited by Mary Jo Hatch, Majken Schultz. Oxford University Press.

Kalin, Yngve (2008). Den bistra verkligheten, Svensk pastoraltidsskrift, issue 14.

Lewin, Kurt (1947). Frontiers in group dynamics. Human Relations, volume 1, pages 5-41. Bobbs-Merrill, College

Division.

Martin, Michael (2007). The Cambridge companion to atheism. Cambridge University Press.

Lantz, Annika (2007). Intervjumetodik. Studentlitteratur.

Liebowitz, Stan J; Margolis, Stephen E (1995). "Path Dependence, Lock-in, and History," Journal of Law,

Economics and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 11(1), pages 205-26, April.

Pierson, Paul (2000). Increasing Returns, Path Dependence, and the Study of Politics. American Political Science

Review, June

Saunders, Mark; Lewis, Philip; Thornhill, Adrian (2009). Research Methods for Business Students. Pearson

Education.

Thompson, Kenneth (1980). Organizations as constructors of social reality, in Control and ideology in

organizations edited by Graeme Salaman, Kenneth Thomson. MIT-press.

Whetten, Albert (2004). Organizational identity, in Organizational identity: a reader, edited by Mary Jo

Hatch, Majken Schultz. Oxford University Press.


36/38

36

Electronic references

NE #1, Nationalencykolpedin, retrieved 2010-06-03 from

http://www.ne.se.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/lang/folkkyrka

The Church of Sweden #1, retrieved 2010-05-25 from

http://www.svenskakyrkan.se/SVK/eng/liturgy.htm


http://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-01.pdf






http://www.svenskakyrkan.se/kyrkoordningen/kyrkoordningen.shtml


http://www.svenskakyrkan.se/default.aspx?id=100243&did=174943

Wikipedia #1 retrieved 2010-05-07 from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urn_problem
http://www.ne.se.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/lang/folkkyrkahttp://www.ne.se.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/lang/folkkyrkahttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/SVK/eng/liturgy.htmhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/SVK/eng/liturgy.htmhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-01.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-01.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-02.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-02.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-57.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-57.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/kyrkoordningen/kyrkoordningen.shtmlhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/kyrkoordningen/kyrkoordningen.shtmlhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/default.aspx?id=100243&did=174943http://www.svenskakyrkan.se/default.aspx?id=100243&did=174943http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FUrn_problem&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHv3b21056OeWWtFnCpqGcpr9uI4whttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FUrn_problem&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHv3b21056OeWWtFnCpqGcpr9uI4whttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FUrn_problem&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHv3b21056OeWWtFnCpqGcpr9uI4whttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/default.aspx?id=100243&did=174943http://www.svenskakyrkan.se/kyrkoordningen/kyrkoordningen.shtmlhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-57.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-02.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/tcrot/kyrkoordningen/filer/KO-kap-01.pdfhttp://www.svenskakyrkan.se/SVK/eng/liturgy.htmhttp://www.ne.se.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/lang/folkkyrka


37/38

37

Interview framework in Swedish1. Vad r SvKs (Capernaum) existensberttigande idag?

1. Varfr r du med i SvK och inte ngot annat kristet samfund?2. Vad ska en riktigt bra kyrka innehlla?3. Hur viktig r tron bland de som jobbar i kyrkan?4. Hur uppfattar du kyrkans mission-statement?5. Vad skulle bidra till att fler nya medlemmar ansluter sig?

2. Vad gr SvK (Capernaum) fr att de alltid har gjort det? 1. Vilka verksamheter mste en kyrka ha?2. Hur viktiga r byggnaderna?3. Var ligger makten?4. Vilka verksamheter r mindre viktiga?5. Vilka "kostnader" r frenade med att frndras?6. Hur pverkar kyrkans struktur, dess frmga att frndras?7. Hur mycket har frndrats sedan 2000 d kyrkan separedes frn staten?8. Vad r leftovers frn den gamla ordningen?9. P vilket stt pverkar kyrkans verksamhetsml dess rrlighet?10.Hur ser du p kyrkans politiska styrning?

3. Hur arbetar SvK (Capernaum) med frndring?1. Hur mycket information samlar man in?2. Gr man omvrldsanalys?3. Vilka krafter anser ni pverkar er?4. Behver ni pengar fr att fungera?5. Ser ni konkurrenter?6. Sker ni recept p frndring?7. Hur ser samflligheten ut om 20 r och hur mnga medlemmar har ni8. Behver kyrkan bli tydligare i sin syftesbeskrivning


38/38

9. Hur hg r medvetenheten om kyrkans styrdokument och frsamlingsbeskrivning iolika delar av verksamheten

10.Vad/vem/vilka r det som driver p frndring?

Documents

Soul Searching - On identity, inertia and change in a Church