Humans have been choice-makers since the days when hunter-gatherers had to decide when to hunt and what to gather. Making choices is what humans do. But individuals feel more personal autonomy and power to choose today than ever before in human history. In Choosing Change, author Peter Coutts acknowledges that clergy today recognize the impact our individualistic culture of choice is having on congregations. But Coutts also points out that many leaders do not think about motivation. For them, encouraging change is about selling their congregation on a new idea, governed by the assumption that a better idea should win the day. Wide experience in the church demonstrates that this approach often doesn't work and leaves many congregational leaders demoralized. Leaders see the need for change in their congregation, and they earnestly want to help their congregation to change. But the approach to leadership they learned, which perhaps worked better in days gone by, is no longer working. Leaders are in the motivation business, argues Coutts. Choosing Change provides an overview of current thinking from the field of motivation psychology. In the first half of the book, Coutts explores theories, ideas, and terms that are most pertinent for leaders who desire to encourage congregational change. The second half of the book offers detailed guidance for congregational leaders who want to be motivational leaders.
The author analyses and describes the manner in which the Newgarden Meeting evolved from circa 1650 to 1730, exploring a wide range of topics including the growth in membership, Meeting discipline, governance, socio-economic status, tithe assessment, record keeping, religious life, education and migration. A number of new approaches to the analysis of Quaker records are used to assess participation of members in Meeting governance and readers are introduced to a "Reconstitution Model" that incorporates and integrates all manner of Quaker records enabling researchers to estimate Meeting membership at any point in time as well as to explore many other aspects of Quaker life with reasonable confidence. The author demonstrates that the Meeting was essentially governed by the wealthiest Members and he offers a number of select biographies of the wealthy and Members of lesser socio-economic status for comparison.
Irish Quaker biographers have focused on ministers, the influential and wealthy; many biographies are also unstructured and selective, leaving gaps in the narrative. The current work uses the life and family of John Boles (1661-1731), a Quaker stalwart for 50 years, as a case study for the biographer, introducing the major sources and showing how they can be deployed to 'resurrect' the contributions of the anonymous Quaker majority. As the biography is developed, information is explored and analyzed to construct reliable genealogical charts; information is culled from Friends' records to document the contributions and failures of family members in the context of their Quaker meetings; land records are consulted to measure and assess their gradual accumulation of wealth and the historical context is discussed as a backdrop to their evolving socio-economic status - all topics essential for comprehensive Quaker biographies and family histories.
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