There was no “business as usual” when the Rev. Chris Haden was appointed pastor at Aloma United Methodist Church in Winter Park last summer.
The church had been closed and the property sold. Some of the congregation had moved on to nearby churches, and others had formed The Table at Goldenrod, a communal weekly dinner church.
Haden, who previously served First United Methodist Church in Eustis, knew he had an uphill battle in his plans to create a relevant Christian ministry with Methodist principles that appealed to a younger generation.
At 37, he understood the age group. He knew the declining numbers of young people attending church didn’t lie. And it was no surprise to him. From as far back as high school, when Haden was involved in youth ministry, he started thinking of how the church needed new ideas to engage younger believers.
“We didn’t want to duplicate what other traditional churches already offered,” Haden said. “That doesn’t always work with this group. We knew we had to go in a totally different direction.”
the second week of discussion about suffering and the book of Job.
He envisioned streaming podcasts, small group discipleship sessions, Sunday worship in rented spaces and living-room Bible studies. He wanted storytelling, conversations and listening sessions, like Jesus did in his ministry, that helped people find God through honest relationships and deep introspection.
While far more cost-effective than maintaining a physical facility and staff, Haden’s concept still required funding. How could the congregation finance this innovative outreach?
The Florida United Methodist Foundation offered a solution.
After the church building was sold and its finances settled, church leaders deposited $3.8 million into the foundation’s Development Fund, an investment option with features similar to a savings account.
Under an experimental, first-ever plan, $3 million of those funds will be moved into the foundation’s managed investment funds. The church will then take $175,000 annually from interest payments to pay Haden and two part-time staffers, provide a housing allowance, and cover other ministry expenses.
The congregation will move forward as a new venture called Kindred United Methodist Church, a name members and leaders have already embraced.
Tom Wilkinson, the foundation’s vice president of church relations and new business, describes the financial arrangement as “trailblazing.”
“This was brand new territory for us,” he says. “But Chris is the right guy at the right time for this. He’s got the passion and the vision for this nontraditional church, and we want to support that.”
The foundation’s investment funds provide conference churches and affiliated United Methodist agencies with an investment option for their charitable gifts, memorials and other designated donations. Those gifts are invested in stocks, foreign equities, bonds and mutual funds.
Members of the foundation’s board of directors form an investment committee that meets quarterly with independent review management to evaluate the fund performance. Overall, the foundation’s board provides the oversight, such as making sure the investments follow the denomination’s guidelines on environmental, social and governance investing.
The portfolio of funds includes cautious, balanced growth and aggressive growth funds, and last year, churches and agencies earned $3.86 million from their investments. Kindred’s money will be invested in the aggressive growth fund, which provides a higher rate of return.
“It’s not a risk to us by any means,” Wilkinson said. “They trust us to do the investing, and they’re able to draw the interest. If this option doesn’t work out for them, they are free to withdraw their funds at any time.”
“I really can’t imagine being a part of anything else. This has been a transformative experience for my faith. … Now that I’ve found healing and freedom in my own story, I’m using this experience to empower others.” — Courtney Young, director of community engagement, Kindred United Methodist Church
Wilkinson credits the Florida Conference for being open to the vision. Typically, the United Methodist Book of Discipline requires funds from the sale of real property to be used to purchase replacement property. The conference made an exception for this plan, calling it a “quasi-endowment.”
He also lauded the Rev. Dr. Bob Bushong, superintendent of the conference’s East Central District, for supporting Haden’s innovative plan.
“He had Chris’ back,” Wilkinson said. “He knows that the best intentions sometimes don’t work out, and Chris will have to make up some of this as he goes along. Having a district superintendent in your camp makes all the difference.”
Bushong says his flexibility could be rooted in his own background. He didn’t grow up in the church, coming to it instead as a young adult. That means he doesn’t have a set-in-stone view of how the church should look.
He also recognizes the church is in a time of change. The pandemic only accelerated the necessity to respond to new challenges.
“I’ve got about 80 clergy in my district, and each one had to regroup and be innovative after things were shut down,” Bushong said. “For Chris, who was just getting started, there were even more roadblocks in his way. But no one ever said this calling was going to be easy.
“There were conversations where he needed some lifting up, but overall, he’s creative, edgy and smart, and he is learning how to make this work.”
Indeed, Haden says launching Kindred — both virtually and in person — has been a rollercoaster of emotions and shifting plans.
“In just a year, we’ve had to reinvent ourselves a few times,” Haden said. “At this point, our story is both sad and heroic.”
Laying the groundwork was the easy part. With a dedicated and loyal group of supporters, including his former pastor and another Fresh Expressions leader, Haden mapped out ideas on how to draw spiritual seekers with no church background or who had drifted away. He chose to start with small groups rather than large gatherings, modeling that approach after his chaplaincy experience during his clinical pastoral education at Tampa General Hospital.
He also set up monthly house parties, reaching out to people via social media and through word-of-mouth. He and his wife hosted a “Friendsgiving” on Thanksgiving, inviting friends and newcomers to a holiday meal.
The big break came when Kindred struck a deal with Geek Easy, a Winter Park bar, to rent space to hold a Sunday afternoon service. The establishment was normally closed at that time, so it was a win-win deal.
The first service was March 15. That was also the last service, because concerns over COVID-19 triggered a shutdown in the Florida Conference and businesses throughout the state.
It also didn’t draw the numbers Haden had hoped. Just about a dozen people attended, and few others watched the online version. Still, it was a start, and he had hoped to build on it.
Like his fellow United Methodist pastors, Haden had to figure out a new game plan. Unlike other pastors, he was still in the process of figuring out how to establish the Kindred community. Small groups, house meetings and the bar arrangement all had to be put on hold as people went into quarantine.
“We were building all this momentum. Then everything blew up, and we needed time to grieve,” he said.
Haden and his small team hunkered down for about a month before they realized the pandemic wasn’t immediately going away. The brainstorming began anew. How could they launch in the strange new era of COVID-19?
From those sessions, they came up with Kindred Spirits: An Enneagram Podcast (available on Spotify and Google). With each weekly episode, the interviewers sit down with a guest who picks a cocktail. They share a drink and start a conversation based on the guest’s enneagram type. The enneagram is an ancient tool used to uncover a person’s core motivation, which tends to fall into nine types.
By the end of the interview, viewers hope to learn something about the guests and something they did not know about themselves.
They also began producing a more traditional service at Haden’s house, featuring music, a sermon by Haden and conversations with lay members, available to stream on Sundays.
A Monday night Bible study, which evolved out of a group of friends getting together to watch “The Bachelor” on TV, now meets regularly to tackle spiritual issues in a member’s living room. And the Discipleship series — with groups divided into four to six people who make a 12-week commitment to share stories and listen, do empathy exercises, and complete homework assignments — will launch again.
“We move forward in baby steps, but we’re moving forward,” Haden said.
“This was brand new territory for us. But Chris is the right guy at the right time for this. He’s got the passion and the vision for this nontraditional church, and we want to support that.” — Tom Wilkinson, FUMF vice president of church relations and new business
He estimates Kindred draws 20 active members, and another 55 “on the periphery.” He’s confident those numbers will continue to grow.
“Those declining numbers are real. So maybe we’ve got 100 laboratories out there, coming up with 100 ideas to change that direction,” Haden said. “Maybe just one of those ideas will work, and maybe this it. I’m grateful we’ve got a bishop who is willing to let us experiment.”
Courtney Young, former director of student ministries at Aloma United Methodist Church and now Kindred’s director of community engagement, hitched onto Haden’s vision from the beginning. Her husband, Matt, leads the Monday night Bible study.
She says she’s always been passionate about starting something from nothing and building it from the ground up. She loves Kindred’s “super different and super cool vibe” and feels she’s found her spiritual community.
“I really can’t imagine being a part of anything else,” she said. “This has been a transformative experience for my faith. I’ve gone through a lot of emotional work through our small groups and have a much more authentic view of myself and my relationship with God. Now that I’ve found healing and freedom in my own story, I’m using this experience to empower others.”
Young has no doubts Kindred is the “church of the future” for disconnected youth and people whose previous church experience was disappointing, passive or even painful.
“We want to get people engaged, help them heal and let them know that Jesus is there for them,” she says. “We’re more interested in healthy people than perfect Christians. And this is a place to get healthy.”