It is a cardinal sin of the Church and its organizations to avoid the “masses”.  On site after site,  Church site,  denomination site,  Publisher site,  almost to a tee there is a widespread avoidance of the actual conversations taking place.  Even amidst supposed “dialogue” about “what are we going to do as a Church in order to be relevant?”,  there is a hesitancy,  no ,  a REFUSAL to host the conversations in a way that encourages people to see what is being discussed.  Emails are requested.  “Tell us what you think”,  and a Web form is presented ,  expecting people to fill it out without knowing the flavor of the others who are contributing.  These are one to one conversations,  instead of many to many,  and these miss the mark.  I am RARELY , if ever,  prone to “contribute” without having an idea of what the “conversation” is.  These appeals for amounts to a “blind” contribution throws up a barrier at the outset.  I get the feeling that there is a group of “editors” and “survey evluators” receiving the responses and “ranking” it or “categorizing it” into a mass amalgam of  “response types”.  This is the way heirarchy thinks.  If we can analyze the “real needs” that we supposedly cull from a set of “response types”,  then we can “decide for the Church” what the people REALLY want.  Our surveys give us “Information” on which we can base OUR decisions on what’s best for the Church.