Are Churches Dying from the Loss of a Younger Generation?

Two interesting articles appeared and offered conflicting prescriptions to stave off the death of Christianity in America. One appeared in National Review, written by a “conservative attorney,” David French. The other appeared in a CNN blog written by a liberal feminist who found true religion in the Episcopal Church USA, Rachel Held Evans. They are both listed below.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/417931/if-you-want-destroy-your-church-follow-liberals-advice-david-french

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/07/27/why-millennials-are-leaving-the-church/

Both articles deal with the decline or exodus of millennials from Christian Churches. Each has their own diagnosis. I will seek to summarize both below. 

Rachel Evans addresses why Millennials are leaving the church, describing herself as a millennial (i.e. someone born between 1980 and 2000):

1. We want an end to the culture wars.
2. We want a truce between science and faith.
3. We want to be known for what we stand for, not what we are against.
4. We want to ask questions that don’t have predetermined answers.
5. We want churches that emphasize an allegiance to the kingdom of God over an allegiance to a single political party or a single nation.

·         We want our LGBT friends to feel truly welcome in our faith communities. We want to be challenged to live lives of holiness, not only when it comes to sex, but also when it comes to living simply, caring for the poor and oppressed, pursuing reconciliation, engaging in creation care and becoming peacemakers.

Rachel Held Evans goes onto comment that “My search has led me to the Episcopal Church, where every week I find myself, at age 33, kneeling next to a gray-haired lady to my left and a gay couple to my right as I confess my sins and recite the Lord’s prayer.” Evan’s goes onto to comment:

It’s about the “inclusiveness,” you see: This is the inclusivity so many millennials long for in their churches, and it’s the inclusivity that eventually drew me to the Episcopal Church, whose big red doors are open to all — conservatives, liberals, rich, poor, gay, straight and even perpetual doubters like me.

French succinctly summarizes what Evan’s is suggesting isn’t so much a theological perspective but a “progressive writer’s wish list,” with the trappings of high-church traditions married to “no-church” theology. French is right.

As French notes, and objective research indicates (some provided by the denominations in question), nothing could be further from the truth. Millennials aren’t flocking to the Episcopal Church, USA, the United Church of Christ, the Presbyterian Church USA (not to be confused with either the PCA or OPC), or the United Methodist Church (my old alma mater). These groups are dying a slow and painful death and most of these groups, based on current rates of decline will not see the end of the 21^st Century:

1. Episcopal Church, yet between 2002 and 2012 it lost 18.4 percent of its members, and its church attendance declined 24.4 percent.
2. The United Church of Christ (UCC), lost 20.4 percent of its members in the seven years after it voted to recognize same-sex marriage.
3.  The Presbyterian Church (USA), which further liberalized its stance on sexuality in 2006 and redefined marriage in 2014. Between 2006 and 2013, the church lost 22.4 percent of its members and is now on pace to disappear entirely by 2037.
4.  The United Methodist Church in 2014, with its 49 reporting U.S. annual conferences, reported over 83,000 fewer members combined, with more than 68,000 fewer members attending weekly services. These losses are consistent with the results of the previous year’s annual conference reports, as reported by United Methodist News Service. UMNS’s analysis found a loss of 87,319 members and 50,895 fewer people in worship in 2012, based on 57 of the 59 annual conference reports. While membership losses continue at roughly the same pace, the decline in worship attendance has jumped by more than one-third.

All these groups have one thing in common, they began following Rachel Held Evans’ advice before she gave it. While much is being made about the decline of Christianity in the US, this decline is good because it pertains to non-bible believing groups who embraced the culture’s secular agendas and ideas about sexuality rather than staying with the Bible.  Jesus spoke about this type of phenomena in Matthew 7:19: “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” 

Let the pruning continue. It is good that unhealthy groups who have abandoned the faith die off. 

However, in a parallel theological universe there is growth. Assemblies of God Churches, for example, have experienced explosive growth. The Southern Baptist Convention, while stagnant at the moment, has grown exponentially to the point that its membership is greater than all the Mainline Denominations combined. Biblically committed groups remain healthy, others... not so much. We could go on but a picture is worth a thousand words. We recently found this series of drawings online, they come from the website: http://adam4d.com/death-of-christianity/. They tell the story best: 

Those (Millennials or others) who are abandoning the Church aren’t abandoning it because it is not hip, relevant, or young enough. They are leaving dead groups for biblical ones or they are leaving because of what 1 John 2:19 states: “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.” This is not to suggest that the state of all biblically committed churches is a healthy one. However, generally speaking the biblical churches are healthy churches and relative to the mainline churches they continue to thrive. It’s not about age groups it’s about truth. It's not about size, it's about content---the Bible.