A number of my friends shared a blog post last week, which I couldn't help but read. According to this guy, the following are the reasons why people are leaving the church:
1) Your Sunday productions have worn thin.
2) You speak in a foreign tongue.
3) Your vision can’t see past your building.
4) You choose lousy battles.
5) Your love doesn’t look like love.
He lays things pretty squarely at the feet of the people in the church. I can really only respond to this one way.
Bullshit.
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| Even Picard finds this unreasonable. |
I don't mean to be overly harsh. But, maybe John should try talking to someone who has actually left the church. It sound to me like Christians stay in the church in spite of all of those things listed by him. You may still be in the church and find these things to be problems, and you may hear this kind of thing from people who are between churches, but I doubt someone that has truly left the church cares about most of this.
Conveniently for you, I am someone who has left the church. Therefore, I do know a little about this. If you are still in the church and want to really know why your numbers are getting smaller, I'm here for you. You may have accepted John's explanation since you have trouble understanding it yourself, but if you think about his reasons they make little sense. They are somewhere between the same stuff I have been hearing in the church since I was in the youth group myself, which itself amounts to mostly naive guesswork.
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| Come on, RED!!! |
Just to be clear on all of John's points:
"1) Your Sunday productions have worn thin." Honestly, I really liked Sunday mornings, and I miss them. I had an opportunity to see my church family every week, hear live music (I actually performed in the band, which was one of the highlights of my week), and talk over coffee. There are a million different ways to "do church", and each and every one of them has it's merits. John complains that it somehow doesn't reach into the rest of the week - I honestly don't know what he is expecting.
"2) You speak in a foreign tongue." This can be a barrier to getting unchurched people to join the church, but I don't see how it would drive anyone away. I spent 20 years involved in the church, and I found some discussions easier with church people precisely because they knew my code. If I have a hard-earned legacy of vocabulary from the church, why would I want to throw that out?
"3) Your vision can’t see past your building." Some churches are involved in their communities, and some aren't. But every church member can decide individually what they do outside the church doors, and they do. I can see why someone would leave a church because of this, but not the church.
"4) You choose lousy battles." This is the closest John comes to making a valid point. He is essentially pointing out that the church has chosen the wrong side in the homosexuality debate. But not all churches have made this mistake, and it appears to be more of a geographical phenomenon. There are other factors in play here. Regardless, this issue has been a huge embarrassment to liberal Christians, and I can certainly understand a churchgoer leaving their congregation if their minister or members have chosen to stand on the wrong side of history. But there have always been liberal churches to go to, so I don't see how this would make someone leave entirely.
"5) Your love doesn’t look like love." This is utter crap. People will always assemble with others who share their values - rich white people will go to churches with other rich white people, hippies will hang out with other hippies, etc. This is basic sociology. I don't think anyone ever looked around their church and said "Whoa, these people are too much like me, I'm outta here". If they find they have too little in common with the others, they will just find a place where they do fit, or often even start their own. But regardless of social situations, I never felt like the people in the church loved me any less than people anywhere else.
The bottom line is, there is no sociological reason why the church is faltering. There are a lot of smart pastors out there, and they do whatever they can see to get people in the doors. John is telling the church "You are the problem."
No, John it's not you - it's me.
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| You're damn right it's me! |
Look; I don't speak for everyone that has left the church. But I have to think that people who have left the church for the reasons described above are probably coming back if they find a church doing those things right. And it's not like those places don't exist. In the mean time, maybe they're going to spend some time saying that they are "spiritual, but not religious" or "it's not religion, it's a relationship", or "I'm doing church on my own, just me and Jesus". Then they will show up at some church across town 6 months from now. When I hear someone say "leaving the church", I assume they mean for good. I say this because I left over 3 years ago. And it's not because the church was using the wrong techniques, it's because I changed.
But it's not just me. Our society is becoming less religious as a whole. You don't have to be a stats guru to see which way the line on the graph is going.
So if none the things above are the reasons why people have left the church, then what are the real reasons? There's a part of me that doesn't want to say, because doing so will affect my relationships with people. I have a lot of friends who I know from all my years in the church, and many of them probably figure I'm just taking a time-out. If I tell the truth, they will know once and for all. Furthermore, church people are really, really sensitive about criticism of their faith. They are usually dismissive of doubts and doubters. Once again, I am trying not to be offensive - please remember that I am speaking as one who was there myself. I know the thought process, because this is how I used to think.
If you are an open-minded church-goer, I invite you to read the second part of this, which I will post soon as a separate entry. If you don't wish to go there, I won't hold it against you, but please don't hold my honesty against me.
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