Death Knell for the Church Herald?

Two years ago I was distressed to learn that the RCA Synod voted to drop the every-member subscription plan for the Church Herald. Shortly thereafter the quarterly RCA Today, using the Church Herald’s subscription list, began arriving in my mailbox. I couldn’t help but conclude that assessment-based funding formerly paying for the Church Herald was now funding its usurper.

The RCA Today publication is politely called a house organ by some and characterized in less polite terms by others. It lacks the modicum of editorial independence that the Church Herald has. That it was preferred by many Synod delegates over the Church Herald makes me wonder whether we can appreciate the difference between public relations and journalism.

For 180 years the Church Herald has been informing the Reformed Church about its strengths and weaknesses, about issues of religion and justice in the denomination and around the world, and about the activities of its missionaries and its congregations. More recently, it has informed our denomination about the Belhar Confession and informed our discussions about what it means to be Reformed and missional.

Except for this newly created Church Herald blog, the Church Herald’s publication of letters from readers is the only means for people to share their comments and ideas with the denomination. God may be the glue that holds the visible Church together, but for the RCA God has been using the Church Herald to be an active ingredient in that glue.

When I read tonight that the Report of the Advisory Committees on the RCA Dialogue on Communication and the Church Herald was recommending in R-68 “an orderly cessation of the publication of the Church Herald” with “appropriate severance for the Church Herald personnel" and was recommending in R-69 what I consider a eulogy for the Church Herald, I was appalled.

I hope that others too will be shocked into resuscitating this venerable voice.  I suggest the following:

a. Approve R-64.

b. Approve R-65 revised as follows [the blog editing software does not convey struck-through text, but a comparison of this blog's version with that of the handout can inform about what is deleted here]:

To instruct the General Synod Council to continue the print publication of the Church Herald and RCA Today with some editorial independence granted to the Church Herald and with RCA Today being a central section within the magazine, and this to be done on a three-publication-per-year basis during the transitional period from General Synod 2009 to General Synod 2011.

 c. Approve R-66.

 d. Approve R-67 revised as follows:

To instruct the communications staff to conduct a readership review of RCA Today, the Church Herald and the merged publication to determine how many people read each and which parts are read, and the levels of satisfaction with content and layout, in time to report to the General Synod of 2011.

e. Reject R-68.

f. Reject R-69.

Judy Parr

Comments

[Isaac Rottenberg]

In 1956 , the CHURCH HERALD published a series of five articles of mine on the general theme of church order and the confessional life of the church. Between that year and 1978, when my relationship to the RCA effectively came to an end, the magazine published at least thirty-five other pieces I had written. Your comment on editorial independence brings back memories of editor Louis Benes. He and I had some severe theological differences, but we established a relationship of mutual respect that almost amounted to a friendsip. He was under constant attack from those who felt he was too conservative. He told me repeatedly that he would rather resign than surrender his integrity and independence as an editor. That's journalism! The rest is at best PR and at worst propaganda.

[Mick Nienhuis]

Judy - I surely agree with your analysis. The Church Herald is an important means of conversation and information within the RCA. My fear is that the RCA Today is more about control of words and actions and less about interaction as brothers and sisters in Christ.

[Lee DeYoung]

Judy: As a delegate I, too, was appalled by R-68 and R-69. I proposed an amendment to R-65 which was approved by the Synod. In light of that, Synod's subsequent approval of R-68 and R-69 seemed incoherent.

As I've previously written on the RCA's General Synod blog, the only aspect of Synod 2009 which did not seem to me to have worked well was its handling of the communications issue. The extensive debate surrounding the six communications-related recommendations was commendably respectful and thoughtful. The parliamentary intricacies were occasionally daunting but very well-handled by General Synod President Carol Bechtel.

To many delegates and observers, the main problem seemed to be the sketchiness of the three communications options presented to the delegates by GSC. Each seemed to envision the possibility of some future role for the Church Herald in an overall communications strategy. In retrospect, I believe that assigning three such options to the advisory committees was a regrettable miscalculation. Especially problematic was the shortage of objective data which could have better informed the deliberations of the delegates. A primary reason why the advisory groups produced more than forty different recommendations was the fact they were based on a variety of assumptions which sometimes seemed contradictory. More substantial resourcing of the deliberations could have improved their quality. That's now water under the bridge. Hopefully a few lessons might be learned from this experience which may be beneficial to future General Synods.

LOOKING FORWARD...

I am struck by one apparent irony about RCA communications. While it may be true that members "voted with their feet" so to speak with regard to the Church Herald's diminishing subscription base, there would appear to be no empirical evidence that the RCA Today publication (which is attractively produced) would necessarily fare any better if it were sustained solely on a subscription basis. RCA Today is supported by assessments and distributed extensively but not through subscriptions. So comparing one publication to the other is (in terms of viability), akin to comparing apples to oranges. None of delegates who spoke in support of the recommendations that the Church Herald cease publication acknowledged this crucial distinction. Yes, the subscription model no longer seems to work for a printed RCA magazine. Everyone at Synod seemed to agree that electronic communications is the wave of the future. And that is precisely where there seems to be a glaring inconsistency between Tuesday's Synod actions and the behavior of online consumers of information about the 2009 RCA General Synod!

At least two "official" blogs covered this year's General Synod--one on the official RCA General Synod web site as well as a separate one operated by the Church Herald. Commendably, administrators of the two blogs consulted with each other in advance and cross-promoted both blogs. A marvelous example of cooperation! It is striking to me that, for whatever reason, that the activity level at the Church Herald blog appeared to be higher than it was on the RCA's official General Synod blog. That seems to empirically contradict the assumption that RCA members have decisively "voted with their feet (i.e. magazine subscriptions)" to effectively "kill" the Church Herald. Online, at least, it would appear that considerable interest remains in the independent perspective which the Church Herald provides. And everyone at General Synod seemed convinced that the future of RCA communications is becoming increasingly electronic. So, might that suggest that there could be a future role for an independent voice such as the Church Herald?

I am truly not interested in tilting at windmills, so to speak. Ecclesiastes 3:2 applies to organizations, too. But I wonder if the high level of interest in the Church Herald's General Synod blog might point to a viable future role in some electronic form?

Thanks for sharing your insights!
Lee