Transitioning to a new structure is demanding of resources, both human and financial.

The disaffiliation of some churches has reduced the amount paid in assessments to the movement.

The need to support struggling churches and the desire to plant new ones creates competing financial demands.

Creating compelling job opportunities for clergy is difficult when our overall pay scale is less than most other movements.

Our commitment to international ministry creates great demands that include immigration, personnel, travel, language and cultural adaptations.

The plan to reduce denominational assessments by .5% per year coincides with a time when our opportunities for ministry have never been greater.

Trends may indicate that there is growth potential world wide over the next decade.

Understanding GLBT globalization in a religious context is crucial in understanding how to proceed.

Our world wide churches have great needs in the areas of multilingual and culturally appropriate resources, equipped leaders, and financial support.

Developing and equipping leaders around the world is a necessity not a luxury. This will require the flexibility of varied requirements and expectations as well as a commitment to a country’s best practices.

Dealing with immigration issues and demands, especially for a U.S. based corporation, creates issues of injustice. America-centrist and homophobic policies require strategies for changing government policy as well as the financial commitment to support our clergy and their families.

Understanding currency and legal differences is a key component to setting up appropriate systems and structures that will help to support international ministry.

Creating a unified message is made more difficult when we hold many different theological perspectives.

The public can perceive us to be an "anything goes" kind of church unless we find and articulate our common ground.

The development of theological perspectives and an openness to articulate them will require a lot of time and effort along with a lot of openness and tolerance to many ways of living out our faith.

Our greatest challenge will be to see that our theological diversity is our greatest asset rather than allowing it to become our greatest liability.

Diverse theology will cause some churches to feel that they don’t fit in MCC. Our challenge will be to allow that reality rather than feel pressured to conform to a uniform set of beliefs.

Finding ways to include other faith traditions rather than alienate them is an ongoing challenge, as we work to meet the needs of interfaith families and individuals with diverse spiritual practices.

In order to live into our call, there will be many urgent priorities. Discerning which things we focus on first will be a challenge.

Planting new churches without strengthening existing ones could create conflicting strategies.

Creating more resources for local churches could easily compete with the need to translate of the resources we already have.

Reaching out to the heterosexual community could be a competing priority with reaching the millions of GLBT people who don’t know we exist.

Being at the forefront of social justice issues that are focused on LGBT people could be in conflict with the demands of other social justice issues that exist around the world.

Equipping leaders in countries outside the U.S. may create a competing need for continuing to create opportunities for people inside the U.S.

Reaching out to the unchurched could create tension with those wishing to reclaim their historical church.

Building an appropriate infrastructure to support our commitment to being a global movement could seem conflicting with the values of reducing bureaucracy.

Continuing to be in the forefront of U.S. politics could be conflicting with the resources that need to be deployed to fight for basic human rights in other countries.

We still have many churches that have been in existence for a long time but have grown very little. In order to revitalize these churches, commitment of resources, both human and financial, must be prioritized in accordance with their desire to grow.

Successful church planting around the world will require specifically trained leaders and pastors as well as start-up funding.

Constant review and adjustment of our affiliation process may be necessary in order to accommodate churches, communities of faith, groups or new churches who would like to be part of MCC.

Balancing the need for healthy growth as well as numerical growth could be an ongoing challenge.

The last three years in MCC, membership has stayed constant and some churches have lost members. Addressing this is crucial to our growth.

Articulating our message to give exposure to MCC as a movement in general and to local churches specifically, will surface our differences and challenge our willingness to find common ground. It will also challenge our ability to articulate who we are across different cultures. We cannot grow unless people know we are here!

It will challenge us to acknowledge that the bulk of our congregations are made up of people from 35-55 years old. If we are going to grow, we must be deliberate about reaching out to younger generations and making our ministry relevant for them.

With a full range of generations represented in most of our congregations, we are challenged to create programming, curriculum, and care for infants, children, youth, young adults, middle-aged adults and seniors.

Addressing social justice issues that impact every generation and gender is a daunting task and yet the make-up of our membership demands it.

Recruiting and developing leaders for all generational needs will be crucial if we are to effectively minister to them.

MCC’s membership has stayed constant and not grown over the last three years, indicates that some of our ministries are not relevant to the communities they are serving.

In many counties there is an increasing trend toward GLBT people having children. For example, the last census in the U.S. showed that, of those who said they were homosexual, 25% of them had children. This would indicate that our need to have strong children’s programs is crucial.

Around the world, there is a growing existence of interfaith families that we need to consider as we develop ministries, programs and resources.

Being deliberate in our effort to see ourselves as One Movement rather than the movement and the local church is the only way we will have enough creativity and energy to reach a world that needs us.

Learning to deal with differences and disagreements in an open and honest way will challenge us greatly.

Learning to trust in an evolving structure and remain flexible enough to critique it will challenge us.

Maximizing our strength rather than competing for strength will call us to a different way of being and a different way of seeing the world.

The message of God’s all inclusive love has served us in many ways and yet, we have not packaged that message in a way that gives people the greatest opportunity to know who we are and how to find us.

The key component to any message is its audience. At this point in our history, we have the opportunity to determine who makes up our primary audience as well as our broader audiences.

There will never be a better time to determine what our primary audience needs and is looking for in spiritual community across generations and cultures.

Finding ways to open up our theological discussions such that our message of spiritual diversity can be communicated clearly is an opportunity awaiting us.

Our opportunity has never been greater to continue the work we have begun around spirituality and sexuality. This will likely be our greatest contribution to the world.

Exploring our common ground allows our message to be clear without dictating a particular Christian belief system for the local church.

Doing more work around "branding"(becoming known) is a great opportunity to increase our visibility, our accountability and public recognition of who we are.

With so many GLBT affirming churches emerging, it is all the more critical that the ministry we do, the values we live by and the programs we offer be articulated clearly to the public.

As our participation in seminaries, global Human Rights organizations, the World Council of Churches, interfaith and ecumenical efforts continue to increase, the way we represent and articulate our message will determine the place we hold at the table.

With the right kind of focus and prioritizing resources could be developed from several sources:

Explore new ways of delivering resources that maximize our human gifts and our financial means.

Finding ways to organize our efforts around the delivery of resources is an exciting and compelling opportunity.

With a clear message and a strategic plan in place, the opportunity and responsibility to build our donor base is significant.

A long term financial plan can be put into place that includes a strategy for a planned giving program that benefits everyone.

With a strategic plan in place, funneling resources toward specific priorities and goals will be much more effective.

With a focus on healthy planting and renewal of churches, everyone’s financial position could be improved.

Fully leveraging our assets is a compelling opportunity and responsibility so that our ministry can be intentional and focused.

At this point in our development, there is an opportunity to revitalize some of our existing churches and offer support that would help them move to the next level of healthy growth.

The world awaits us. There are so many places that are waiting for MCC. This creates enormous opportunity.

Following successful models of church planting could significantly enhance the success of our movement.

There are many independent GLBT churches that are well established who might be interested in affiliating with MCC. Developing this as a strategy could hold much promise.

Being deliberate about developing leaders, both lay and clergy, in different cultures is a tremendous opportunity.

Developing partnerships with other movements to share resources of all kinds seems crucial to our overall future growth.

Right now is a prime opportunity to renew and expand our Strategic Growth Initiative program.

As GLBT issues rise more and more to the forefront of public life, we could have an opportunity to reach people in an entirely new way. Our expertise around sexuality and spirituality could put us in a great position to be a definitive voice on this subject.

Local churches indicate that they are ready to begin looking outside themselves. With our international needs so clearly before us, this is a great time to mobilize our churches toward that reality. The opportunity for ALL of us to be educated about other cultures as well as the difficulties of doing ministry world-wide, could be an enormous bridge builder.

All over the world, there are social injustices that oppress people. These are our issues. As part of our own maturity of purpose, we must seize the moment to be part of the liberation cause and Human Rights movement all over the world.

With strong interfaith openness and dialogue, we will be a significant contributor to peace and understanding that abides in an all inclusive God.

If we find ways to let the world see the good that we do, our contribution to social justice and liberation will be significant.