Topics from Your Senior Warden This Month: Livestreaming

Last month, the Vestry agreed to sign a three-year contract with LocalLive, to live-stream our 10:00 worship services beginning in September.   This is exciting news, as it will allow us to continue to reach the various members of our congregation who will sometimes prefer online worship, or who will need this option due to scheduling challenges, immobility and/or distance. 
 
Keeping our doors open in this new way fits in with St. Johns’ strategic plan goal to build up our membership, which has been declining over the past decade.  We know this must be done if we are to survive and thrive as a worship community.
 
I’d like to provide some additional background supporting this decision. 

• First, the pandemic was transformative in terms of how we are thinking about growing our church going forward. During the past year, we found that a number of previous parishioners who had drifted away from our community actually came back to worship with us on zoom.  We don’t want to lose them.   

 
We also discovered new people were participating on Sundays from as nearby as Oakland but as far away as England, and various points in between.  Some were friends or relatives of parishioners, and some came to us through online channels.  We hope they will stay with us, either online or in person in September.  We need to provide an online option for these folks.

• Second, several local parishes in our community are already using live streaming, with significant success.  These churches are growing their membership base.  During our COVID year, St. John’s built enthusiasm for online worship out of necessity.   We now have an ideal opportunity to build upon that momentum as we work to increase our membership.  Live streaming is an inexpensive and easy way to do that.

• Third, the contract was fully vetted and it is very reasonable cost-wise.   For $4500 in each of three years, LocalLive will provide the equipment and run it for us on Sundays.  If it turns out we like the live-stream option and it is well-attended, we can gradually upgrade our lighting and sound equipment in the church when the timing is right, fiscally.  The Vestry has not committed to doing any major upgrades at this point.

I’ve heard that some in the congregation are wondering why we can’t continue with zoom services.  This is mainly a staffing issue.  The zoom services are very labor intensive to produce.  When you think about it , they are unique, “mini- productions” produced each week that involve the time of many – clergy, staff, lay volunteers, music personnel, and Jon Owens, who has been assembling the elements and running zoom on Sundays.   Once we start with two in-person services on Sunday this fall, it won’t be sustainable to continue with zoom church.
 
I hope everyone will be open-minded about introducing the live-streaming option. In the view of the Vestry, there seems to be no strong downside to giving this modality a try.  I’m sure that many of you would agree that if we are to grow and remain relevant, we need to be open about trying new things – particularly those  that we know are working at other institutions.
 
Please feel free to reach out to Ruben or me with any questions about this initiative.  We are here for you, and always happy to discuss what’s on your mind.  These are exciting times at St. John’s as we begin to move out of the pandemic and into a new world of growth and discovery.  We welcome good conversation along the way.
 
Blessings,
Victoria Robinson

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