Unruh, Saving Souls, Serving Society

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Heidi Unruh and Ronald Sider, Saving Souls, Serving Society: Understanding the Faith Factor in Church-Based Social Ministry. Oxford University Press, 2005.

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LifeandLeadership.com Summary

The purpose of this volume is to help churches understand and maintain the distinction between faith-based social action and secular activism. The authors do this through a responsibly conducted qualitative case-study of fifteen churches that are active in both evangelism and social action. They thoroughly explain the distinctive features of faith-based social ministry, and suggest ways churches have preserved their unique witness. A previous book which Sider and Unruh wrote alongside Philip Olson, Churches that Make a Difference, offers a more prescriptive plan for holistic ministry, and draws on the same case studies as this text. This summary focuses on parts one and two of Saving Souls, Serving Society, which will help readers determine the value of this volume for their own efforts.

Understanding and maintaining the faith factor is important for a variety of reasons. One is that when churches become serious about social ministry, they must rub shoulders with government- and private-run agencies that do similar things. Congregations that are less separationist along the church-state continuum may not struggle with this as much (see resource guide on Political Theory and Church-State). Yet it is a legitimate concern that churches not lose their biblical identity as they associate with outside organizations. Related to this is the assumption that Christian social action is not merely an effort to improve the conditions of challenged populations in the here and now. More importantly, it represents the in-breaking of God’s kingdom among those served as sign and foretaste of the coming eternal kingdom when the whole cosmos will be redeemed from its evils, both personal and social, and everything restored to God’s original intent. Also, Christian social action is the lived out faith of the redeemed community, and therefore hopefully a part of the church’s evangelistic proclamation of the Gospel which saves humankind from sin. This volume shows how fifteen congregations sought to keep these special religious features of congregational social action at the forefront.

Part One describes church-based social ministry. Chapter 1 highlights the aspects of congregational life that shape its contributions to the social good from one end of indirect, informal, and individual interaction with the needs of members and outsiders, to the other end of more organized, corporate efforts that often collaborate with other entities. It also discusses some of the more recent sociopolitical factors that affect congregational outreach such as devaluation, faith-based initiatives, changing norms of religion in public life, and ambivalence toward proselytizing.

Chapter 2 describes eight of the fifteen socially active churches that were case studied, profiling their outreach programs, followed by a careful definition of the terms social ministry and evangelism as reflected in these church’s efforts. These definitions are more functional, i.e. according to the actual practice of the congregations studied, than theological. Chapter 3 provides very encouraging and enlightening stories of how these churches expressed their faith through both evangelism and social action.

Part Two, “Toward a New Vocabulary of Faith,” encompasses Chapters 4-6. Chapter 4 discusses the spiritual meanings people of faith invest in acts of social care, or what gives their work religious significance. As they say, “some meanings derived from social activism are shared by secular and religious folks alike,” (67) but others are unique to people of faith. The authors describe four types of spiritual meaning attached to social ministry. Some engage is as a matter of dutiful ministry. Others see themselves as empowered by God as agents of social change. Some attach a devotional significance. Others see it as an evangelistic intervention in the spiritual lives of others. They point out that “while faith-based and secular activism often look similar in terms of the goods or services provided, they may be shaped by significant differences in what this involvement means to activists—what motivates them to participate, how they define the need, what spiritual outcomes they are hoping for, what they believe makes their work effective, and how it is fulfilling to them personally.” (84)

In chapter 5, the authors go beyond these implicit religious meanings to describe activities and messages that are explicitly religious in nature, or “the ways that specifically religious content may be incorporated into the methodology and program design of social ministries.” (87) These are important, because “A program may be infused with these types of implicit, nonverbal qualities while outwardly appearing similar to programs with no faith affiliation. Unless the connection to religion is made explicit, beneficiaries may experience a faith-based program without awareness of its basis in faith.” (88) Among the churches studied, they found nine categories of programmatic features that were self-evidently religious, and seven variables as to how this content was presented. These features and variables are discussed in great detail.

Chapter 6 synthesizes the findings from the previous chapters into typologies that describe the variety of ways churches express their social consciences. They discovered five categories of faith-based organizations: faith-permeated, faith-centered, faith affiliated, faith background, and faith-secular partnerships. These are compared/contrasted alongside the strictly secular category in table and full description. The tables classify the types according to their similarities and differences in organizational characteristics and the varieties of programs/projects.

Parts Three and Four continue unfolding the distinctive features of faith-based social action. Part Three, “Mission Orientations,” discusses the relationship between social action and evangelism, the influences of social ministry on overall congregational mission, and the special dynamics of conversionist churches. Part Four evaluates the overall effectiveness of faith-based programming, addressing the question of whether faith actually enhances social action, with an honest look at their short-comings. It also discusses the social and spiritual capital congregations have and do not have. The final chapter draws the overall conclusions based on the study.

From the Publisher

Recent years have seen unprecedented attention to faith-based institutions as agents of social change, spurred in part by cuts in public funding for social services and accompanied by controversy about the separation of church and state. The debate over faith-based initiatives has highlighted a small but growing segment of churches committed to both saving souls and serving society. What distinguishes faith-based from secular activism? How do religious organizations express their religious identity in the context of social services? How do faith-based service providers interpret the connection between spiritual methodologies and socioeconomic outcomes? How does faith motivate and give meaning to social ministry? Drawing on case studies of fifteen Philadelphia-area Protestant churches with active outreach, Saving Souls, Serving Society seeks to answer these and other pressing questions surrounding the religious dynamics of social ministry. While church-based programs often look similar to secular ones in terms of goods or services rendered, they may show significant differences in terms of motivations, desired outcomes, and interpretations of meaning. Church-based programs also differ from one another in terms of how they relate evangelism to their social outreach agenda.

Heidi Rolland Unruh and Ronald J. Sider explore how churches navigate the tension between their spiritual mission and the constraints on evangelism in the context of social services. The authors examine the potential contribution of religious dynamics to social outcomes as well as the relationship between mission orientations and social capital. Unruh and Sider introduce a new vocabulary for describing the religious components and spiritual meanings embedded in social action, and provide a typology of faith-based organizations and programs. Their analysis yields a framework for Protestant mission orientations that makes room for the diverse ways that churches interrelate spiritual witness and social compassion. Based on their observations, the authors offer a constructive approach to church-state partnerships and provide a far more objective understanding of faith-based social services than previously available.

About the Authors

Heidi Rolland Unruh is Associate Director of the Congregations, Community Outreach, and Leadership Development Project. She lives in Hutchinson, Kansas.

Ronald J. Sider is Professor of Theology, Holistic Ministry, and Public Policy at Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wynnewood, PA. He is also Director of the Congregations, Community Outreach, and Leadership Development Project. Together they are the authors of Churches That Make A Difference: Reaching Your Community With Good News and Good Works (2002).

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