I’m Father Cathie - you can find out more about me HERE - and my ministry is called Free Range Priest.
Free Range Priest is …
the things I’ve learned, the things I’ve learned from others, and the things we’re learning together about getting church ‘unstuck’ - and small, practical changes we can make to move into the future of church.
FrP is for:
We’re lay and ordained, from all the traditions, serving inside, outside, alongside the institution. We’re people preparing for ministry and those who are retired. We’re full time in a congregation or denominational staff. We’re ‘part-time’ - meaning we get paid part-time and we’re working full-time, often in more than one place. We’re working secular jobs in order to pay for our ministry. We’re worried about losing our jobs. We’re worried about losing our church. We’re entrepreneurial ministers - clergypreneurs - creating online ministry or ministry as an author, musician, spiritual director, coach, consultant or faith practitioner of any kind. We’re serving both traditional ministry ministry and as a clergypreneur. We’re watching the institutional church collapse and wondering if we can save it. We’re praying the institutional church doesn’t collapse and trying to do the same things over and over and hope different results. We don’t know what to do.
Free Range Priest is three ‘lenses’ to look through while reimagining ministry…
Lens one: The System
Vision: Agile, networked, technology-based, focused on Christian practice and small worshiping communities
Lens 2: The Community
Vision: Welcome, Belonging, Formation, and Practice
Lens 3:The Minister:
GRIT!!
God (Wondering where God is in the midst of all this)
Root (Focusing on the ‘root’ over the ‘fruit’ of Christian faith)
In charge (Not being ‘in charge’ of congregations)
Task-based contracts (Not doing ‘everything’)
!! (…and giving up trying to save the institution!)
Free Range Priest is 4 Newsletters that look through the Lenses…
At Cage Free Ministry - look through one (or all!) of the lenses with your own ministry…
It’s about how to do it yourself - break out of the institutional gridlock and bring church to people in your own context, with your own ministry.
What comes with the Cage Free Ministry Newsletter:
Monthly coaching email (last Wednesday of month - for everyone, but paid subscribers get extra)
Your six word mission statement (this is for everyone!)
Copy of ebook - The Free Range Priest Way (about the three lenses - exclusively for paid FrP subscribers)
Courses (paid subscribers get 10% off)
One of the small practical things we can do as ministers in the digital age is get rid of static church websites that are now out there in the new internet wilderness - and build an engaging digital ministry system instead! Ask Father Cathie (first Wednesday of the month, for paid subscribers)
Trexo and Substack Seminary are how the lenses are applied …
Trexo: a gym for your soul
Christian practices from the earliest church. Stretch and strengthen your soul to draw closer with God.
It’s Lens 1: the System - because it’s agile and networked. You can participate individually or as a member of a congregation. And Lens 2: the Community - because it is directly about Christian formation practice (which also makes it part of Lens 3: the Minister, because it’s about ‘root, not fruit’!)
What comes with the Trexo Newsletter:
The Hearts up! Practice - our first practice, and our basic orientation towards God (free for everyone, always)
The Practices (join the gym - become a paid FrP subscriber - to join us for all of them)
Coffee with Coaches (3 Wednesdays a month, for paid subscribers), coaching email the next day - or everyone, but paid subscribers get extra)
Workout/Rule of Life (for gym members)
Substack Seminary
Cage Free Ministers unite! It’s the home for weirdo orphan pastors. It’s community for all of us out there figuring out the future of church.
You’re not weird - you’re early. And now you’re right on time.
It’s Lens 1: the System - because networked and technology-based. And Lens 2: the Community -because it focuses on Welcome and Belonging. And it’s about all parts of Lens 3: the Minister!
What comes with the Substack Seminary Newsletter…
Substack Seminary is active on a Quarter schedule (6-7 weeks each), so you get content during the Quarters, and we take off the weeks around Thanksgiving/Christmas, Holy Week/Easter, and deep summer.
Q1: Vision & Systematic Change (Jan - Mar)
Q2: Structure & Business Model (Post Easter till late May/early June)
Q3: Theology & Community (August/September)
Q4: Technology & Collaboration (Mid-Oct - Mid-Nov)
Wednesday blog on topic(for all subscribers to the Newsletter), mostly written by founding partner Loren Richmond Jr..
Live stream Conversation on topic (Thursdays 3:30 Eastern - for paid subscribers). Mostly led by Pastor Sierra Ward with 1 or 2 guests.
Weekly chat on the topic starts Monday (also for paid members)
Friday ‘Good Stuff’Every Friday morning, I just put out a blog to everybody who follows me that lists six blogs I read that week that inspired, moved, or engaged me.
I share it as a way to promote other writers on Substack (I subscribe to over 350 publications!) and also as a way to help people who might be new to Substack or not sure where to find things.
I think of this as Lens 1: the System, because it’s agile, networked, and technology-based. It’s also Lens 2: the Community, because it focuses on Welcome and Belonging. And Lens 3: the Minister, because it’s a lot of ministry that is not part of the institution.
Become a Founding member to get everything -
including free courses and a yearly 1-1 check in with me!
It’s the most affordable -and effective - clergy coaching and church consulting for the future of church.
Free Range Priest is about getting past the ‘stuff’ that is holding us back…
…the institutional gridlock left over from 20th century organization - and get to more of the Good Stuff -
sharing the love of God, find ways to practice ministry sustainably, and living with more hope, love, and JOY.
At Free Range Priest, we’re bringing church to people.
Bite-sized ways that YOU can re-imagine ministry and get ‘unstuck’.
Subscribe to re-discover ministry JOY.
Sign up for the Newletters - and manage your preferences HERE.
