Seen in the comments section of “Father Jake Stops The World:”

It is a truism that 20% of the membership does 80% of the work of a parish. If this is so, even roughly speaking, then it stands to reason that the key statistic is not how many show up on Sunday, but how many are active. “The ministers of the church,” the Catechism says, “are laypeople, bishops, priests and deacons” (ECUSA BCP [1979], p. 855). This simple statement makes it clear that the work of the church belongs to the laity. The clergy are there to help the laity do that work.

What this means is that the primary function of a parish is to be a community of ministering people. It starts with offering worship on Sunday, “the work of the people,” which is what “liturgy” means. The ability to offer regular Sunday worship is the sine qua non of every church. This is so fundamental that we often overlook it. New missions, and the tiny churches that dot the nation, however, understand it well.

But the work of the people is much more than that. Each one of us has a speaking part in God’s drama of salvation. The meaning of a Christian’s life is to discover that role, accept it, and learn to employ the specific gifts of the Holy Spirit in accomplishing that work. This means of course being part of the ministry of the local congregation.

Each congregation is therefore a seedbed?a “seminary”?for the individual ministries of each member. Those congregations that claim this as their primary role will succeed in helping birth the vocations of their members. The consequences of this will be enormous. First of all, the negativity of being a static or declining church will disappear, as well as the “category envy” (“we wanna be a corporate parish!”) that all too often infest the thinking of parochial leadership. The higher the percentage of members who have claimed their ministry, the more joy a congregation will experience being who they are, rather than wishing they were another bigger, richer parish (Eph. 4:16). – Anglicans Online Essays | The True Measure of a Successful Parish, by Pierre W. Whalon

This enlarges on themes and topics that are being kicked around in our diocese, and adds new food for thought as well.