The Great Decline in Church Attendance: Studying the Trends
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- Опубликовано: 28 июн 2024
- Is the church in Canada disappearing? Data collected by StatsCan over the past thirty years shows a steady decline in church attendance among Canadians. And the years over COVID accelerated that trend even further. But what is driving this trend? Who are the people foregoing church? And what does this indicate for the future of Christianity in Canada?
In this episode, Scott and Shawn begin looking at this dechurching phenomenon that is transforming the religious landscape of the west. They look at who are dechurching, and what reasons are being given by those who used to regularly attend and participate in church life, but no longer do.
This is the first episode in our series on “Dechurching”. Our goal is to help you understand what is happening in the church, how Christians should respond, and what we should expect to see happen for this trend to be reversed.
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📖 Resources mentioned in this episode:
“The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Religiosity of Canadians”, Stats Canada: www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/4...
The Great DeChurching, by Jim Davis, Michael Graham, With Ryan P. Burge: www.christianbook.com/great-d...
“Most Teenagers Drop Out of Church When They Become Young Adults”, LifeWay Research: research.lifeway.com/2019/01/...
“10 Reasons Church Attendance Is Declining (Even for Committed Christians”, by Carey Nieuwhof: careynieuwhof.com/10-reasons-...
“New American Bible Society Study: Gen Z Exhibits Significant Openness to Scripture”, American Bible Society: news.americanbible.org/blog/e...
“Study: Gen Z Wants to Know More About Jesus”, Christianity Today: www.christianitytoday.com/new...
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Timestamps:
00:00 Teaser and intro
00:22 We’re in our new studio!!
01:41 Why we need to talk about dechurching
03:53 Is church attendance declining?
06:53 Who is leaving the church?
10:24 Reasons why are people leaving the church
29:17 Some of the overall themes from the trends
33:01 Does this signal end of the church in Canada and the U.S.?
Becuase people are starting to find out that “the church” isn’t teaching what the Bible actually says. They’re stuck in man made traditions.
And they are too worried about offending people. They have resorted to progressive Christianity. I think Paul was blunt and direct, and his message is something Christians today need to hear.
I left the church because I just don't believe in it anymore.
Was your faith in the church, or in Jesus Christ?
the news about the amount of abuse that goes on at the so called church pastors etc hasn't helped at all
Some people no longer go to church because their church is literally gone. Seized by the courts and the property sold to compensate victims. It's bad enough to have incidents happen, it's a whole extra level when incidents are covered up and continue even after promises to reform were made
At 62 years old, I just left a high demand church after the Lord began dealing with me about "common unity" (community). I am now going a more local church.
Hey guys. Great show lots of good stuff. I liked the thought on parents feeling like they are failing if they aren't giving their kids every "opportunity" to be the person that they could be. Would be good to do a show that covers that and how "postmodern individual expressivism" has steered well meaning christian parents away from biblical parenting.
This has missed a few key points. American religious communities have traditionally been divided upon socioeconomic lines. Economic pressure on the middle class will make large numbers of people feel uncomfortable going to church. Also, declining birth rates shrink congregations, which makes church attendance less attractive. This is just demographics. Couple this with new social norms in education and beyond that is antithetical to what every previous generation would have thought of as Christian, and it becomes surprising no that so many people have left but that so many people are still there. This, however, I believe, is a by-product of successful marketing that has made the church experience almost unrecognizable. In the town I grew up in, there are two churches that I attended as a child. One has become the quintessence of Wokism, and the other is an evangelical rock concert. It goes without saying that when I was a child, neither were like this. Both have waxed and wained over the years, but they both are welcoming and seeker centric in their own way. However, I don't feel very welcome. If you want Christians, breed them and be a real community to them, promulgating Christian traditions and a Christian way of life. But how does the local church be a community when the national drive is to move people around constantly. (I will not give you the satisfaction of knowing what my religious preferences currently are.)
Not to miss the big point of this chat... but the studio looks 🔥🔥🔥
I think a large part of declining attendance is because believers are not being fed from the word by good expository teaching. Far too many churches are worshiping music rather than God. I finally got to the point that when I walked into a church for the first time, I turn around and leave if there is permanent setup of band equipment like a drum kit, guitar stands, keyboards and large speakers. I'm not always right, but more often than not, the so called church is nothing more than a social club with music at its center that only calls itself "Christian" to feel good about themselves.
It's the influence of Hill Song on other evangelical churches. The music is supposed to draw them in. But there is little substance in terms of doctrine and teaching. Worse, many of these modern churches have become woke and resort to progressive Christianity. For example, don't like Paul's teachings? Just throw them out and keep what makes you feel good.
I attend a Baptist church here in Brazil. The situation here is no different from the USA. Spiritual coldness has taken over the churches. The Sunday school with few members. This is very sad...😥😥
The church is having a hard time with
A. Scientific concordism and being confused about ancient near east cosmology in the Bible.
B. Confused about equality of women where women are not accepted as pastors.
C. Confusion over how to treat LGBTQ.
If the church could handle these 3 topics, they'd begin growing again.
The true Church of Jesus Christ will be triumphant.
Did you dig behind the "life circumstances" answer? Someone who wants to attend church will make it happen in some way, shape, fashion, or form. They will attend at a different time, maybe they can only hit Wednesday night or Sunday night. Or they find a church with a Saturday. Or whatever it is. Moving away to college - most colleges have chapels or nearby church relationships. And disconnection - that makes no sense when they can now attend a chapel on campus with peers. That study collected answers about a very sensitive question that people may not want to own an answer to. Lifeway made zero attempt to ask that in multiple ways or in a more subject-sensitive manner the way ACTUAL qualitative researchers do.
And here's a news flash: People ARE NOT leaving primarily due to Christians or the church. They leave because of LITERACY. They can read a bible anytime they want on their phone, or wherever. And when they do, they learn about the actual god in there: the violence, the land theft, the misogyny, the chattel slavery, the ritual male genital mutilation loyalty oath. They can hear about the bigotry toward this group or that. They're not stupid, in other words. Literacy has ALWAYS been a prime enemy for the church. They burned bibles, bible readers, and destroyed printing presses when moveable type became a thing in 1452. They KNEW the grift was at risk.
A lot of reasons why I don't go:
1. I taught Attic/Ionic and Koine Greek to classics students in Europe for 25 years. Pastors use English translations but they are all bad, just bad. All English translations promote Jerome's neo-Platonism. Jerome knew more about Plato than he did about Christ. And there is no, absolutely no, eternal human soul. Jerome just loved Plato's unbiblical nonsense.
2. Pastors preach James and they really should leave James alone. James refers to faith in the Jewish Shema and not faith in Christ for salvation. He wrote to Jews awaiting Messiah. Jews believed that faith in the Shema saved them and they recited it twice daily. James reminds them that the Shema is the introduction to the entire Law of Moses, and they are saved by doing good works via the Law. ("Was not Abraham justified by works?")
3. The early church met as a family, where everyone, including women, prayed, sang, prophesied, and mutually edified one another. The passive audience listening to one member of the Body of Christ is unbiblical and denies the priesthood of all believers. ''
God will NOT bless any institutional church where the pastor dominates the gathering.
4. There's no fellowship. See #3.
5. The moment that a church becomes obsessed with "authority and power," rest assured that the Spirit of God has left the building.
Thank you for leaving a comment, and for the time and thought you put into it. I'm certainly resonate with some of the things you lament are often missing from many church experiences, such as true biblical fellowship and passive participation. However, surely you can't suggest this is always the case, can you?
I confess I'm always a little leary when the term "new-Platonism" is thrown down as an objection because I'm never really sure what the objector means by it. In what way did Jerome's knowledge of Plato influence his Bible translation? And how does this then affect modern translations whose translation committees depend upon Greek and Hebrew manuscripts for their translation? And how did you come to the conclusion from it all that there is no eternal, human soul? Are you differentiating soul and spirit somehow? What then is Jesus referring to as "eternal life"?
Respectfully, I honestly think you mis-represent James grossly. He clearly states that he himself is a "servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ" (1:1), writing to "brothers and sisters, who are believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ" (2:1). James never argues that we are saved by works. He argues that Abraham was justified by his works, because his works were a demonstration of his faith. He clearly states in 2:23 - "Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness".
His overall point being "faith without works is dead". Where Paul often faced the legalism of the Jews who believed we are saved by works of the law, James was tackling the opposite problem of "easy believe-ism" (antinomianism) and needed to re-establish in the minds of his readers the necessary connection between faith and deeds. Here's a useful summary from Micheal Kruger www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/book-james-christian/
Our overall discussion in this series focuses on the fact that, while definitely flawed, the church is still the bride of Christ and his great love. How then can we call ourselves Christians and have no place for it in our own lives?
I'd encourage you to listen to our conversation through this series. Thanks for your interest!
I would be interested in how the Ethiopian and Orthodox translations compare to the KJV, NKJV, NIV, and NLT versions of the Bible.
Re. #3. I attend the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We use a bishop as congregation leader, but they are not a traditional pastor. Sermons or talks are given by lay members each week. Members get callings, or positions to keep them active in the church (like primary or youth class teacher). There is also a sense of community or secondary family. If a member is in trouble they can turn to the church for help. Our numbers are up post COVID compared to other churches in Canada. My congregation (ward) has seen a 120% increase in attendance in the last 12 months.
The congregations are expanding in bible knowledge beyond the preachers who are still locked into a past, dogmatic, historic understanding of scripture. This is the Church in the age of information. Maybe this is the beginning of the end for the clergy class?
This is an interesting perspective. But this is as much the age of mis-information as it is information. How will this "clergy-less" (i.e. leaderless) church learn to discern truth from error? If we dismiss our historic understanding of Scripture, what are we replacing it with and how do we know this new way of understanding is a true understanding?
Our young people are not fearful as most church-goers are.
When you are scared, sitting in a pew watching a priest or minister do everything can be comforting.
Young people know that there is a God, but being our Father, He loves us as a "father" and we do not "earn" this love.
Spending every Sunday in church is a Middle Ages Catholic attitude when everything was about sin and avoiding sin.
Jesus was all about love, charity, and acceptance!
I give Christianity ten years!
I’m SGI Buddhist that makes sense. God type religions just don’t
They would still be selling slaves in Rome if it were not for the Holy Spirit. “The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world” John (1:9)
In the Nordics, we’re very fortunate to be largely atheist nations where religion doesn’t affect our daily lives. Our young daughters are protected by law from being indoctrinated with the ignorant, primitive nonsense of the bible. Only some 3% of our population, usually the elderly, attends any kind of religious gathering as frequently as once monthly. In contrast to the dysfunctional U.S., we have low crime rates, little violence, bigotry is both uncommon and unwelcome, few people feel or encounter hate. In Norway, our police have no need to routinely carry guns.
And wasn't one of the worst cases of mass murder committed in Norway a few years back?
@@user-og2wt3le4j Mass murder in Norway is extremely rare but we did indeed have 77 civilians murdered by a right wing extremist about 10 years ago. The perpetrator was sentenced to 21 years in prison, the longest sentence available under Norwegian law. We tightened our gun laws and improved our mental health services to try to ensure there was no repeat. The fact that we had a mass shooting was horrific but it hardly starts to hold a candle to the largest mass murder in the US, with around 3,000 victims. The US takes no effective actions after mass shootings and, as a result, had some 647 mass shootings in 2022 alone, virtually 2 mass shootings daily. Our annual homicide toll is some 20 per year, about the number of civilians shot dead by dirty US cops weekly. Our police still have no need to routinely carry firearms. I’m unsure what point, if any, you’re trying to make. Our 11 year old daughters cycle or ski unaccompanied to school on a daily basis. We have never had a school shooting, unlike in the US where they are commonplace. Each day, 12 children die from gun violence in the US ~ 84 each week, more than died in the mass shooting in question and, still the US takes no effective action.
I attend a Baptist church here in Brazil. The situation here is no different from the USA. Spiritual coldness has taken over the churches. The Sunday school with few members. This is very sad...😥😥
@@Mau66634 I find the decline in church membership to be a source of great hope for humanity, especially when children are staying away. Fewer young lives being destroyed by superstitious nonsense.
Religion dying is not a problem, it's a solution.
More and more people are discovering they can and are living moral and spiritual lives without Religion and the god beliefs.
As a pastor's kid who grew up in the church and is now a non-believer, I can assure you that the biggest reason why church attendance is declining, is because religious belief is declining. I realized when I was ten years old that the bible is just a book. It's not the word of God, and most of the kids around me agreed. We all thought that we were being fed a bunch of BS. By the time I was thirteen, I realized that about 30% of our congregation didn't want to be there. Like myself, they were only attending because of coercion, family pressure, etc. To me the question shouldn't be, "Why are so many people leaving the Church?" The question should be, "Why are there so many people still there?"
I attend a Baptist church here in Brazil. The situation here is no different from the USA. Spiritual coldness has taken over the churches. The Sunday school with few members. This is very sad...😥😥
@uug6677 I know that it is sad for many people, but you can't expect people to keep on believing something that is false. Eventually, that belief will die off.
Thank you for leaving a comment.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience with church, and your conclusion that Christianity is false. A great deal of our discussion in this "Declining Church" series highlighted the definite impact that negative church experience had and has on people's faith. I'm sorry if that was your experience. It certainly hasn't been mine, being part of a loving church family where people genuinely show me and my family the love of Jesus all the time. Also, where we regularly hear stories from people, such as our recent baptism service, who testify to the way that Jesus has literally transformed their lives, freeing them from the brokenness and shame of sin. You've likely heard all this before, and think it's nonsense, but this is my experience with church which I wish for others.
I'm curious to know how you came to the conclusion that the Bible was just a book, and nothing more. Was that the result of study, or just being fed up?
I'd also just challenge your final statement that belief (I assume you mean Christian) will just die off. Sadly, the decline is an undeniable feature of western culture. But globally, the growth of Christianity is outpacing population growth, at least according to 2024 Status of Global Christianity Report. www.gordonconwell.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2024/01/Status-of-Global-Christianity-2024.pdf. See also research.lifeway.com/2024/01/22/8-encouraging-trends-in-global-christianity-for-2024/
Thanks for leaving a comment.
@@PreparedtoAnswer Thank you for responding to my comment.
I can't really say that I had any seriously negative church experiences that led up to my conclusion that the Bible was just a book, besides it being excruciatingly boring, and screwing up my weekend plans. I did have some family members who were victims of sexual abuse by a pastor who was given a severe slap on the wrist, and banished to a new parish in Calgary, where he promptly re-offended. I was pretty choked about that, but by that time, I was already done with Christianity.
The one really negative experience I had was shortly after I saw the light, so to speak. I was in church and instead of just drifting off to my happy place and riding it out, like I usually did, I decided to listen to the sermon. It was a different pastor preaching that day, not my dad, and it was during that sermon that it just hit me like a ton of bricks. The pastor was going on and on about how the Bible is true, and God is our creator, and that Jesus is real, and that he really does love me. No seriously, it is true, and he wants to spend eternity with me, so I had better believe in him and love him back....or else! (I am paraphrasing a little bit there, but that was the gist of the message). I instantly knew that it was all crap. When you are talking to someone, you don't have to keep reminding them over and over again that you are not lying, and then threaten them if they don't believe you. Only a liar does that. Remember the Fox News logo, "Fair and Balanced"? A news station shouldn't have to remind it's audience every commercial break that they are fair and Balanced. If you are not fair and balanced, then you are not a news station. Fox News finally figured that out and dropped that logo, but I digress. It was a few days after hearing that sermon, that I foolishly asked my dad, "How do we know that the Bible is true?" He got this psychotic look on his face, grabbed me by the short hairs and said, "Don't you ever, EVER, question the word of God. Do you hear me?" That was the last time I had ever discussed religion with my dad. We somehow managed to go the next 45 years without ever bringing up the subject again.
As far as the Bible goes, I am perfectly justified in assuming that the Bible is entirely man-made, until proven otherwise. According to UNESCO, there have been 158 464 880 unique books published as of 2023. Of course that is just an estimate, but let's assume that number is correct just for arguments sake. I believe that all of those books were authored entirely by human beings with absolutely no divine, or supernatural input, influence, or inspiration whatsoever. Christians believe that 158 464 879 of those books were authored entirely by human beings, and one was not. What makes you think that number is 158 464 879, and not 158 464 880?
If you want to take a closer look at the Bible, it completely collapses under the sheer weight of it's own hypocrisy, contradictions, scientific and historical inaccuracies, misogyny, brutality, injustice, and absolute madness. It looks, reads, sounds, smells, and tastes like fiction. It has our grubby little human finger prints all over it. Like Penn Jillette said, "If you want to become an atheist, nothing will get you there faster than reading the Bible."
@@PreparedtoAnswer To address your comment about the growth of the church globally, I agree that in the developing countries, Christianity will continue to grow for the time being, but once those countries start catching up to the west as far as education and development, I'm sure that religiosity will start to decline. It appears that education levels and religiosity are inversely proportional.
Sing the word of God and saturate your hearts with God's living word.
I left because I just couldn't stand the nonsense in the Bible any longer.