the rationale for Better with less

Mainline* congregations across North America are tightening their belts to live within smaller budgets. More than 40 percent have no full-time clergy. Thousands have no pastor and no good prospects to fill their pulpits. 

This creates opportunities to do better -- to do church in healthier, balanced, affordable ways -- while becoming less dependent on staff, less consumeristic in approach and less resigned to the status quo. 

But many congregations simply don’t know how. They haven’t learned from sister churches that have done it. 

That’s why I founded Better with Less, LLC, an educational enterprise for a leaner, adaptive and appreciated mainline church. 

Through workshops, news stories, books, study guides, workbooks and courses, Better with Less helps congregations scale up impact and joyful engagement while lowering costs. 

This often involves learning how to do church without clergy or with part-time clergy.

Congregations learn to leverage underutilized assets while deepening discipleship in a resource-constrained environment. 

The learning process is exciting! Churches that do it feel emboldened, focused, streamlined, less stressed and closer to God. 

It’s also urgently needed. North America has tens of thousands of at-risk mainline congregations. It would be a shame to lose their distinct witness and life-giving hospitality. 

Better with Less is for congregations serious about stabilizing finances and renewing mission. 

Learning to mobilize latent assets, expand impact & be faithfully sustainable is what it’s about. 

*"mainline" refers to Protestant denominational traditions that trace their roots in North America to colonial times.