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In spite of Jesus' prayer that we would all be one, this has never really been a reality for the church. From the groups that split off to follow Paul while others followed Peter we moved to the split between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches. The Reformation was more of a complete fragmentation than a split, and even today denominations are splitting along conservative and liberal lines.

It goes against our very idea of what ministers should be, but the fact is that a great many of them are extremely territorial. In many ways church leaders are competing for congregants in the same way that Fortune 500 CEOs compete for customers and market share. To be fair to a great number of clergy who week only to minister to those around them, this certainly does not apply to all clergy, and there are a great number of "ministers" who were not called by God at all.

As more and more churches, and the clergy that lead them, compete for the same resources (members, land for buildings, even radio and television airtime) the church is looking more like a series of fiefdoms than the One Body Jesus prayed for. One of the biggest reasons is the growth of the so-called mega church. As with everything else in our culture, we equate the value and success of our churches with size. We think that growth is a sign of God's favor and blessing, and that conversely a lack of rapid growth signifies a lack of God's blessing.

This helps fuel the growth of these "Super Churches," as well as competition between clergy. While ministers in small churches struggle to keep their congregations intact amid the call for more programs and better facilities, the virtual CEOs of the mega churches see the entire city as their territory. Far too often they are not reaching people who have never heard the Gospel but are rather "stealing sheep" from other churches, often within their own denominations.

The competition and territorialism are also exacerbated by the need to bring in huge amounts of money to finance these mega churches and multitude of programs. Huge churches need large numbers of people contributing to keep things running the same way big cities need a large tax base to continue operating. The church is as driven by economics as any other large business enterprise.

The most disturbing result of this territorialism is that churches very rarely work together for the common good. While the vast majority still belongs to a denominational body of some sort, true cooperative work for either the spread of the Gospel or the meeting of people's physical needs is no longer a priority. What we are left with is a mere shadow of the Body of Christ we are called to be.

Learn more about this author, Bruno Somerset.
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