We Don’t Have to Beg, But We Could Ask…

It’s no secret to anyone in a mainline protestant church that we are experiencing significant decline. In fact, last week I came across some charts that were startling to me, even as I am aware that we are shrinking. The denomination in which I am ordained, the United Church of Christ, is less than half of the size that it was in the late 1980s. Another chart showed that the denomination of the church that I am currently serving, the Presbyterian Church USA has experienced a 63% decline over the past 38 years!

While these figures are startling, they aren’t completely a surprise to those of us who have seen larger and larger spaces between attendees on Sundays and tighter budgets year over year. I’ve read so many commentaries over the last decade that seek to answer the question of “Where did they all go?” and there are so many valid points that likely factor in - shifts in generational attitudes, behaviors and preferences, the Covid-19 pandemic, the unhealthy mixing of religion and nationalism and politics, etc. The truth is there is a constellation of reasons that so many of our churches have experienced significant decline in recent decades, but in all the reports and articles I’ve read and in all the conversations I’ve had, I’ve never once observed that it’s because faith and spirituality have become useless to those who have opted out of life in the local church.

I’ve found in conversations with younger folks (I am in my 40s), that there is an interesting “jar-label” distinction at play when it comes to religion. When considering churches, younger generations are less interested in the label on the outside and more interested in what is actually in the jar. In other words, denominations and their particularities are less important than the substance that defines a local church community. The younger folks who have moved away from religious institutions are more interested in some pretty basic things, rather than creeds, doctrines and particular dogma. They have simpler questions than we often assume - Who are they people that make up this church? What do they believe and how do they feel about others who believe differently? What are the requirements be a fully-included member of this community?

And so I ask my fellow mainline friends, do we have good answers to these seemingly simply questions? Do we ask them of ourselves enough and reflect on whether the answers align with the church we intend to build? Do our members have a concise “elevator pitch” that shares who our community is, what they believe to be essential and what they do in the world?

While the desperation of our declining numbers certainly suggests we should be begging folks to return to our churches, what would it be like to simply ask them to come and experience a few hours with us? How often are we inviting folks to our churches and offering a chance to show how perhaps the substance inside the jars is not whatever is assumed by looking at the labels? Or, how often are we bringing the substance of our particular churches outside of the building and into the world to meet folks wherever they gather so that they can experience who we are and what we do on their own turf?

So let’s practice our hospitality not just by welcoming those who actually cross the threshold of our buildings, but through extending an invitation for folks we encounter every day who are “spiritually-curious.” We know our communities have so much to offer, otherwise we wouldn’t be there ourselves! Invitations don’t have to mean evangelizing or a full-court press, but they can be the little nudge that someone needs to try something new. There are real benefits to living our lifelong faith journeys in community versus going solo, and in our present screen-dominant, social distancing-competent society, we may have to remind folks of this value. But it all starts with an ask…