Thursday, August 17, 2006
Why Some Churches "Grow"...
...and others do not.
In his extremely kind acknowledgement of my post last week, Glenn Lucke is trying to continue the conversation, more with liberals and moderates than me, all I can do is extend the invitation, and please liberal and moderate readers, consider it extended. But in the comments on his originating post, Glenn asks some questions I would like to address.
Firstly, in the PC(USA), I have seen the application of "social science principles" stabilize the decline of moderate and liberal churches, but never produce the kind of explosive growth seen in mega-churches, or even the growth seen in LDS.
Which leads me to conclude that what produces the phenomena is, as is typical in these situations, a synergy of factors. Let me list some of what I see.
Product confusion. The social science stuff that Glenn talks about creates a confusion about what the "product" of the church is - is it salvation, epiphany, or a family club? In reality, it is some blend of all of them, requiring total commitment to none. In fact, a consumer based mindset is a huge part of the equation - giving people what they want, not necessarily what the church has. This leads me to the second factor.
Laissez Fair. In my experience, churches that have this kind of growth take a very "take it or leave it" attitude to the people in the church. They do not attempt to draw them in, pull them deeper, rather they lay out a set of "services" and let the "consumer" choose. "No pressure" is a phrase you hear a lot of. This often expresses itself by the opportunity for anonimity in the church.
Strong on 'reality,' weak on doctrine. Conservative or liberal, most churches that see this kind of growth are really strong on dealing with the "real life" issues the parishoners face and don't spend a lot of time on issues of doctrine. This describes LDS, in my opinion, to a "T" - their doctrine seems to shift with the wind, but they are really strong on building good families, making a living, that kind of stuff.
Confuses politics and religion Glenn describes me as "Evangelical," I think largely because I am a political conservative, but theologically I part company with much of evangelicalism. As a Presbyterian, I am almost definitionally pretty moderate theologically. Yeah, I'm Calvinist, but I actually believe I'll meet Roman Catholics in Heaven.
The "life applicaton" aspects of these high numerical growth churches leads to political statements, and the political and theological often get confused with each other. People begin to think their faith is defined by how they vote as opposed to thier faith informing how they vote.
Small, not Big Tent. These high numerical growth churches tend to be pretty homogenous, not necessarily ethnically or racially, although there is a lot of that, but socio-economically and politically they appear pretty narrow to me. Every mega-church I have ever been to, which admittedly is not tons, I have been struck by how similar everyone seems to be in viewpoint and class. There may be asians and blacks and whites, but they all seem to middle- to upper-middle class and educated to a resonable extent, or they seem to be less well educated, less well-off economically, and in that case usually pretty homogenous racially and ethnically too. The point, I guess is that there is a definable "us" to the church, and that "us-ness" is defined by something other than theology or church affiliation, at least primarily. This is also especially true in LDS.
It bothers me deeply that in all these factors that contribute to numerical growth I see nothing about truth, or the Holy Spirit, or salvation, but then maybe that is the point I am trying to make.
Related Tags: church growth, PC(USA), leberal, moderate, evangelical, factors, mega church
In his extremely kind acknowledgement of my post last week, Glenn Lucke is trying to continue the conversation, more with liberals and moderates than me, all I can do is extend the invitation, and please liberal and moderate readers, consider it extended. But in the comments on his originating post, Glenn asks some questions I would like to address.
Strictness maybe one factor for church growth, but I wonder what other factors are in play. Could, for example, moderate and liberal churches employ the same social science principles that the evangelical Church Growth Movement employs and see the same results? What if moderate and liberal churches had enough parking and marketed the way the CGM churches do? What if they had clean, attractive facilities and excellent child care? I wonder how much of the CGM is about applied social science and how much is the work of God. Some might say that God is working through the applied social science, but what would evangelicals say about non-evangelical and non-Christian religious organizations that grow. For example, I don't think people would consider the LDS Church to be evangelical, and probably most would say the Mormons are not Christians in the sense of historic Christian orthodoxy. But the LDS Church grows all the time.I do not have the theoretical backgoround that Glenn or his commenter do, but I have a lot of church experience and given my work on Article VI Blog I am learning quite a bit about LDS. So I think I can add some to this conversation.
Firstly, in the PC(USA), I have seen the application of "social science principles" stabilize the decline of moderate and liberal churches, but never produce the kind of explosive growth seen in mega-churches, or even the growth seen in LDS.
Which leads me to conclude that what produces the phenomena is, as is typical in these situations, a synergy of factors. Let me list some of what I see.
Product confusion. The social science stuff that Glenn talks about creates a confusion about what the "product" of the church is - is it salvation, epiphany, or a family club? In reality, it is some blend of all of them, requiring total commitment to none. In fact, a consumer based mindset is a huge part of the equation - giving people what they want, not necessarily what the church has. This leads me to the second factor.
Laissez Fair. In my experience, churches that have this kind of growth take a very "take it or leave it" attitude to the people in the church. They do not attempt to draw them in, pull them deeper, rather they lay out a set of "services" and let the "consumer" choose. "No pressure" is a phrase you hear a lot of. This often expresses itself by the opportunity for anonimity in the church.
Strong on 'reality,' weak on doctrine. Conservative or liberal, most churches that see this kind of growth are really strong on dealing with the "real life" issues the parishoners face and don't spend a lot of time on issues of doctrine. This describes LDS, in my opinion, to a "T" - their doctrine seems to shift with the wind, but they are really strong on building good families, making a living, that kind of stuff.
Confuses politics and religion Glenn describes me as "Evangelical," I think largely because I am a political conservative, but theologically I part company with much of evangelicalism. As a Presbyterian, I am almost definitionally pretty moderate theologically. Yeah, I'm Calvinist, but I actually believe I'll meet Roman Catholics in Heaven.
The "life applicaton" aspects of these high numerical growth churches leads to political statements, and the political and theological often get confused with each other. People begin to think their faith is defined by how they vote as opposed to thier faith informing how they vote.
Small, not Big Tent. These high numerical growth churches tend to be pretty homogenous, not necessarily ethnically or racially, although there is a lot of that, but socio-economically and politically they appear pretty narrow to me. Every mega-church I have ever been to, which admittedly is not tons, I have been struck by how similar everyone seems to be in viewpoint and class. There may be asians and blacks and whites, but they all seem to middle- to upper-middle class and educated to a resonable extent, or they seem to be less well educated, less well-off economically, and in that case usually pretty homogenous racially and ethnically too. The point, I guess is that there is a definable "us" to the church, and that "us-ness" is defined by something other than theology or church affiliation, at least primarily. This is also especially true in LDS.
It bothers me deeply that in all these factors that contribute to numerical growth I see nothing about truth, or the Holy Spirit, or salvation, but then maybe that is the point I am trying to make.
Related Tags: church growth, PC(USA), leberal, moderate, evangelical, factors, mega church
