The Loose Canon
Knocking on Doors to Invite the Neighbors
On December 18, Bishop Benhase and I met the Rev. Joshua Varner at St. Patrick's, Pooler. We each took a stack of door hangers inviting folks to the Christmas worship services and the Epiphany Burning of the Greens. I took a neighborhood across the road from the church, the other two went to a neighborhood on land adjacent to the east side of the church's 10 acres.
 
In an hour and a half of knocking on doors, we found people home in about a quarter of the house, and touched base with close to 150 homes. For those with no answer, we left the door hanger on the front door knob. For the others, I said, "Hi, I'm Frank and I don't want to bother you, but I just want to share Christmas service times with people who don't have a church home." More than half said they did have a church home, but all but three house asked to take the flyer (pictured below) anyway. If someone said they didn't have a church, I borrowed a line I learned from Christ Church Frederica's Interim Rector, the Rev. Stephen McWhorter, "Why would a nice, together person like yourself not be in church on Sunday?"
 
For St. Patrick's newsletter, Joshua wrote the next day, "In reflecting on yesterday's adventures, I particularly remember one person. This person was on her way out the door, and our conversation was brief, but it quickly came around to the fact that she and the others in her household do not go to any church. I asked why that was, and she responded, 'it's just not something we do.' But her tone of voice was not offended or dismissive, but reflective, as if perhaps she was thinking more deeply about the question than I could see."
 
"My own thought is that perhaps this household does not go to church because no one has ever invited them. Too often we get some impression of what 'church' is and if we think we don't fit in with that group, we are reluctant to risk being rejected, and so we never show up. But once invited, things may change, including our perceptions of what 'church' is anyway. The invitation, however, is the first, and most important step in that process."
 
I spent years at King of Peace sowing these door hanger seeds on houses near the church in the week leading up to Christmas and Easter. I have found it easy to do with everyone being very polite and at least not seeming to mind the low key approach. While I some people did show up at King of Peace after meeting me at their door, this was admittedly rare and it never occured on the Christmas or Easter after I met them. Mostly these are brief encounters, with the occasional longer conversation. In Pooler this time, a recent immigrant from Vietnam invited me in to sit down and to meet his wife and granddaughter. He was thankful to have a guest. With his poor English and my lack of Vietnamese, I didn't stay long, but he seemed delighted.
  
I have found that if knocking on doors is combined with other methods of getting the word out, including advertising, but most importantly invitations from parishioners to their friends, co-workers and family, it is a low-cost way to raise awareness about your church. Everyone I spoke to knew right where St. Patrick's is located as one entrance to the neighborhood hits the main road across the street from the church, but not one person I spoke with knew anything about the church.

  

Whether they come to the church or not, they now know that they are invited to worship, and as Joshua notes above, that is no small thing to accomplish. We marked a map to keep up with the houses we contacted this time. We'll take up the work again later. I look forward to going out with Joshua again just ahead of Easter.

  

The Rev. Canon Frank Logue
Canon to the Ordinary