Online Ministry: The End of an Era? | Trinity Talks Podcast

Hello everyone and welcome to this week's episode

of Trinity Talks. My name is Kyla and I am joined

here by Pastor Rob. Hi Kyla. Hello and we're

gonna sit down and chat about some of the upcoming

changes that are happening here at Trinity as

we continue to sort of step into our strategic

plan and in particular chatting about what's

happening with the online engagement ministry

here. What's happening with you? What's happening

with me? Hey, what's happening with you? What's

happening with all of us? Yeah, and talk about,

you know, what has been some of the things that

we've been learning, what's, you know, coming

next for us, and yeah, where all of this is going.

So thanks for joining me, Rob. I'm very happy

to be here. And as people probably heard at the

beginning of the service, there is a lot of changes

happening, but this is the best way to talk about

them. Yeah, for sure. Okay, so maybe just to

get us started, you can take us all the way back.

When you or when the church first started thinking

about online engagement at Trinity, what was

the sort of vision and reasoning behind that?

Well, like many churches, I think it was the

pandemic that forced us to kind of start thinking

about things. I arrived right in the middle of

the pandemic, like five and a half years ago,

and at that point, online ministry was just,

that's how you... just survived. If you were

going to stay in touch with your existing church

family or if I was even going to get to know

this new church or if they were going to get

to know me, we had to have some kind of online

presence meeting in person was just not possible.

So we just started there. That's how it kind

of began. But then As you guys will remember,

some people started to trickle back that we were

allowed to start meeting again. And that's when

all of a sudden the thing was hybrid, hybrid

online ministry, which meant that you were now

doing an in -person service, but still many,

many people had not come back yet. So you had

to keep... still doing an online service as well.

So you were reaching one congregation here and

you were reaching another congregation there.

And then I think as restrictions continued to

ease, more and more people started coming back

to church, but it still felt like there was a

good number of folks who said, you know what?

I kind of like this online thing. I like doing...

church in my pajamas on my couch. So I'm going

to kind of stay here." And so we kind of just

kept on offering an online version of our Sunday

morning service and stuff like that because certain

people just seem to prefer it. But as we kept

up with that, we were just kind of grew aware

there's a bit of a gap that's forming, right?

Because the people who were coming in person

were getting They were starting to reconnect

in community and rebuild friends and be able

to enjoy their life groups again and all that

good stuff. But on the other side of the gap,

there were these people online who were enjoying

the service, but were they engaging with us?

That was something that we just started asking

more and more questions. What would it take to

make that group of people who are joining us

online feel more engage, not entertained, but

actually engage. Could we form real community

with people online? And even if you just think

of the word engage, what does it mean to engage

someone? It means that you're like, if we're

having an engaging conversation, then we're like...

we're really like paying attention. We're keeping

like, you know, like, or even like, there's like,

like back and forth. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So and

or engagement actually sometimes when you're

talking about tools and mechanical things like

engagements, when like two pieces of a two pieces

of a piece of machinery come together and they

start like turning together. And so what we really

wanted to do is our online congregation and our

in -person congregation to kind of really be

to pieces of the life of this church that we're

turning and growing together. So we said, okay,

if we want to really invest in that, we're going

to have to do some experimenting and what would

it look like? And so we actually reached out

to the Diocese of Toronto and we said, hey, we're

curious about these kinds of questions. We want

to experiment in this world of online engagement.

What do you think? And they said, we're curious

about those kinds of things too. And so they

ended up funding us. for a five -year period

of time to invest in some equipment, but mostly

to invest in people to really explore both the

possibilities and the limits of online engagement.

And one of the greatest things that we invested

in was people like you, Kyla. You're a big part

of that. Yeah. So you hired an online engagement

director to sort of oversee some of this work,

to do all of that experimenting. So how have

you seen that role sort of shift over the last,

I think, three or four years now? Yeah. I think

you're right to say that it shifted. And that's

actually very, very intentional because this

was an experiment, after all. So we had to be

paying attention. Is this working? No. Let's

shift. Is that working? Yes. Let's shift toward

it. Let's shift away from this. Let's shift toward

it. It was always about the shift. It was always

about the adjustment. It was always about the

experiment. So that was one of the... So yeah,

we expected to see things change, not just to

get it right and now we're going to do this forever.

Another shift that actually happened was, our

first online engagement director was Elizabeth

Archer, who many of you will remember. Hi, Elizabeth,

if you're watching. Elizabeth and her family

moved to London, and then about two years ago,

you took her role. That was a shift. You brought

different ideas and different vision and just

a different presence to it all. You've both been

wonderful in your own ways. shift that you and

I talked about a lot was almost a shift from

having you think of your job as the online engagement

director, as someone who's just offering online

programs, to seeing your job as a pastor of an

online congregation. So, in the same way that

I'm pastoring the in -person congregation, what

would it be like for you to envision this job?

not just about, let's offer this, let's offer

this, but this is your flock, your online flock.

How can you care for them in a way that's analogous

to how we care for those who are in person? And

part of that thinking was because we realized,

it's one of our learnings, that actually the

people who are watching, the people who are participating,

the people we're trying to reach are actually

maybe not the people we originally thought. It

turned out, and you'll probably say more about

this, that most of the people who are engaging

with us on Sunday mornings are people who...

are shut in to their house, maybe they're elderly,

and it's just, yeah, that's how they stay connected,

because they physically can't come to church

anymore. And that was like, oh... That's our

online congregation, not everybody, but most.

Yeah, yeah, I think it was interesting because,

you know, when you were describing the like pandemic

situation, you said, you know, there were lots

of people who maybe didn't come back to church.

And I think we assumed there are some people

who didn't come back because they didn't want

to, right? Because it was more comfortable for

them to do it from home. But there are all kinds

of people that weren't able to come back into

church because of health reasons, because they

had moved, because, you know, family situations...

whatever it was, right? And so, yeah, just sort

of seeing them as still a really valid part of

our Trinity family. And still people who need

connection and care the same as everybody else.

And I don't think we expected that, because I

think we thought, oh, the people who are going

to be interested in online are the young folks

and the techies. They're the ones we're going

to be reaching. But that's not what we have found

as we have kept watching the metrics. learning

who's out there. Yeah. Yeah. I think, like, when

I think about, you know, when I first started

this role and, like, what were some of the things

we were talking about? Like, I know originally

when you guys had done some visioning on this,

you were like, what if we do, like, a VR church

sort of situation, like virtual reality? Or,

like, even when I started, I was like, OK, what

are the, like, platforms and, like, you know,

Discord or TikTok or whatever it is? Like, where

do people want us to be? And the answer that

we kept getting was Just keep being faithful

in where you're at. Right. And keep showing up

and making those connections deeper. more than

trying to make the connections broader, I think.

Yes, that's true. And that's always one of the

temptations of the online ministry, is there's

always something new and exciting. You can try

this, you can try that. Yeah, I mean, well, you've

already started talking about this, but like,

so you must have seen shifts. You've been at

this two years. What have you seen kind of change?

Yeah, and I think, yeah, for me, it was really

interesting to learn who our online congregation

is and what what their needs are, what they're

looking for. Right. And then to think about,

OK, how what are the ways that we can bring them

into the in -person or the hybrid elements of

our church family? Right. So like doing. hybrid

courses, doing online life groups with folks

who are sometimes always online and sometimes

in person. And doing, you know, like we went

through a time where we were doing a lot of like

scripture readings and things like that with

with online congregants. Right. So just getting

those folks more part of the life of Trinity

in a really sort of regular way, I think was

really an intentional shift. Yeah, and then I

think the the other thing that I would sort of

say was just recognizing, you know, the value

of having a really active social media like that

wasn't something that Trinity Trinity has had

social media for numbers of years. Right. But

to to sort of say, OK, how do we take what's

happening on a Sunday morning and make it, you

know, like taking clips from sermons, taking

clips from podcasts, you know, making posts about

Bible readings and prayers and like getting the

life of the church out there in a way that people

can see really easily and and then seeing the

fruit of that as people who come to church in

person will say, you know, they're they're new

here and they'll say, hey, I saw this thing on

Facebook or hey, I watched this on YouTube and

like it's giving people a taste of what our church

is like. before they even get to walk through

the doors. Yeah. You know what was another shift

to something that we wrestled with the whole

way along is how do you even count? How do you

even know who's out there? Like, so you have

a service, there's this many views, or you put

a TikTok up or whatever, and oh, there's like

2 ,500 or 10 ,000 views. What does that even

mean? Sure. So that was, I felt like a learning

that I had to get my head around is like, It's

it's you don't these numbers they mean something

but maybe they don't mean all that you you sure

I mean, that's just I mean you must have had

some other learnings like you learned along the

way. Yeah, I think Recognizing to going back

to who our online congregation is I think it

was also really interesting for me to learn and

to think about the fact that our on our online

congregation isn't a consistent group of people

there are some people who are always online and

only ever online. Yes. But actually the largest

sort of chunk of people who check in on the app

on a Sunday morning are people who come in person

at least half of the time. OK. Right. So people

who are here when they can be. And then, you

know, they're at the cottage or they're working

or they're. So you're not on either or you're

not either you're part of an online congregation

or you're part of an in person. But one of your

learnings was that actually they're going back

and forth. A lot of people are both. Yeah. Yeah,

and that's really interesting because I think

that changes the job. Like that changes who I

care for. So like when I am going through a list

of being, okay, who checked in this Sunday? Who's

been checking in regularly? One of the criteria

that I use in my head as I'm going through this

is like, okay. Does this person have other connections?

Are they part of a life group? Do they show up

regularly on Sunday morning? Right. Because if

they have some of those other connections, it's

not that I won't check in with them. Right. But

I will prioritize the people that I know are

feeling more isolated. Yes. Right. Yeah. Fair.

Fair. Yeah. I think that there's. Oh shoot, what

was I going to say? Okay, so we've learned that

this congregation is not like here or there.

They're kind of coming back and forth. I mean,

was there any other like kind of key learnings,

big learnings? Yeah, I think the other piece

is trying to figure out how we build a community

online and how you build trust online. No, I

know this was something you talked a lot about

trust. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That it's it's just

so much harder than I kind of imagined, I think.

Right. Right. That that you if people never see

each other face to face, it's not that they can't

build trust. There's lots of people who can.

do that. But I think it's a lot harder. It takes

a lot more time. It takes a lot more intentionality,

right? And so even trying to have a life group

with people who never see each other aside from

this one hour a week on the internet, right?

Yeah, it's not that it's impossible. It's that

it's really challenging. Yeah. I'll share a quote

a little bit later that I always remember you

said, and I think you're right. That is a huge

learning. Remember, this is all about experimenting.

And that was a big learning. Yeah, trust. Can

you build trust online? But maybe in addition

to learnings, if I think back over the last two

years, you must have had some high points. You

must have had some real memorable moments, whether

it was in here or out there. What were some of

the highlights for you? Yeah, I think I was surprised

at how much I enjoyed doing podcasts. Like I

when I sort of came into this job, I was like,

okay, I guess I'll do that But like what I found

about it was that it's a opportunity for me to

get to like hear different people's stories Right,

like everybody who is on the podcast. I know

Better than I would have known any other time

right because I'm also Not the kind of person

who really loves like small talk and like hey,

let's chat about the weather I like want to be

like, okay. No, tell me your life like let's

get into it And so the podcast provides me with

a space where like that's the job Yeah, and so

yeah just getting to to hear people's stories

and and the way seeing people open up and like

be vulnerable and willing to share more of themselves

with our church family. Did that feel like really

natural to you in the end that we're just, I'm

just legitimately interested in hearing more

about this isn't a script or this isn't a...

Yeah, I mean, yeah, usually you come in with

a set of questions and with a, you know, this

is what we're going to talk about. But yeah,

it is often, I really try to make it flow like

a conversation, right? And so just jumping in

and yeah, and I think especially like there's

been a few times where we've done like a panel

sort of series so there's been you know three

or four people who have really continued through

a whole sermon series or through a whole church

season. And those, I think, were also really

interesting. Yeah, I agree. The more voices you

get around the table, the more perspectives,

you get a wild conversation and the time has

gone just like that. Yeah, yeah. So that was

really cool. I think the other piece that's really

meaningful to me was just getting to know some

of our online congregation. And especially whether

it was doing some scripture reading recordings

and getting to visit people in their homes or

getting to go visit folks in the hospital and

that sort of thing, right? Just like, yeah, spending

that time putting face and flesh to like what

I'm doing, right? Cause a lot of times it's,

I'm looking at numbers in a spreadsheet or I'm

looking at these statistics and that information.

And, but to be able to say, no, this really matters

to these people. Yeah. And this is important.

And I hope everyone who's listening caught that.

that one of the most valuable and memorable things

you did as an online engagement director was

seeing people in person. Yeah. Them in their

homes, you know, having face -to -face interactions

with them. I mean, that alone is kind of a telling

insight. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And not to say

that, you know, there's also been folks that

I've had Zoom calls with and those have also

been helpful. But I think, yeah, just that that

personal connection with people is is really

valuable, I think. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, Rob,

can you explain a little bit of what's coming

next? Okay. So, yes, there are changes coming.

You're probably like, okay, get to the changes.

Well, here's what's happening. As we said at

the beginning, this was kind of always a bit

of an experimental space. We were going to practice

things. We were going to learn things. We were

going to try things. Our goal was to say, can

we bring these online viewers into deeper membership,

deeper engagement, deeper kind of community?

And there's been some successes, but I think

sometimes as we, I mean, here's the hard thing.

Sometimes you have to step back and we have to

kind of be honest at times about what we're seeing

out there. And this is where I remember the quote

that you said to me a few months ago, but you

said something like, for true community to be

formed, what you were learning was that there

had to be trust. And trust was really, really

hard to achieve without some kind of in -person

embodied relationship. So community requires

trust, and your learning was trust requires some

kind of face -to -face interaction with people.

Now that is a big learning for people who are

trying to figure out online engagement, and it's

actually a difficult truth, in some ways a difficult

pill to swallow, that we can actually maybe only

go so far. in reaching you and connecting with

you and drawing you into the life of this church

through this particular medium. This is a great

medium for a lot of things and it's not going

away, but we are going to have to make some changes

to how we do this. Sorry. Yeah, no, just like

on that point that like this medium is really

important. Like I think one of the... biggest

things that we've seen, and like you just chat

with Sally, right? Every newcomer that she talks

to, she'll ask them, you know, how did you hear

about Trinity? And so, so many of them started

as online viewers, right? And then they become

in -person sort of congregants, right? So, so

to say this is really important, but it's not

the be all and end all. That's right. It is,

have you all heard it before? It's like the front

door, right? But it never, our online viewers

never kind of are like fully satisfied I don't

think with just the online portion, it's always

leading them into a community, maybe our community,

maybe in a community. I don't know. But all that

learning has made us to say, OK, we need to be

good stewards of our resources here at Trinity.

And so I want everyone to know Kyla is going

to continue to work. We might have to give you

a different title. I don't know a job, but in

a halftime capacity in this role instead of a

full time capacity. But. it's not going to be

quite the same that way, just because this is

what we're learning. But the second thing that

I want to mention, another reason why we're making

these changes, is because we just did a strategic

planning process as a church, where we discovered

what God's good way was for us here at Trinity.

The whole congregation got a chance to participate.

We launched this strategic plan maybe like five

or six weeks ago. And what we learned was God

is calling us to dig deeper into discipleship,

to strengthen our care ministry here at Trinity,

to invest in the next generation, like youth

and young adults, to build leaders and to extend

our reach by maybe partnering with other churches

in our city and beyond. And so those have now

kind of become some of the guiding pillars in

our vision as a church. And online ministry has

stuff, you know, you could say it's connected

to all of those things. But really, I think what

we're being called to by our congregation and

by God is to invest more heavily in those areas.

And with only so many resources to go around,

we have to also maybe therefore pull back from

other areas. And so, that's another reason why

we decided to pull back a little bit from our

investment in online engagement, is to enable

some of these other things to happen. We are

still going to have a strong social media presence.

We are still going to have a website. We're still

going to live stream the services. We're still

going to have sermon notes and hybrid courses.

We're still going to offer hybrid courses, but

it's especially the Sunday morning stuff that

involves you. I don't know what's going to become

of the podcast yet. We don't have all the answers

yet. So, anywho, it's our strategic plan that's

kind of driven us in this way, partly, too. But

there's actually a third thing that's happened,

and that has nothing to do with me or the church.

It has to do with you, because there's also been

some changes that have happened in your life

or happening in your life. that are perhaps pulling

you into some new directions. And I think that

the congregation would love to hear about that

too. What's going on? Yeah. So yeah, for the

last few months, I guess this year, been sort

of discerning what it would look like for me

to enter into full -time ministry as a priest.

And so actually earlier this spring, I sat down

with some folks from the Diocese of Toronto,

went through some interviews and conversations.

And so I've been accepted as apostate. You passed.

I did. You're accepted. As a postulant in the

Diocese of Toronto. And for folks who don't know

what a postulant is, because it's kind of a funny

word, a postulant is someone who's on track towards

being ordained as a priest. So I do this two

year sort of postulancy process and then one

year of curacy. So when you sort of work underneath

of another priest and then you're finally ordained

as a priest to sort of... go out and serve in

churches. So yeah, spending the next two years,

I need to go back and do a little bit more education

at Wycliffe, doing some retreats and some meetings

with other postulants, other staff from the diocese.

Yeah. And then of course, continuing in this

part -time role here at Trinity as well. And

it's very normal as well. People should know

that you may be asked to do placements at other

churches that would take you away from Trinity

for periods of time as well. And so that's something

coming up. So that's big news. It's exciting

news. I think everybody's pumped about that.

But what I'm wondering is like, what led you

to this? Like, how did you make that decision?

It's a big decision. It's a big change. For sure.

Yeah. I think that like, if I'm really honest

with myself, I think that I've been feeling a

call towards full -time vocational ministry for

a really long time. But I think I've never really

had a clear sense of what that ministry might

look like. Like I've done some work previously

in like international missions and I had thought,

you know, even about doing like local, you know,

like outreach and ministry mission opportunities

and things like that. But I think this opportunity

of working in a local church, so sort of rooting

myself in this context, has helped me to sort

of both get a little bit of a taste of what that's

like to just work in one church with one congregation

with with this wonderful team of staff. And yeah,

to get a little bit of taste of, OK, what's it

like to do pastoral care? What's it like to do

discipleship to do Sunday mornings? Right. And

at the same time, feeling like actually more

of a draw towards some of those things that.

as online engagement director, I don't get to

spend all of my time doing teaching and discipleship.

I don't get to spend all of my time doing pastoral

care. Right. And so feeling like, oh, those are

actually things that I feel called and able to

be equipped to do their life giving and their

and their life giving. Yeah. Yeah. So feeling

like, OK, I want I want to be able to make more

space for that in my life and feeling like, OK,

so. if that's the kind of work that I want to

do, then I guess I'll be a priest. I mean, the

wonderful thing about it is that we don't just

decide, like you said, I guess I'll do this,

right? There's a process and it's a discerning

process and the diocese takes you through that

and the bishop walks you through that. And so

God can work through all of that to either affirm

that call or to say, hey, this isn't the right

place, not the right time. But it's really encouraging

that that not only have you felt it here, but

it's been affirmed by the wider church that,

no, we see this. We see this in you, Kyla. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So I think it's exciting. I don't

really know, you know, what the next two or three

or four or more years look like for sure. But

I think that, yeah, I'm excited to step into

more of that sort of church leadership and ministry

and see where God takes us. It's amazing. Yeah.

So again, Kyla is still going to be part of the

Trinity team here in a reduced capacity. But

that might, but this might, and I don't know

the future of the podcast, but this might be

your, this is probably your last podcast. I'm

so glad I got to be your guest on your last podcast.

And maybe I'll just shut my big mouth. You sign

up for what could be the last time. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, thank you so much, Rob, for sharing and

for being part of this whole journey with me.

And thank you for tuning in to this week's episode

of Trinity Talks. If you have been part of our

online congregation, I just want to say thank

you. Thank you for tuning in so faithfully. Thank

you for all of the ways that you have challenged

and encouraged me and helped me grow through

this season. And if you're just tuning in for

first time that's okay too. We're glad to have

you around and maybe you can go back and watch

some of those other podcasts and yeah we would

love to continue to hear from you and connect

with you as Rob said. Our online presence is

not going anywhere and so we would love to have

you to continue journeying with us here at Trinity.