Where Does Church Culture Come From?

Join us on February 1st for a captivating KZbin live discussion as we delve into the reason for church culture. Guided by Kurt Francom, and accompanied by guests Ryan Gottfredson and John Shaw, we'll embark on a thought-provoking journey exploring the origins, manifestations, and nuances of church culture in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Remind yourself to watch a fun and casual discussion!

[@imtheben]

Great conversation. More, please! I'm currently building a stake communication council, and my stake president refers to our function as "the 3rd Church" (I suppose after the PM/Facilities Group, who have always been something of "a light unto themselves"). I appreciate the views on culture and organization, and giving people an opportunity to move toward the ministry their heart pulls them toward.

[@davidtorbenson4686]

while there is an increase this year, a lot gets swept by the Stake - which is used for good activities - but I agree on the ward level budget limitations relative to # of members

[@zionssuburb]

The amount that gets swept by the stake is always visible to the wards and isn't necessarily always 'alot' - a 17% increase is nothing to shake a stick at since we've had only very rare increases since the inception of the equalized budget program. I'm more concerned with some strange notion that wards and stakes have that they need to 'save' for a rainy day, so they don't budget their entire allotment, and for that matter, rarely, if ever, do we 'really' budget. Most wards treat this like an 'expense account' and tell orgs, hey, you have X dollars to spend. That's an expense account.

[@davidtorbenson4686]

@@zionssuburb Completely agree - in my ward we focus on ensuring the vast majority of our budget is "invested" each year in uplifting spiritual and social experiences - at a ward level, we are not trying to earn a profit 🙂 I think it can be very effective for the ward council to be aware of the entire budget, and understand there are allocations to each organization that can be collaboratively revisited as the year goes on.

[@TheRozylass]

Talking about what are the assets of the church--what about the strength and talents of the members? Is training taking place so that our "assets" grow?

[@BobLigget]

I'm 15 minutes into this and so far culture has not even been defined. It's not a concept to be assumed. My academic background, undergrad and grad, was cultural anthropology and we have a little to say about this! Organizational and corporate culture as an area of research borrows from anthropology and the best books in this area define the term first, i.e., what is culture, and then address the parallels between societies and organizations. Whether teaching, training, or consulting, I discovered people had a general and too often vague notion of what culture is, so defining terms and gaining clear understanding had to come first.

[@lanajohnson2424]

So sad the church doesn't care about single adults