Imagine with me. Imagine with me that the RCA had commissioned its own Bible translation some years ago. Imagine that the RCA took an extensive survey, and discovered that only about 40,000 of the members of the RCA read their Bibles. Most of the members, they discovered, owned no Bible and were not interested in reading it. Among the main reasons people gave was that they cost too much.
A goodly number, mostly younger folks, said they read their Bibles online. And imagine with me that an advisory committee recommended to General Synod of the RCA that we implement an orderly cessation of printing the Bible. What would a General Synod probably do?
The Church Herald is not the Bible. But the fact that many do not read it and that many do not want to pay the cost of producing it is not sufficient reason for discontinuing it.
If we were talking about the Bible, I hope we would say "Let's figure out how to get people to read their Bibles. Let's make every effort to get them to see the value of it. Let's disciple them." I think we would challenge our leaders to lead instead of following.
Imagine with me. What if we survey the denomination and discover that only about 40,000 read RCA today. (I would not be surprised if the readership of RCA today is lower.) Will some advisory committee recommend the orderly cessation of the RCA today? And will we quietly acquiesce and say, "The non readers have spoken?" That would be consistent.
It may be that the Church Herald is a bad magazine and not worthy of reading. I know that is the contention of some. But let's be clear.....that should be the focus of the conversation. Is it a good magazine? If not, the demise of the Church Herald is a failure of the magazine. But if it is a good magazine, the demise of the Church Heraldmay be a failure of leadership, perhaps a failure of discipling.
The leader of our Adult Sunday School regularly engages us in discussing matters of interest in the Church Herald. Our consistory has decided that every member should receive the Church Herald. They lead. In fact, they disciple me. I need it.
Imagine with me. Imagine that at this year’s General Synod, the commission on Christian Education and Discipleship had a section on "The Church Heraldand Discipleship," urging us to use the magazine as part of our discipling. Imagine that the Commission on Christian Unity stressed the importance of having a denominational magazine to hold us together. And what if the keynote speaker had been a Christian journalist, highlighting the value of independent denominational magazines? And what if we had had the Editor of the Christian Reformed Church’s The Banner say a few words, along with representatives of several other denominational magazines? And what if our General Secretary had made a plea for the full funding of the Church Herald, and urged us to set a 10-year goal of raising the readership? And what if the president of this year’s Synod had sung the praises of the Church Herald? Imagine that. And imagine what the outcome of our discussion on the Church Herald would have been.
That none of this happened tells us that the Church Herald was not high on the list of valued things for our commissions and leadership. Maybe they were even right to ignore the Church Herald. My point is this: The demise of the Church Heraldas an independent magazine has only a little to do with the cost of the magazine, and a lot to do with our leadership. And I include myself in that. I wonder if I should have done more. But let’s not hide behind the cost, which per member would have been less than the price of a dinner out. Instead of leading, have we followed the reader (or non reader) in this case?
Joe Veltman
Calvary Community Church
New Berlin, Wisconsin