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It really was. The marketers—a firm called Propaganda—were very respectful and sensitive. They brought a fresh perspective from the world. I don't think it was selling out to the world. I think it was a way of learning what is going on in the culture, what does the immediate society want, how do they view church? I don't know the story very well, but I wonder if Bill Hybels used a similar approach when he went knocking on the doors around Willow Creek, asking what folks would like to see in a church. The most positive thing this did was to raise the profile of the parish in the community, to say, "We're here and open and alive."

What would you say to those who argue that the church does not need to market itself?

I would say that we did not take a secular approach and put the label 'Christian' on it and therefore redeem it. What I would say is that we used a tool available in Western society and used it in such a way to produce something that is worthy of the church. For instance, the marketers challenged us to say, "What is special about the Christian faith?" It was a challenge for us to articulate it; in fact, the congregation was not able to articulate it. By taking a sales point of view and asking, "How are you are you going sell this place, if you can't tell people what's great about it?" the marketers weren't asking us to make things up; they were asking us to genuinely examine ourselves. It sounds pathetic that the congregation was not able to articulate those things already—this is our faith we're talking about, after all—but obviously it wasn't happening.

Does the show play into the idea that "bigger is better" as opposed to "deeper is better"?

I don't think it does. Certainly, the first thing everyone looks at is numbers, and numbers are played up in the show. The marketers asked the archdeacon, for instance, "What is success? 30?" He said, "No, I think for the church to have a viable future there needs to be 70 people there." There is a sense that the church really does need a certain number at the core to be a self-sustaining ministry. For me, success would be reaching a place where the church would be able to take care of itself, and sustain ministry in the community. Whether that's at 50 people or 200 people is not the point, I don't think.

The real issue is quality of faith. Liturgical traditions—places where there's an emphasis on the sacraments, the mystery and the holiness of God—look at the mega-churches and say that you'll never experience the holiness of God in those big places. But on the other hand, they're not always the best at evangelizing and spreading the Word. I think it's good for the Christian church perhaps to have both things, to have that tension. A little place like Lundwood is in no great fear of being too big and not having any quality of faith.

What was the best thing about having your first year in a new country filmed?

Having the profile of myself and the parish raised. It has made more people willing to help, to donate, to give of themselves. It added a buzz of energy and excitement to the project that would not have been there otherwise. As annoying as it was, overall, it was fun. How many people get to do this?

And the worst?

The worst aspect of it was that I did feel a lot of pressure from the film crew to "film this tomorrow," and I was trying to earn the trust of people in the congregation who didn't want things to happen so fast, and I had the archdeacon tell me, "You need to make this happen and that happen," and all this is being filmed, and they're all watching me, and I'm supposed to perform and produce and succeed—which really overwhelmed me at times. There was a point, after I'd been there about three months, I started having a panic, thinking, "We're not going to have anything to show; we're not going to have anything to make good TV." Which sounds terrible—a minister of the church saying that he's worried about making good TV.

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November (Web-only) 2005, Vol. 49